"O my brethren, my heart is enlarge towards you. I trust I feel something of that hidden, but powerful presence of Christ, whilst I am preaching to you"
About this Quote
Whitefield is doing two things at once: performing tenderness and staging authority. "O my brethren" sounds intimate, almost familial, a leveling phrase that collapses hierarchy into kinship. Then he quietly reasserts hierarchy by positioning himself as the conduit: his heart is "enlarge" toward them, not because they have earned it, but because grace is moving through him. The grammatical oddity (enlarge rather than enlarged) adds to the feeling of immediacy, like language straining to keep up with spiritual sensation.
The real power sits in "hidden, but powerful presence of Christ". Whitefield is preaching to people who cannot see what he claims to feel, so he offers a paradox: Christ is concealed and undeniable. That construction is a rhetorical trapdoor. If listeners don't feel it, the problem isn't the claim; it's their spiritual dullness. If they do feel something, Whitefield gets credit for having been the instrument that awakened it. Either way, the room is pressed toward conversion.
Context matters: this is revival-era Protestantism, the emotional, itinerant energy of the Great Awakening, where the sermon is less lecture than event. "Whilst I am preaching to you" foregrounds the live moment. He isn't citing doctrine as much as narrating an experience in real time, inviting the crowd to mirror it. The subtext is a kind of holy feedback loop: your attention enlarges my heart; my enlarged heart proves Christ is here; Christ being here demands a response. It's charisma disciplined into theology, intimacy engineered into persuasion.
The real power sits in "hidden, but powerful presence of Christ". Whitefield is preaching to people who cannot see what he claims to feel, so he offers a paradox: Christ is concealed and undeniable. That construction is a rhetorical trapdoor. If listeners don't feel it, the problem isn't the claim; it's their spiritual dullness. If they do feel something, Whitefield gets credit for having been the instrument that awakened it. Either way, the room is pressed toward conversion.
Context matters: this is revival-era Protestantism, the emotional, itinerant energy of the Great Awakening, where the sermon is less lecture than event. "Whilst I am preaching to you" foregrounds the live moment. He isn't citing doctrine as much as narrating an experience in real time, inviting the crowd to mirror it. The subtext is a kind of holy feedback loop: your attention enlarges my heart; my enlarged heart proves Christ is here; Christ being here demands a response. It's charisma disciplined into theology, intimacy engineered into persuasion.
Quote Details
| Topic | Faith |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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