Edward Payson Hart: The Second Man of Free Methodism
Date
2007
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Spring Arbor University Press
Abstract
In the last half of the 1850s, persecution and proscription m a d e the formation of the Free Methodist Church a necessity for those dedicated to the gospel of holiness and ministry to the poor. Three years after launching the new Methodist denomination, founder and organizer Benjamin Titus Roberts found himself feeling alone, having lost his most loyal and trusted friends to premature deaths: William Kendall (1858), Loren Stiles (1863), and John Wesley Redfield (1863). However, waiting in the wings was a young Free Methodist minister, quietly building his circuit in the prairie lands of northern Illinois, who would soon be called upon to partner with Roberts and share the yoke of leadership for the next 30 years.
Born in the Green Mountains of Vermont in 1835, Edward Payson Hart was trained as a lawyer, but turned evangelist and preacher when he was converted through the ministry of John Wesley Redfield. W hen asked by B.T. Roberts if he would go to Michigan to see if a work could be established there, his immediate and faith-filled response was, “If you say so and l can gel
there. I will go to the North Pole." Other than B.T. Roberts, Free Methodism owes more to the influence of Edward Payson Hart than any other man: and yet to many,
he remains a mystery...until now.
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Keywords
EP Hart, Edward Payson Hart, Christian Higher Education, Spring Arbor University -- History., Free Methodist Church Universities and colleges -- Michigan -- Spring Arbor., BT Roberts, Free Methodism, Holiness Movement
Citation
Kulaga, Jon S. Edward Payson Hart: The Second Man of Free Methodism. Spring Arbor, MI: Spring Arbor University Press, 2007.