The Prayer Meeting of 1648: Confession of Sin Brings Blessing on Cromwell’s Army

Oliver Cromwell, Defender of the Protestant Faith, 1653-1658

The year is 1648.  The Black Pope’s Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) has concluded in Germany along with the 80-year War of Independence waged by the Protestant Dutch against Roman Catholic Spain: both bloodbaths had been incited by the Society of Jesus in accordance with its Counter Reformation doctrines embodied in its Council of Trent.  The Lutherans and Calvinists of Germany and Sweden had won the contest securing religious liberty in Germany continuing the Reformation.  The Dutch Reformed Calvinists in the Netherlands had broken the bands of Jesuit-ruled Spain, thereby winning Protestant liberty to be taken to the ends of the earth by the Protestant Dutch fleets.  Stifled on two fronts, the Order now pitted all of its Satanic spiritual and political power against the Reformation Bible-believing Puritans of England led by Independent Baptist, Oliver Cromwell.  The Puritans backed by Parliament had won the first Civil War led by Cromwell and his New Model Army (1642-1645).

But by mid 1648—the Dawn of the Modern Era—England lay on the verge of being overtaken by the forces of the Jesuits determined to restore Jesuit Temporal Coadjutor King Charles Stuart I to the throne, he now a captive of Parliament.  In brief, the Jesuit Power had:

1.  Won over the Scottish Presbyterians which fielded an army of 40,000 Protestant men ready to march on London and restore the monarchy;

2.  A great Royalist Army ready to rise again against the Puritans and their Cause of religious liberty;

3.  A great Presbyterian Party, at the head of which is London City, the financier of the Cause, and deeply influenced by the Order;

4.  A divided and fretting Parliament ready to abandon the Cause and betray blood-bought liberties obtained from the first Civil War;

5.  A headlong Mutineer Party called “the Levellers” within the Army who are, in fact, advocating the socialist-communist doctrine of “universal equality” perfected by the Jesuits on their Paraguayan Reductions in full production at this time;

6.  Effected a division between the leaders of the Parliament and the leaders of the Army unable to unite against the foes of Puritan liberty;

7.  Effected a huge Apprentice-riot in the City.  Arms were seized along with the City gates, the riot after 40 hours finally put down by a desperate charge of Cromwell’s cavalry.

8.  Fomented a design in the Vatican to use the military forces of King Louis XIV of France and King Philip IV of Spain to aid Charles I in his fight to maintain absolute kingship and continue the overthrow of the Reformation as well as English liberty secured by Magna Charta.

These were the many strings to the Jesuit bow; such was the impending doom of the Puritan Cause led by the Man of God, Oliver Cromwell.  In the face of certain defeat without the interposition of Almighty God, Cromwell calls a Prayer Meeting at Windsor for the Army leaders.  According to General Allen, the following transpired:

“In the year Forty-seven, you may remember, we in the Army were engaged in actions of a very high nature; leading us to very untrodden paths,—both in our Contests with the then Parliament, as also Conferences with the King.  In which great works,—wanting a spirit of faith, and also the fear of the Lord, and also being unduly surprised with the fear of man, which always brings a snare, we, to make haste, was we thought, out of such perplexities, measuring our way by a wisdom of our own, fell into Treaties with the King and his Party; which proved such a snare to us, and led into such labyrinths by the end of that year, that the very things we thought to avoid, by the means we used of our own devising, were all, with many more of a far worse and more perplexing nature, brought back upon us.  To the overwhelming of our spirits, weakening of our hands and hearts; filling us with divisions, confusions, tumults, and every evil work; and thereby endangering the ruin of that blessed Cause we had, with such success, been prospered in till that time.

“For now the King and his Party, seeing us not answer their ends, began to provide for themselves, by a Treaty with the then Parliament, set on foot about the beginning of Forty-eight.  The Parliament also was, at the same time, highly displeased with us for what we had done, both as to the King and themselves.  The good people likewise, even our most cordial friends in the Nation, beholding our turning aside from that path of simplicity we had formerly walked in and been blessed in, and thereby much endeared to their hearts,—began now to fear, and withdraw heir affections from us, in this politic path which we had stepped into, and walked in to our hurt, the year before.  And as a farther fruit of the wages of our backsliding hearts, we were also filled with a spirit of great jealousy and divisions amongst ourselves; having left that Wisdom of the Word, which is first pure and then peaceable; so that we were now fit for little but to tear and rend one another, and thereby prepare ourselves, and the work in our hands, to be ruined by our common enemies.  Enemies that were ready to say, as many others of like spirit in this day do, of the like sad occasions amongst us, ‘Lo this is the day we looked for.’  The King and his Party prepare accordingly to ruin all; by sudden Insurrectionis in most parts of the Nation; the Scot, concurring with the same designs, comes in with a potent Army under Duke Hamilton.  We in the Army, in a low, weak, divided, perplexed condition in all respects, as aforesaid:—some of us judging it a duty to lay-down our arms, to quit our stations, and put ourselves into the capacities of private men,—since what we had done, and what was yet in our hearts to do, tending, as we judged, to the good of these poor Nations, was not accepted by them.

“Some also even encouraged themselves and us to such a thing, by urging for such a practice the example of our Lord Jesus; who, when he had borne an eminent testimony to the pleasure of his Father in an active way, sealed it at last by his sufferings; which was presented to us as our pattern for imitation.  Others of us, however, were different-minded; thinking something of another nature might yet be farther our duty;—and these therefore were, by joint advice, by a good hand of the Lord, led to this result; viz.  To go solemnly to search-out our own iniquities, and humble our souls before the Lord in the sense of the same; which, we were persuaded, had provoked the Lord against us, to bring such sad perplexities upon us at that day.  Out of which we saw no way else to extricate ourselves.

“Accordingly we did agree to meet at Windsor Castle about the beginning of Forty-eight.  And there we spent one day together in prayer; inquiring into the causes of that sad dispensation, coming to no farther result that day; but that it was still our duty to seek.  And on the morrow we met again in the morning; where many spake from the Word, and prayed; and the then Lieutenant-General Cromwell did press very earnestly on all there present to a thorough consideration as an Army, and of our ways particularly as private Christians: to see if any iniquity could be found in them; and what it was, that if possible we might find it out, and so remove the cause of such sad rebukes as were upon us (by reason of our iniquities, as we judged) at that time.  And the way more particularly the Lord led us to herein was this:  to look back and consider what time it was when with joint satisfaction we could last say to the best of our judgments, The presence of the Lord was amongst us, and rebukes and judgments were not as then upon us.  Which time the Lord led us to find out and agree in; and having done so, to proceed, as we then judged it out duty, to search into all our public actions as an Army afterwards.  Duly weighing (as the Lord helped us) each of them, with their grounds, rules, and ends, as near as we could.  And so we concluded this second day, with agreeing to meet again on the morrow.  Which accodingly we did upon the same occasion, reassuming the consideration of our debates the day before, and reviewing our actions again.

“By which means we were, by a gracious hand of the Lord, led to find out the very steps (as we were all then jointly convinced) by which we had departed from the Lord, and provoked Him to depart from us.  Which we found to be those cursed carnal Conferences, our own conceited wisdom, our fears, and want of faith had prompted us, the year before, to entertain with the King and his Party.  And at this time, and on this occasion, did the then Major Goffe (as I remember was his title) make use of that good Word, Proverbs First and Twenty-third, Turn thou at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my Spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you. Which we, having found out our sin, he urged as our duty from those words.  And the Lord so accompanied by His Spirit, that it had a kindly effect, like a word of His, upon most of our hearts that were then present: which begot in us a great sense, a shame and loathing of ourselves for our iniquities, and a justifying of the Lord as righteous in His proceedings against us.

“And in this path the Lord led us, not only to see our sin, but also our duty; and this so unanimously set with weight upon each heart, that none was able hardly to speak a word to each other for bitter weeping, partly in the sense and shame of our iniquities; or our unbelief, base fear of men, and carnal consultations (as the fruit thereof) with our own wisdoms, and not with the Word of the Lord,—which only is a way of wisdom, strength and safety, and all besides it are ways of snares.  And yet we were also helped, with fear and trembling, to rejoice in the Lord; whose faithfulness and living-kindness, we were made to see, yet failed us not;—who remembered us still, even in our low estate, because His mercy endures for ever.  Who no sooner brought us to His feet, acknowledging Him in that way of His (viz. searching for, being ashamed of, and willing to turn from, our iniquities), but He did direct our steps; and presently we were led and helped to clear agreement amongst ourselves, not any dissenting.  That it was the duty of our day, with the forces we had, to go out and fight against those potent enemies, which that year in all places appeared against us.  With an humble confidence in the name of the Lord only, that we should destroy them.  And we were also enabled then, after serious seeking His face, to come to a very clear and joint resolution, on many grounds at large there debated amongst us, That is was our duty, if ever the Lord brought us back again in peace, to call Charles Stuart, that man of blood, to an account for that blood he had shed, and mischief he had done to his utmost, against the Lord’s Cause and People in these poor Nations [England, Scotland and Ireland].

“And how the Lord led and prospered us in all our undertakings that year, in this way; cutting His work short, in righteousness; making it a year of mercy, equal if not transcendent to any since these Wars began; and making it worthy of remembrance by every gracious soul, who was wise to observe the Lord, and the operations of His hands,—I wish may never be forgotten.”

Thomas Carlyle, Oliver Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches: With Elucidations, (London: Chapman and Hall, Ltd., 1893; first published, 1845), Vol. I, pp. 286-290.

Cromwell’s Ironsides at Dunbar, 1650

This is the real Oliver Cromwell at his finest, in prayer with his officers, seeking the face of the Lord, the knowledge of his sins, confessing and forsaking the same, and then leading his cavalry and footmen to the most stupendous military victories of the age.  Oliver, knowing the source of his success, when years later his attention was called to the statue of a famous Englishman declared:

“Make mine kneeling, for thus I came to glory.”

May the risen Lord Jesus Christ intervene for us White Anglo-Saxon-Celtic-Slavic Protestants and Baptists once again as we seek to establish our new nation of ProBaptiCal here in North America.  May we his people obey his Word—the AV1611 Reformation English Bible—that God in turn would send another Protector of the Faith and Defender of the Commonwealth, another obedient and courageous Oliver Cromwell!