William Lincoln (1825-1888)

‘I hope you will not talk about William Lincoln, for I am only a saved sinner’.¹From such a beginning, perhaps it would be inappropriate to write this article, or one on any other servant of the Lord, but we do so, like others before us, with the desire to encourage all in their obedience and faithfulness to the word of God and its principles.

Lincoln was born in Bethnal Green, London in 1825, his parents dying when he was very young. Apart from the early loss of his parents, he was also widowed before the age of thirty, marrying his second wife, Mary Elizabeth Wilson, in 1855. There were no children from either of his marriages.

He was first stirred as to his need of salvation by the reading and re-reading of a book by Philip Doddridge.² Whilst the book brought a realization of his sin, he was brought to faith by other means at the age of seventeen. The zeal of this newly saved young man led him to study for a year under the Church Missionary Society (CMS), intending to seek service for the Lord in India. This was not to be realized, the CMS council rejecting his request ‘owing to hereditary consumption³ in the family’.⁴

Following this seeming setback, he entered King’s College, London, ultimately becoming an associate.⁵In 1849, Lincoln was ordained at Preston by the Bishop of Manchester. He served in the established church there for some years before becoming curate at Saint George’s, Southwark, London. As curate, he preached mostly at a district church but drew large numbers to hear him. In 1859, Beresford Chapel in Beresford Street, Walworth, became vacant, and Lincoln applied for the living, and got it - a defining moment, for Lincoln was thereafter identified with Beresford Chapel.

Although attendances started small, numbers were attracted by his powerful preaching. Beattie comments, ‘There was soon scarcely a sitting to be obtained in a building holding about one thousand three hundred people, and weekly the chapel was crowded to excess’.⁶Over the next three years, Lincoln’s study of the scriptures led him to realize that he could not continue in the established church. That break with the Church of England came in November 1862 when, as Pickering notes, ‘He read out his reasons for so doing on a Sunday evening to a congregation which crowded the building to the utmost’.⁷

The occasion of his secession was a very memorable one for a number of reasons. His congregation reduced in number as many refused to follow him.⁸ Lincoln was also baptized by immersion at a nearby Baptist Chapel. Although friends urged him to be baptized outside of London, he expressed determination that it should be done in his own neighbourhood, giving testimony to his newfound light. This was also the moment when he wrote the book for which he is perhaps best known, The Javelin of Phinehas, Or, Christ’s Own Judgment Upon Christendom, which was published in 1863.⁹

As the work at Beresford continued, changes began to be made. Although gradual, they were made as the congregation’s understanding of scripture grew. As Pickering notes, ‘Many attempts were made to get Lincoln to join one or other of the various denominations; but his expressed determination always was, “never to join anything or any party,” but to cleave to the Lord alone. His purpose and joy ever was to press the truth of gathering to the Lord’s Name alone’.¹⁰ After about a month, the Lord’s Supper was celebrated every Lord’s Day, albeit in the evening. This practice continued for a while before it took its place in the morning. Equally, old practices were abandoned; the large organ on Sundays was given up, and the stained-glass windows were covered.

On one subject Lincoln was particularly persuasive. He maintained that there should be time devoted to the consecutive teaching of scripture after the breaking of bread on the Lord’s Day mornings. It was in this ministry that he was so used of God and from which much of his written ministry is drawn.¹¹ Although much of his service was confined to Beresford Chapel and London, Lincoln only ever regarded himself as ‘a teacher, chosen of God to minister to the Saints, a pastor among many others’.¹² He continued there for twenty-six years before, after a period of failing health, he was called home in 1888.