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G.D. Watson
George Douglas Watson (1845–1924). Born on March 26, 1845, in Accomac County, Virginia, G.D. Watson was a Methodist holiness preacher, evangelist, and prolific author who became a leading voice in the late 19th-century holiness movement. Raised in a devout Methodist family with godly influences like family prayer and Sunday school, he felt convictions at age five or six, singing “Rock of Ages” with siblings, and sensed a call to preach by 12 or 13. Despite early rebellion, described as the “black sheep” among six siblings, he sought religion during revivals and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Ordained in 1868, he pastored in Kentucky but struggled spiritually until 1876, when he sought sanctification, achieving it after a Cincinnati evangelists’ conference, transforming his ministry with a focus on holiness. Watson’s evangelistic campaigns spanned the United States, England, the West Indies, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, and Korea, preaching a deeper Christian life. He authored over 18 books, including Soul Food, Our Own God, Bone of His Bone, and The Heavenly Life, emphasizing sanctification, the Holy Spirit, and victory over sin, many still in print via publishers like Kingsley Press. Married to Eva, who wrote his biography, Glimpses of the Life and Work of G.D. Watson, he faced personal trials, including his wife’s illness and his lapse into tobacco use during a period of spiritual backsliding. Watson died in 1924, leaving a legacy as an “Apostle to the Sanctified.” He said, “The Holy Spirit never comes to us to make us smart, but to make us holy.”
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G.D. Watson preaches about the intimate and challenging journey of being called to be like Christ, emphasizing the life of crucifixion, humility, and obedience that God demands from His chosen ones. He highlights how the Holy Spirit works uniquely in individuals, leading them through deep mortification, obscurity, and dependence on God to produce precious fruit for His glory. Watson encourages believers to embrace God's sovereign control over their lives, allowing the Holy Spirit to guide and discipline them in ways that may seem puzzling to others but ultimately lead to a deep, personal relationship with God.
Others May, You Cannot
Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. If God has called you to be really like Christ in all your spirit, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility and put on you such demands of obedience, that He will not allow you to follow other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other good people do things which He will not let you do. Others can brag on themselves, and their work, on their success, on their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works. The Lord will let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hid away in obscurity because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for His glory, which can be produced only in the shade. Others will be allowed to succeed in making money, but it is likely God will keep you poor because he wants you to have something far better than gold and that is a helpless dependence on Him; that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day - out of an unseen treasury. God will let others be great, but He will keep you small. He will let others do a great work for Him and get credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more precious, He will let others get the credit for the work you have done, and this will make your reward ten times greater when He comes. The Holy Spirit will put strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and will rebuke you for little words and feelings, or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem distressed over. So make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign, and has a right to do what He pleases with His own, and He will not explain to you a thousand things which may puzzle your reason in His dealing with you. He will wrap you up in a jealous love, and let other people say and do many things that you cannot do or say. Settle it forever, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that others are not dealt with. Now, when you are so possessed with the Living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this particular personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of heaven.
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George Douglas Watson (1845–1924). Born on March 26, 1845, in Accomac County, Virginia, G.D. Watson was a Methodist holiness preacher, evangelist, and prolific author who became a leading voice in the late 19th-century holiness movement. Raised in a devout Methodist family with godly influences like family prayer and Sunday school, he felt convictions at age five or six, singing “Rock of Ages” with siblings, and sensed a call to preach by 12 or 13. Despite early rebellion, described as the “black sheep” among six siblings, he sought religion during revivals and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Ordained in 1868, he pastored in Kentucky but struggled spiritually until 1876, when he sought sanctification, achieving it after a Cincinnati evangelists’ conference, transforming his ministry with a focus on holiness. Watson’s evangelistic campaigns spanned the United States, England, the West Indies, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, and Korea, preaching a deeper Christian life. He authored over 18 books, including Soul Food, Our Own God, Bone of His Bone, and The Heavenly Life, emphasizing sanctification, the Holy Spirit, and victory over sin, many still in print via publishers like Kingsley Press. Married to Eva, who wrote his biography, Glimpses of the Life and Work of G.D. Watson, he faced personal trials, including his wife’s illness and his lapse into tobacco use during a period of spiritual backsliding. Watson died in 1924, leaving a legacy as an “Apostle to the Sanctified.” He said, “The Holy Spirit never comes to us to make us smart, but to make us holy.”