By D. W. Lambert
Robert Aitken of Pendeen
Our story takes us from the borders of Scotland away down to a Cornish village, with intervals at Leeds and the Isle of Man.
Robert Aitken was born in 1800 at Crailing near Jedburgh, where his father was the village schoolmaster. The stern religious background of the Scotland of that day, with its narrow Calvinistic emphasis, did not suit young Robert and he was drawn into the Episcopal Church, through the influence of the saintly Bishop of Elgin, later being ordained by the Bishop of Durham and becoming curate at Whitburn near Sunderland. From there, for the sake of his wife’s health, he moved across to the Isle of Man. He bought a small estate and lived the life of a gentleman farmer except on Sunday when he took services, becoming known, throughout the island, as an eloquent preacher. Now came an hour of crisis.
Although prosperous and popular, he had no rest in his soul. Let his son, Canon Hay Aitken tell the story:
“Whilst occupied with composing a treatise on the Atonement, and pondering on the part played by Christ’s human nature in the great sacrifice, he heard a voice, not an outward voice, yet distinct as any human utterance, saying: ‘You are making a Gospel for God, instead of believing God’s Gospel.’ Startled and perplexed, he fell on his knees, asking for light, when again the voice spoke, this time more distinctly than before, inasmuch as he actually glanced round to see if anyone was present, and it said: ‘All thy righteousness is as filthy rags.’
“Never doubting that this warning was of God, he spent many days in great agony of mind, neither eating nor sleeping and finding no help either from God or man . . . At last on the sixteenth day of sleeplessness, he cast himself exhausted on his bed, crying, ‘Now Lord let me see Thy Salvation.’ He then fell into a profound sleep, from which he awoke with the joy of assurance flooding his soul.”
What was the outcome of this amazing experience? Canon Aitken goes on to tell how, beside himself with joy, he climbed the mountain near his home, and “shouted his praises aloud” . . . “the whole parish became alight with his new-found happiness. He went to men who were at work in the fields, to the farms, the villages, the towns: in barns, warehouses, streets, it mattered not, wherever he could get men to hear, he preached the glad, great news of a free salvation.”
From now onwards, Robert Aiken was a soul-winner; like Wesley, a hundred years before, he found his own church did not welcome his passionate evangelism, but the followers of Wesley did and he worked among them up and down the land. Wherever he went revival broke out: it is said that in Sheffield alone, in six weeks, there were three thousand converts. These were “perhaps the great harvest years of his life.”
After ten years as a free-lance evangelist, or should we say “bringer of revival fires,” this ardent and sensitive soul was burdened for the state of the Church of England which he had never left (in this also he was like Wesley). The bishop to whom he applied for reinstatement after his years of “schism,” wanted to put him under a ban from preaching for three years; this was humbly accepted, but the ban was lifted, and Aitken was allowed to minister, first in Liverpool, and then in Leeds, and later in Coatbridge. During this period he passed through much sorrow and frustration, which led to deep spiritual search. In spite of his evangelistic success (or perhaps because of it) he was conscious of pride, and aware of his own heart need.
To a friend he wrote:
“It is now two years since I began very earnestly to seek after holiness . . . It pleased God to give me to see very soon that I had little or no spirituality, and that Christ was not in me at all. He was certainly neither formed in me, nor doing His great work in me. I mean condemning sin in the flesh. The discoveries that were made of my thorough selfishness were simply appalling . . . I was like one bound to a rock, and vultures picked at me and tore me in pieces. Observe, this had nothing to do with outward sin; the conflict was altogether internal.”
Through reading the life and works of the German pietist, Tersteegen, he found that “there was in truth a hidden life, a state of real union with Christ which was to be enjoyed on earth” and which “by God’s grace I most earnestly set myself to seek.” He did not seek in vain, although there was much agony of soul, as he cried out, “The Spirit, the Spirit; oh, give me the Spirit!”
At last rest came to his troubled heart, and great joy and peace. He summed it up in these simple words: “How needful it is to apprehend Christ dying for us, but how precious, how glorious it is to have Christ living in us.” He humbly adds: “True, my heart is but a poor stable and there are oxen in it still but, Oh, my adorable Maker has humbled Himself to come there, and He is working meekness and lowliness and nothingness and moderation and patience and charity.”
At this time, Robert Aitken was offered a parish in a mining area down in Cornwall, but there was no church, no vicarage, no school, no income! The challenge was manfully accepted, thanks largely to the prayers and faith of a man of God who wished to see the work of the Lord revive among the pagan miners of the district. The new vicar challenged the men to bring their picks and shovels and help him put up a temporary church; and while the work was going on many of the men were converted. Soon the revival fires were alight.
Then he started a daily service, promising to preach whenever there were fifty persons present. Soon he was preaching every night, and the work of salvation continued until the whole district was affected. He wrote, “We are in a state of wild religious excitement. Blessed be God it is better than spiritual death . . . you see it never rains in Cornwall but it pours.”
Robert Aitken was still a mighty evangelist, but the deeper experience into which he had entered, had made him a loving pastor and an understanding shepherd of souls. His home became a Mecca to which many pilgrims journeyed seeking spiritual help, and rarely did any depart unblessed. A daughter of Dr. Arnold of Rugby (and sister of the famous Matthew Arnold) describes a visit paid to Pendeen:
“The wonderful consistency of the whole life there is something beautiful and inspiring. A whole family, father, mother, sons and daughters with their hearts in Heaven, all their energies bent on helping others into the right way . . . all combined to give one a memorable proof of what real vital faith can do.”
Mrs. Aitken, a godly and practical character, worked with her daughters and the maids in the kitchen. At noon the Angelus was rung, and everyone throughout the house spent fifteen minutes on their knees in silent prayer. One visitor who stayed several months said: “During the whole time I was there, I do not believe that Mr. Aitken was (except in his sleep) for five minutes out of the conscious presence of God.”
Through the years that followed, this saint of God faithfully carried on his fruitful ministry in the out-of-the-way village of Pendeen, henceforth to be linked with his name. In 1873 God suddenly called him Home. Over his grave in the church is a slab, bearing a symbol of his inner life, a cross entwined with thorns, and the text, true to his life ministry, Galatians 6:14.