HISTORICAL MINISTRIES OF THE PAST CENTURY

The name of Rev. John Alexander Dowie, though forgotten today, was known to millions throughout the world at the turn of the century. His story is that of a reformer who fought against the greatest of odds, and challenged the apostasy of his time and succeeded in bringing to the attention of the church the message of the Gospel of healing - a message of deliverance for the whole man, body, soul, and spirit. Against overwhelming opposition, a hostile press, bitterly opposed clergymen, antagonistic city officials, unscrupulous lawyers, who, hired by the combined opposition, used every loophole of the law and legal technicality to stop him, he fought for and maintained the right to pray for the sick. Despite the fiercest persecution, numerous illegal arrests - as many as 100 in a year - he out witted and foiled his enemies, and succeeded in bringing to the attention of the world, the great truth that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And established the right for the minister of the gospel to lay hands on the sick for healing. In 1893 he was in his forties, and just at the starting of the World’s Fair in Chicago he decided to make his head- quarters permanently in Chicago. He built a small unpretentious wooden structure just outside of the doors of the fair grounds. This became the scene of his first important efforts in his warfare against the vice and iniquity of the great metropolitan city - at that time a city of about two million inhabitants. Many passed by the “little wooden hut” as they thronged the grounds of the World’s Fair, but they gave it only passing notice. They were going to see the excitement of such hair raising and blood curdling features as, “The Siege of Vicksburg”, or the “Blood and Thunder” of Buffalo Bill and his Whooping Indians. the history of America, a relentless opposition, determined to drive Dowie and divine healing from the city. Dowie came against the pork industry, the tobacco industry, the alcohol industry, and the dance halls and dens of iniquity. He had a lot of enemies from all of the different industries but he seemed to possess a resourcefulness and a stubborn courage that accepted no defeat. He defended his own casein courts which were completely filled with his enemies. The results in the lower courts was a foregone conclusion. When he lost, much to the exasperation of his adversaries, he carried his cause to the higher courts where the inequities were quickly overruled. His enemies, frustrated and enraged continued to oppose him until they began to lose popular support, they were forced to give up the fight, retire in confusion and acknowledge their complete defeat. Significantly, many who engaged in this publicity that he was able to move into and fill the largest auditoriums in the city. And now his voice cried out against sin in high places and low. The evils of tobacco, liquor, and drugs were scathingly denounced, much to the dismay of the great vested in- terests which engaged in their sale and dis- tribution. He exposed the shams and hypo- crisies of an apostate and decadent church. Iniquity in the government or in the pulpit alike, brought forth his stern and uncompromising censure. Several times attempts were made on his life, but all attempts failed. He gave the forces of iniquity no respite, and continued to blast at social evils wherever he found them, sparing none. Scene in Zion Tabernacle at a praise and testimony meeting on Dec. 30, 1894. In 1895 Miss Sadie Codie, Buffalo Bill’s niece was healed of a Cancerous tumor in her lower spine. And her leg was 3” shorter than the other. She was very ill and unable to move off her stretcher, rallied her strength and was brought by Ambulance to the International Healing Home for the Sick and carried into the home on a stretcher where Dowie laid hands on her and prayed for her healing. She was com- pletely healed and her leg was lengthened as well. Weekly newspaper called, Leaves of Healing. Zion Publishing House