George Whitefield Preaching

George Whitefield was an English Anglican cleric and evangelist preacher who started the evangelical movement and Methodism. He wears a thick, black robe with his hand raised. In 1739, George Whitefield went on a preaching tour through America, starting the First Great Awakening movement. His sermons originally were taught in a church, but he soon was not welcomed because of his position of establishing clergymen. Each sermon brought more and more listeners. His preaching was aggressive and fear installing, but people would travels miles and miles to hear him preach. His life was centered around preaching and the orphanage he had built in Savannah, GA. In just one year he traveled over five thousand miles and preached more than 350 time north to south in America. His appearance and the way he taught is what drew people to hear his sermons. Unlike other preachers he did not read from notes, he wrote and memorized his sermons and did not look off notes when he spoke. By 1742, the religious debate of the First Great Awakening had spilt the New England clergy in half. One side the “Old Lights” did not support preachers like Whitefield, and the “New Lights” who did support Whitefield.