Lamentable: The Second Great Awakening

“How many thousands…never saw, much less read, or ever heard a chapter of the Bible. How many ten thousands who were never baptized or heard a sermon. And the ten thousand, who never heard of the Name of Christ, save in curses…Lamentable. Lamentable is the situation of these people,” stated an Episcopal preacher from the Second Great Awakening. Before the 1780s, America was becoming a nation vacant from God and religion. Less and less people attended local churches. However, several preachers saw the direction America leaned towards and started Protestant movements, which became known as the famous Second Great Awakening. The Second Great Awakening embarked as a movement to bring religion to the recently settled Americans, was the catalyst
The churches and colleges were full of corruption, “The college was in a most ungodly state. The college church was almost extinct. Most students were skeptical and rowdies were plenty. Wine and liquors were kept in many rooms; intemperance, profanity, gambling, and licentiousness were common,” Timothy Dwight, grandson of Jonathan Edwards and President of Yale College in 1795, reported. Timothy Dwight transformed Yale by preaching to his student body and sharing Christian theology his students. This began a revival. Many of the students turned to Christ, “By 1802…one-third of the student body professed faith in Christ. This, in effect, was the beginning of a new wave of spiritual awakening that touched Andover, Princeton, Amhurst, and other colleges.” After seeng the dramatic change at Yale, other colleges followed in their footsteps, bringing religion and Christ into institutions. Cleaning up society was one action that solidified the Protestant faith as America’s primary
American, Samuel Mills, designed and organized the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM). The design of the ABCFM was to send missionaries across the country to serve and proclaim Christ to others. It began as the very first mission board in America. The American Missions Movement, which it became known as, emitted two men, Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice to India through ABCFM. Judson and Rice belonged to the Baptist Church. While in Asia, the two men became known as the first great missionaries, preaching and translating the Bible in Asia. Hundreds to thousands came to know Christ as their personal King and Savior through their work. The administration of overseas missions solidified the Protestant faith as America’s primary