William Wilberforce and the Long Obedience

In 1785, a young British parliamentarian named William Wilberforce sat in a carriage rolling through the French countryside, reading Philip Doddridge's The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul. The book cracked something open in him. By the time he returned to England, Wilberforce was a changed man — but he nearly abandoned politics altogether, convinced that public life and genuine faith couldn't coexist.

It was his friend John Newton, the former slave trader turned hymn writer, who urged him to stay. "God has raised you up for the good of the nation," Newton told him. So Wilberforce committed his parliamentary career to the Lord and took up the cause of abolishing the slave trade.

The road was brutal. He introduced his first abolition bill in 1789. It failed. He introduced it again the next year. It failed again. For eighteen consecutive years, Wilberforce brought the matter before Parliament, enduring mockery, death threats, and physical collapse. Each session, he committed the work again to God and pressed forward.

In 1807, the Slave Trade Act finally passed by an overwhelming vote. Members of Parliament rose to give him a standing ovation while Wilberforce sat weeping at his bench.

Proverbs 16:3 says, "Commit your works to the LORD, and your thoughts will be established." Wilberforce didn't need to see the finish line to keep walking. He only needed to know Whose hands held the outcome.