Don't Let Cold Keep You From God's House

When you’re tempted to stay in bed on rainy or cold Sunday mornings, remember the sacrifice of early generations. Februarys were exceedingly difficult, for example, in Puritan New England. Judge Samuel Sewall once noted in his diary after an unusually frigid Sunday that “the communion bread was frozen pretty hard and rattled sadly in the plates.”

Ministers were forced to preach while wrapped in layers of coats, heads covered with caps, and hands cased in heavy mittens. According to Sewall, one Puritan preacher in Kittery, Maine, used to send his servant to the meetinghouse to find out how many had braved the snow. If only six or seven had come, the servant would ask them to return with him to the parsonage and listen to the sermon there.

In harshest weather, women brought to the church little footstoves, filled with hot coals from home, around which children huddled by their mother’s feet beneath the pews. But after several churches burned down because of footstoves, their use grew controversial.

In one of his journal entries, Judge Sewall tells of a winter’s Sunday when his friend, Rev. Michael Wigglesworth, preached from the verse in Psalm 147 that says, “Who can stand the cold?” By the next Sunday, the entire congregation was so afflicted with illness that services were canceled for three weeks. On February 20, 1698 services resumed and Wigglesworth prayed and preached from the words, “At his command the ice melts.” The very next day, a thaw set in. It was regarded as a direct answer to his prayer.

"He sends forth His commandment on the earth;
His word goes out swiftly.
He gives snow like wool;
He scatters the frost like ashes;
He casts forth His ice like morsels;
who can stand before His cold?
He sends out His word and melts them;
He causes His wind to blow and the waters flow. (Psalm 147:15-18).