Peter Cartwright and the Circuit Riders: A Sustained Revival
Cartwright’s mediating position proved unpopular as both polarized camps viewed him as part of the other camp. The Methodist church violently split in 1844 over the issue of slavery, and Cartwright lamented the loss of missional potential as he took the unpopular middle ground. The Methodist split soon expanded to the nation as the nation divided in 1862. Cartwright, after the succession of the South, ardently supported the Union. His mediating position, however, remains an interesting position in which much division and pain could have been averted. Cartwright still speaks today to the church’s involvement in polarizing political issues such as homosexual unions.
Cartwright’s mediating positions did not rise from compromise or weakness. He strongly defended the essentials, but he mediated positions not ranked as highly in his thinking as the essentials. For example, the mission of Christ to all humans ranked higher in Cartwright’s thinking than slavery. He plainly expressed his opposition to slavery, but equally expressed the need for salvation in all humans. Cartwright took a strong mediating position and refused to allow polarizing forces to intimidate him. Ensley observes the influence of Methodist preachers like Cartwright on America: “The Methodist preachers for a century and a half have helped to keep freedom alive in America simply by refusing to be intimidated.”[23] Cartwright observes his own tenacity: “In general I have made it a rule not to back down to the devil or his imps, whether he appears in male or female form. But sometimes it requires backwoods courage to stand our ground.”[24]
Cartwright, however, refused to allow the devil to distract him from the mission. He would not lose the war for human souls for a victory in a small skirmish over a particular social issue. Newman in an address to the Cartwright Jubilee in which he compares Peter Cartwright to the Apostle Peter describes Cartwright’s ability to mix muscle and the Holy Spirit:
(Western) indifference to restraint as well as licentiousness of action, which required a second Peter to grapple with them—a Peter who had an arm of flesh as well as a word of power, and who at times, believed in a dispensation of muscular Christianity as well as a dispensation of the Holy Ghost.[25]
Cartwright demonstrates strength in submission to Christ.
Cartwright fiercely defended the Methodist brand of Christianity as he saw the brand as effective in his mission. He often defended his new converts against sects that attempted to steal the new believers from Methodism. He placed Calvinists, New Lights, Campbellites, Shakers, and Mormons in the same category and rigorously defended his young believers against their perceived heresies. Many stories exist of Cartwright marching into a meeting to which his new Methodists had been enticed and powerfully reclaiming his new believers. Cartwright took no mediating position concerning doctrine. One of the most interesting pieces of Cartwright’s communication preserved today is a reply to some ultra-Calvinists who had written anonymously to Cartwright pretending to be the devil thanking Cartwright for his work. Cartwright writes a lengthy reply in which he takes apart Calvinism and accuses his accusers of cowardice and residing near the devil themselves.[26] Cartwright worked with many non-Methodists on the mission field of camp meetings, but he refused to allow doctrinal divides to polarize his followers or for those he saw as heretics to steal his new believers.
Sustained Revival Through Structure
The American frontier formed an environment uniquely suited to the method behind Methodism. The structure of episcopal government combined with the freedom of the circuit rider ensured an environment in which revival flourished without losing its center. Jaroslav J. Pelikan describes the unique fit of Methodism to the American frontier: “A church that had been forged in the heat of one man’s search for such vigor and power and in his rediscovery of the essence of evangelical Christianity was ideally suited to the demands of the frontier.”[27] Methodism, according to Ensley, emerged from three forces: the gospel of Jesus, the “activist temperament of John Wesley,” and its ability to “habituate to the American frontier.”[28] Cartwright readily embraced the structure of the Methodist Episcopal Church as a means of organizing his revival activities and retaining its converts. He frequently spoke at the Methodist Episcopal convention. His conference elected him as delegate in almost every convention. He supported the church’s structure even at its lowest moments such as the division of the church over slavery in 1844.
Category: Church History, Fall 2016
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