Page 37 - Heros of the Faith - Textbook w videos short

itself. Yet, when they met unexpectedly, he could still say with generous exuberance, ‘God bless thee, James;
God bless thy undertaking. Perhaps God has given thee more light than he has given me — God bless thee’.

Although Grimshaw remained a staunch member of the Established Church all his life, one of his converts,
founder of Westgate Baptist chapel in Bradford, spoke of him in glowing terms, calling him the ‘father of
Yorkshire Dissent’, and adding, ‘he may well be considered the parent of nearly all the religion in that part of the
country’.

Pervasive influence
Grimshaw’s influence was no mere passing phenomenon, despite the comparative shortness of his life. When
his biographer James Everett visited Haworth 60 years after Grimshaw’s death, he exclaimed, ‘He seems to meet
us at every point, like a sword turning every way to guard the way of the tree of life’.

Certainly, if there had been no Grimshaw in Haworth, there would have been no evangelical Patrick Bronte to
follow him nearly 70 years later. This in turn has led to today’s ceaseless visitors to Haworth, who come to
marvel at the creative genius of the Bronte sisters giving the English language such masterpieces as Wuthering
Heights and Jane Eyre. Even Ted Hughes, England’s former poet laureate but no friend of the gospel, was
amazed at the continuing effect of Grimshaw’s ministry upon the whole area well into the twentieth century.

He had been brought up in the nearby village of Heptonstall, and after visiting his home village could exclaim:
‘To judge by the shock-waves which could still be felt well into this century [the 20th], he struck the whole
region like a planet … His heavenly fire … shattered the terrain into biblical landmarks; quarries burst open like
craters, and chapels … materialized, standing in them’.

And Grimshaw’s influence lives on. Hall Green Baptist Church stands prominently at the foot of the steep hill
leading to the parish church, where Grimshaw once thundered out his long and passionate sermons. Hall Green
still bears faithful testimony to the gospel and to the fiery preacher’s legacy. Mick Lockwood, the present pastor,
explains: ‘I think the evidence [of Grimshaw’s ministry] lies just in the number of old chapels in the north of
England … they really stemmed from this period’.

William Grimshaw was tireless in his labors. His friend, Henry Venn of Huddersfield, complained: ‘He uses his
body with less compassion than a merciful man would use his beast’.

Last enemy
But, by 1762, even Grimshaw recognized that his strength was failing. So, when an epidemic of typhus fever
swept through Haworth in 1763, he was not surprised that he succumbed to the infection. Hearing that
Grimshaw was seriously ill, Benjamin Ingham visited him. ‘My last enemy has come’, Grimshaw declared, ‘the
signs of death are on me, but I am not afraid! No, blessed be God, my hope is sure, and I am in his hands’.

Life in eighteenth-century Haworth was tenuous, with an average age of only 26. Grimshaw had constantly
taught his people to prepare for death and to meditate on the joys of the world to come. ‘Today is your living
day’, he would say, ‘tomorrow may be your dying day’. And Grimshaw himself faced this last enemy without
flinching.

Despite a burning fever and violent headaches, he confessed to Henry Venn, who was visiting him, ‘I am as
happy as I can be on earth and as sure of glory as if I were in it’. His words are indeed heroic. He asked Venn to
conduct his funeral and to preach on words of the apostle Paul that had been his own guiding beacon ever since
his conversion: ‘For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain’.

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