Excerpt from: Human Ladders. "Samuel and Susanna Wesley had 19 children in their lifetime. 11 of which died in their infancy. Samuel was an Anglican Pastor in the small town of Epworth. One night an angry church member set fire to the parsonage. Fortunately, the Wesley’s were awakened by the blaze and were able to rush their children out of the house and to safety. But once outside they realized that they had somehow miscounted. Young John Wesley, age five, was still in the house standing at an upstairs window. As the fire raged throughout the house the boy looked helplessly down at his panicked parents. It was too far for the boy to jump, but the house was now so engulfed in flames that no one could go in and hope to come out alive again. One of the Wesley’s neighbors awoken by the commotion, saw young John standing at the window. He immediately rushed over to the house directly beneath the window where the boy stood. He then placed his hands against the smoldering side of the house. Another neighbor saw what he was doing and quickly raced over to him, climbing atop his shoulders and also placing his hands against the house. Another neighbor did the same. This repeated until a human ladder had been formed and the last man – smashed the window to bring young John out of the raging inferno. When Susanna Wesley held her son she said, “Surely you are a brand plucked from the fire!” How could those men know that they held in their hands, the father of the Methodist movement? Did they comprehend that from this fiery preacher countless nations would be influenced toward salvation? Could they have understood that from his preaching and teaching another future group would emerge determined to recapture Pentecost?" preachit.org
Posted on: Wed, 09 Oct 2013 06:10:58 +0000
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