October 27 | Moments Almanac | Conviction

Welcome to Moments Almanac for October 27th. There he stood, in front of a congregation in Colonial Pennsylvania, dressed like a preacher, sounding like a preacher, and delivering what everyone assumed was a perfectly legitimate sermon. There was just one problem. He wasn't a preacher. He wasn't even a believer. But before the sermon was over, something extraordinary would happen. The preacher would become the one person in the room who most desperately needed to hear what he was saying. This is the remarkable story of Elias Keach. And it begins with a famous father and a wandering son. Elias was born in England around 1665. His father was Benjamin Keach, one of the best known Baptist preachers in London. Young Elias grew up surrounded by scripture, sermons, prayers, and the rhythms of church life. He knew the language of faith. He knew how Christians talked. He knew what preachers were supposed to say, but knowing the language of faith and possessing faith are two very different things. And Elias, it seemed, had little interest in following his father's footsteps. Around the age of nineteen he sailed for America, hoping to make his fortune in the New World, and when he arrived in Pennsylvania he had an idea. Not necessarily a good idea, but an idea. He dressed in black, put on the clerical bands worn by ministers, and began passing himself off as a preacher, and why not? His father's name was already well known among Baptists. The young man had the name, he had the clothes, he had the vocabulary, he had everything he needed to look like a preacher except the one thing that mattered, a genuine faith in Jesus Christ. Well, word spread that the son of the famous Benjamin Keach had arrived from England, and before long a congregation near Philadelphia invited the young man to preach, and Elias accepted. Perhaps he figured out after listening to his father all those years he could deliver a sermon well enough. After all, how hard could it be? So he stood before the congregation and began. And for a while everything went according to plan. The words came easily, the people listened, the young man sounded convincing. But then something happened that Elias hadn't planned, something no amount of preparation could have anticipated. His words began to convict him. Baptist historian Morgan Edwards, writing years later, tells us that Elias suddenly stopped in the middle of his sermon. The congregation noticed the change in his voice. They thought he might be ill, but Elias wasn't suffering from sudden sickness. He was suffering from a suddenly awakened conscience. The young man who had come to deceive a congregation found himself unable to continue the deception, and there before the people he had intended to fool, Elias Keach broke down. With tears and trembling, he confessed that he was an imposter. He admitted that he never truly experienced the grace that he had been preaching about and he threw himself upon the mercy of God. Just imagine that congregation. They had come to hear a sermon. Instead they witnessed a confession. They had come to expect a preacher. Instead, they saw a prodigal coming home. And the most remarkable part of the story of Elias Keach and his ministry is that the day didn't end. In a very real sense, it began. He sought out an older Baptist minister named Thomas Dungan, and Thomas baptized him. And in time the young man returned to the very people among whom his deception had been exposed. Only this time he wasn't pretending. He preached throughout Pennsylvania and New Jersey, helped organize Baptist churches in Pinnapec, and became an influential voice among the early Baptists of colonial America. Eventually, Elias returned to England, where he continued preaching and helped establish a congregation in London. On this day, october twenty seventh, sixteen ninety nine, Elias Keach died. He was only thirty four years old. His life had been brief, but what a remarkable journey from pretending to preach the gospel to spending his life proclaiming it, from borrowing his father's reputation to discovering a faith of his own. From an imposter in the pulpit to a servant of the living God. And that's what makes this story so beautiful, because Elias Keach reminds us that the gospel doesn't depend on the perfection of the person proclaiming it. As Apostle Paul said in Romans 1 16. The power was never in Elias Keach. It wasn't in his clothing, his vocabulary, or his famous last name. The power was in the gospel itself. And there's one more thing I love about this story. Somewhere in London was a father who had spent years preaching the truth to his son, and for a long time it may have seemed like those words had accomplished very little. But grace always has a way of traveling farther than we can see. And God's word has a way of finding people in the most unexpected places, sometimes in a distant country, sometimes in a moment of profound embarrassment, and sometimes of all places in the middle of a sermon, you're only pretending to preach. Elias Keach stood in that pulpit pretending to be somebody he wasn't, but he left on the road to becoming someone he never imagined he could be. And that, my friend, is the wonder of grace. Sometimes the words we think we have mastered turn around and master us. And sometimes the first person who needs to hear a sermon is the person preaching it. Thanks for joining me for Moments Almanac. I hope you'll join me tomorrow. Until then, take heart. Notice the scattered moments and share the grace.