By Joanne Sloan
Special to The Alabama Baptist
Christmas Evans (1766–1838) was one of the greatest preachers of Wales.
This year is the 250th anniversary of his birth.
He was born to Samuel and Joanna Evans in Llandysul, Wales, on Dec. 25, 1766.
His father died when he was young and his mother sent him to work at his uncle’s farm, where he received food and clothing. For the six years he lived with him, his cruel and drunken uncle proved a poor example. Evans escaped death several times.
Young converts
He then worked on the farm of David Davies, a Presbyterian minister. Christmas Evans attended a Presbyterian chapel during a spiritual awakening in 1784–85, one of several revivals during his lifetime in Wales. He and other young men were converted.
“The fear of dying in an ungodly state,” he said, “especially affected me … and this apprehension clung to me till I was induced to rest on Christ.”
The new believers met at night in a barn with candles and their Bibles. Within a month the illiterate Evans could read his Welsh Bible. For the next six months he studied at Davies’ school, the only formal education he received.
His conversion resulted in a lifelong love of learning. He later became proficient in Hebrew and Greek.
Evans’ former friends resented his conversion. Six of them attacked him one evening, beat him brutally and struck him in the eye with a stick. He lost his sight, which resulted in his being called the “One-eyed Preacher of Wales.”
Because he disagreed with some of Davies’ views, he left the Presbyterians and joined the Baptists. A Calvinist Baptist minister baptized him when he was 20.
Ordained at Salem in South Wales in 1789, he preached in the remote Llyn peninsula for two years and married Catherine Jones, a member there. Often he preached five times on Sunday. The membership doubled.
Evans frequently traveled on foot or horseback to North Wales. Less than 10 Baptist chapels existed. Burdened about the lack of the gospel on the island of Anglesey, he became pastor of a chapel at Llangefni in Anglesey in 1791. He planted new churches and visited farms and villages, preaching three times every Sunday. By 1794 he became known as a leading Baptist minister.
His preaching was powerful. He used vivid illustrations, and he was always sincere. In 1814–15, it was estimated 600 people were converted under his preaching.
Evans served 35 years in Anglesey and saw incredible changes in the religious life there. Forty times he traveled on horseback from North to South Wales to raise money for 16 new chapels.
Tripled membership
His wife died in 1823. After he remarried in 1826, the couple moved to Caerphilly where his church’s membership tripled in two years. He then served as pastor of a chapel in Cardiff for four years. His preaching still attracted large congregations and he continued to make frequent tours of Wales.
He became ill while preaching at Swansea and died July 16, 1838. His final testimony was to “Preach Christ to the people. Look at me in my sermons; I am nothing but ruin. But look at me in Christ, and I am heaven and salvation.”
He was buried in the cemetery at the Baptist chapel in Swansea.
Share with others: