the Gospel Awakening Author:Dwight Lyman Moody Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: IRA DA"VID SANKEY. In the good providence of God, the Gospel Preacher was given the Gospel Singer, that they might go forth together, like the first disciples... more » sent out by the Lord—double for fellowship, single in heart—to labor as yoke-fellows in the harvest-field of the world. The first, as we have seen, had been trained in the rugged school of adversity and self-denial, that he might be bold, self-reliant, patient, fearless, venturesome in deeds of faith, and tireless in labors of love. His companion, on the contrary, was reared under the hallowing influences of a happy, Christian homestead, so that his whole character was mellowed by the sweetening experiences of a childhood and manhood developed harmoniously and joyously. So strangely diverse was their training as individuals. Yet so wisely ordered were all the events of these isolated lives by the Master's hand, these two Christian workers when joined together and tested, were found to be admirably fitted to supplement each other's deficiencies, and thus to constitute a human instrumentality which the Lord could use for glorifying himself and extending his kingdom upon earth. Ira David Sankey was born on the 28th of August, 1840. His birthplace was the village of Edinburgh, Lawrence county, in western Pennsylvania. On the paternal side he came of English stock, and on the maternal, of Scotch-Irish. His parents were natives of Mercer county, and were members of the Methodist Episcopal church. Out of their family of nine children, only three sons and one daughter grew up to maturity. David, the father, was well off in worldly circumstances, and in such good repute among his neighbors that they repeatedly elected him a member of the state legislature. He was also a licensed exhorter in his own church. Thus the means and th...« less