The Life And Ministry Of John Morris

Gospel Standard 1865, Page 356:

John Morris was born at Syston, Lincolnshire, October 25, 1773, of poor but honest parents. Soon after his birth, his parents removed to Harrowby, a small hamlet about two miles from Grantham, where they continued for some years. The family having increased, the parents were not able to give John much schooling; but he went for a time to a day-school at Grantham, and from that to be farmer’s boy at the farm where his father worked. After a year or so he was taken into the house, and for several years was with the family as ploughboy, &c. At about 16 years of age he left the farmer’s employ, and went to live at Welby Warren, where he continued for two years; and it was during the time he was living there that he first felt convinced he was a sinner. His father and mother were God-fearing people, and had done their best to bring up their family in the fear of God; but it was not until he was frightened by a very heavy storm of thunder and lightning at Welby that he really prayed. The storm was in the night, after the family had retired to rest, and was so terrifying that he arose and dressed himself, for he durst not lie in bed. He came down stairs, and thought of escaping from the house, thinking it would fall every minute. When he reached the door he was too frightened to go and stand under some trees which were near, and where he had at first thought of seeking refuge, so stood just inside the step of the door, with the door open, ready to fly to the trees if the house fell. After some time the storm gradually abated, and it was during the time he stood at the door he first cried to God to save him, feeling convinced that, unless God had mercy on him, he must be lost for ever. After this change in his feelings came a desire for some better employment than being in farm service, and he accordingly put himself apprentice to a saddle-tree maker at Grantham, where he continued for about two years, and then went to London for improvement. He walked all the way to London, in company with a soldier, and the first night they slept at the Bull and Swan Inn, Stamford. He often spoke of it in after life, and was led to admire the goodness of God to him; for when he first went to London, not being a good workman, it seemed improbable he would ever be more than a journeyman. For some time he had to work under price, and endure the taunts of the other men for so doing, until the Lord put in into the heart of a fellow-work-man to be kind to him, telling him not to mind what the others said, to sit next to him, and he would show him how to do the work which he did. During the time he was in London he attended Mr. Huntington’s ministry, and it was at chapel he first met with his future partner in life. He was married in the year 1799; and in 1800 he was so ill that the doctor’s advice to him was to leave London, which he did; and coming down to his father’s home for the benefit of his health, he thought he saw an opening in Stamford for the saddle-tree business, and accordingly they removed to that place.

For a very long time he found it almost more than he could manage, the want of capital being so much against him. But the Lord put it into the heart of first one customer and then another to pay him ready money, and by other means also, so that he was at length enabled to take the premises in St. Martin’s, Stamford, where he lived for 54 years.

When Mr. Morris first came to Stamford, there was no place there where the truth was preached, so that they did not go to any place of worship; feeling it would be better to stay at home than go to the parish church after hearing such preaching as Mr. Huntington’s. In course of time he found a few who were seekers of the truth, and they met on the Sabbath-day at his house for reading and prayer, until, at length, a room was engaged and licensed, and a weekly meeting formed, which they continued for some years. Before this room was used for preaching in, the late Mr. Hardy, of Leicester, was in the habit of visiting Stamford, and at such times he preached in Mr. Morris’s house in St. Martin’s. He was the guest of Mr. Morris, and on his periodical visits continued to be so, until his last visit to Stamford, when Mr. Morris, from affliction in his family, was unable to receive him, and he became the guest of Mr. De Merveilleux. A letter written by Mr. Morris to Mr. Oxenham, minister, dated Stamford, February 18th, 1815, will show the state of his mind at this time:

“Dear Sir, I was at Grantham last Sunday, and saw Mr. B., who told me he was going to write to you, to request you to preach there when you came into the country. I was very glad to hear it, not only that I might have an opportunity of hearing you myself and family, but I have no doubt there are many in that town and neighbourhood who have heard you, and, like myself, have been grieved to think that you should come into Lincolnshire and not have an opportunity of hearing you. When you have appointed the time for coming I should be greatly obliged to you if you would drop me a line to inform us, as I should not like to be out of town when you come; and my wife and I would be very much obliged if you could make it convenient to stop a night at Stamford, and thank you very kindly for condescending to call upon us last summer. We still continue like the sparrow alone upon the house top; and I see but little in the professors at Stamford that can make us desire their acquaintance; for the most part they seem to be desirous of doctrines and to neglect the experimental part, without which I am certain none can be saved. A consideration of these things often humbles me in the dust to think that the Lord should take notice of such a poor illiterate creature as myself. About nineteen years ago, when employed in following the plough, the Lord made me to feel what a sinner I was; and, under your preaching, gave me faith in his dear Son, and has not suffered me to rest in a form of godliness without feeling and knowing the power. It is the Lord that has kept my soul alive until this present day, and has enabled me to say with the testimony of conscience, ‘that I esteem all things but dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, by whom this world is crucified to me, and I unto the world.’ What debtors are we to free grace! And the longer I live the greater debtor I am, as I daily must be receiving out of the Lord’s fulness grace and strength, or I should be overcome. May the Lord ever keep me at his feet, sensible of my great obligations and littleness in my own eyes, as I am persuaded it is most safe and most profitable, as God beholdeth the proud afar off, but giveth more grace to the humble. Excuse this scribble, as my heart got a little warm by looking back on the way that the Lord has led me these nineteen years. Surely goodness and mercy have followed me all my days. I know that your goodness will excuse the liberty I have taken. My wife joins with me in undissembled love to you and all that love our Lord Jesus Christ; while I remain,

“Your obliged Servant,

“John Morris”

[The above account is supplied by a granddaughter of Mr. Morris’s, and though no doubt substantially true, there are some little discrepancies in the dates which I cannot reconcile. These are, however, of little real moment. What I more feel is that there is so long a blank between his letter to Mr. Oxenham and the following account of his last days, which I can but most imperfectly attempt to supply in the note appended to this article. His granddaughter thus writes of his very last days, when old age had reduced his faculties almost to dotage. J. C. P.]

On Sept. 29th, 1860, he said to his attendant, “I have had this morning such a blessed manifestation of the pardoning love and mercy of God to my soul that language fails to express the blessedness of it. I have been enabled to pray for all my friends, and I know the Lord will hear me. He has strengthened and supported me thus far, and I know that when I leave this world I shall be with him where he is. O the power I felt, and do still feel, is past description! I cannot tell you how happy I am.” He remained for some time in the same happy frame, the tears running down his cheeks when speaking to those around him of the love of Jesus to such a poor sinner as he felt himself to be. The loss of his sight, about six years before his death, was a great trial to him, but he still attended chapel until prevented from failing strength. He was always pleased to have the Bible read to him; also Mr. P.’s sermons, which he much enjoyed. Hart’s hymns were especial favourites, although many others from the selection he much valued. He felt at times a sweet sense of pardoning mercy, and especially on Feb. 9th, 1863, when his housekeeper took him his breakfast. He was in such an ecstasy of joy that he could scarcely contain himself. He said, “O that I could thank God for his goodness to me! O that I could fly away and be with Jesus!” He said be could not feel more happy than he then felt, unless he was with Jesus in heaven. He was weeping and praising God all the time he was taking his breakfast. He said, “I could shout for joy. You may tell all that ask after me how happy I am.” In June, I863, he was very poorly for several weeks, and from that time his mental faculties gradually gave way, and he frequently did not know us. Indeed from that time to his death he required constant attendance day and night; still there were times when he enjoyed a chapter from the Bible, or a portion of Mr. P.’s sermons; and he was frequently in a very prayerful frame of mind.

On the 1st of May, 1864, I was sleeping in my grandfather’s room; he awoke me about half-past two o’clock to tell me how happy he felt, having had, to use his own words, a “visit from the Lord.” He was talking quite rationally for more than an hour. I repeated a part of that hymn of Berridge’s:

“If Jesus kindly say;”

and when I came to the last line of the fourth verse he exclaimed, “Ah, that’s it; that’s what I do wonder at, his grace to save such a poor creature as I am.” He wept for joy, and said much more, which I cannot at this time remember. He was frequently talking of death, and on the 8th of November in particular, when talking to his housekeeper about dying, he said to her, “But I am not afraid; no, I am not afraid to die. The Lord called me when I was very young, and he has never left me.” He frequently prayed to God to be with him to the last. We perceived a change in him on the 21st. He dozed very much for two or three days, and his speech was almost gone, but in his waking moments we perceived him much in prayer.

A few hours before his departure, seeing that he was evidently sinking fast, his housekeeper said to him, “Do you feel Jesus Christ precious to you, now you are in the valley?” He tried to say “Yes,” and I believe that was the last word he spoke. He was sensible until shortly before his death; for, although not able to speak, he could make us understand that he knew when we spoke to him; and at one o’clock on the morning of the 25th November he quietly breathed his last, in the 92nd year of his age.

Stamford.

Mary Ann Morris

[I much regret that I cannot present anything beyond what I must call the above meagre Obituary of one of the most God-fearing, upright, honest, gracious men that I ever knew in my life; and I knew much of him from more than twenty years’ intercourse, as he was a member and a deacon of my church at Stamford. For more than half a century did he live in the same house at Stamford, and during all that time maintained a profession so upright, sincere, and unblemished that he was generally known in the town as “honest John Morris.” But he was something more than honest. He was a man well taught and established in the truth of God, with a good discernment of men and things, and yet of very tender feelings in divine matters. Having been blessed, under Mr. Oxenham at Grantham, before he went to London, when there, he settled under the ministry of Mr. Huntington; and often has he spoken of the blessing it was made to him during the four years that he sat under him. Being compelled, however, as is stated above, by the state of his health to leave London, he was led, in the providence of God, to pitch his tent at Stamford. During more than twenty years of that time he appears, as regards attending any ministry, to have been as a sparrow on the housetop, except occasionally hearing Mr. Oxenham at Grantham. It must have been about the year 1823 that Mr. Hardy first visited Stamford, and preached at his house. I have heard that it arose from the circumstance of Mr. Hardy’s being detained unexpectedly there by a very heavy flood, which prevented him from going on, as he had intended, to Boston or Sleaford. It becoming known that he was in the town, he was asked to preach, and his ministry was made so acceptable to the few who met together, that from that time forward he visited Stamford regularly, and always took up his abode at Mr. Morris’s house, much mutual love and esteem existing between them. When under the preaching of my late dear friend, W. Tiptaft, Mr. de Merveilleux was wrought upon to come out from among the Independents, and to build a chapel at Stamford for the truth, Mr. Morris did all that he could to strengthen his heart and hands for the good work. When, in the providence of God, I was led to Stamford in the year 1830, Mr. Morris warmly and cordially received both me and my ministry; and from that time till the infirmities of old age, combined with “blindness and deafness, absolutely prevented him, was never absent I believe on a single occasion, if at home, when the chapel doors were open. When the church was formed a few years afterwards, Mr. Morris was one of the first who was baptized, and was, together with Mr. de Merveilleux, unanimously elected deacon. I am not speaking, therefore, at a peradventure when I bear my testimony to him as a Christian man. The Lord blessed him with remarkable health and vigour both of body and mind; and though of little education, he had excellent business qualities, and was as hard-working and industrious in his trade as he was honest and upright. His was a feeling religion. Much did he at times indeed complain of his barrenness and darkness; and yet when the right chord was touched, and his heart and mouth were opened, he could speak very sweetly and blessedly of the dealings of God with his soul, of the gracious visitations of the Lord in the night seasons, and what he had tasted, felt, and handled of the word of life. I had few better hearers in my congregation at Stamford than good old John Morris, and none whom I more respected and esteemed, or walked with in more unshaken union and friendship; for there was never a cloud between us, and we were, I believe, firmly knit together in the bonds of Christian affection and love. In his conversation there was always some weight, and often much savour, for he had at times felt much of the goodness and mercy of God in his own soul; and being possessed of a very humble, child-like spirit, with a deep and abiding sense of his own sinfulness and helplessness, there was a signal absence of all boasting and self-exaltation. Until the last year or two of his life, he may be said to have borne fruit in old age, for I have never seen him more melted and broken down under a sermon than once or twice, when, being wholly blind and half deaf, he could come to chapel only once in the day from growing infirmities; and even when his faculties on ordinary subjects were gone, and he could scarcely recollect names or persons, when the things of God were mentioned he seemed as if awakened up, and could for a short time speak upon them with his former unction and savour. He always struck me as a remarkable instance of the faithfulness of God to his own work of grace. Here was a man who had been in the way nearly 70 years, and during all that time maintained a most upright, unblemished conversation in the church and the world, still alive in his soul, still blessed with a child-like, humble spirit, still a man of sighs and cries, and at times still blessed with the presence and smiles of the Lord, he did not live to disgrace his religion or wear it out, to sink into carnality and death though pressed down with the infirmities of age, and even when natural faculties were almost gone, was still blessed with the manifestations of God’s love to triumph in and over all nature’s decay. “The memory of the just is blessed,” and as long as life lasts I shall remember with esteem and affection good old honest John Morris.—Joseph Philpot]