The Secret
All the Evangelical Churches in Melbourne were working together.
They held 1700 weekly prayer groups across Melbourne!
They appointed 45 evangelists to preach in every area of the city.
"The Vital Elements: Unity And Prayer"
From: "Evangelical Christianity in Australia" Stuart Piggin (Oxford)
The Many Revivals In Melbourne
- 1843
- 1859 Started at Brighton
- 1879
- 1902 The Great Revival – with R.A. Torrey and Charles Alexander
- 1926 Sunshine Revival
- 1959 Billy Graham Crusade was the largest, most successful evangelistic campaign in human history. 719,000 attended in Melbourne with 26,440 inquirers "More prayer has been made for the Melbourne and Sydney crusades than for any single event in the whole history of the Christian Church" Billy Graham 1958
How Did The Gospel Influence The Shape Of Australian Society?
The answer is TRANSFORMATION. Our secular historians have always said 'rubbish'. But in 1988, our bicentennial year, a number of Christian historians demanded that the Christian contribution to Australian history be examined seriously instead of dismissed as negligible.
One such historian has demonstrated that Christianity has made 'a magnificent and almost dominant' contribution to the shaping of Australian society. He argues that the 'reform of a convict colony was a social miracle, the product of the evangelical gospel' and that universal education, trade unionism, and federation were all 'at heart evangelical achievements'. Yet another speaks of the transforming power of the cross on a society 'where the convict stain was dyed deep', achieved not only through the preaching of the Gospel, but through the many institutions established by Christians such as Mechanics Institutes, savings banks, libraries, and temperance and benevolent societies. Yet a third historian, a Presbyterian from Scotland, disturbed by the absence of studies of the impact of vital Christianity on Australia's development, conducted his own enquiries and came up with an interesting list of institutions on which Christian influence was critical: schools, newspapers ('an honest press'), the fight against monopolies, and the securing of rights and representation.