Lillian G. Harvey

Edwin and Lillian Harvey (1908-1983) & (1911-2008) respectively. Edwin was brought up in a Christian community known as the Metropolitan Church Association (MCA), founded by Edwin’s uncle and a friend who was a wealthy banker. They had sold up all they had and purchased a large, stately building known as the “Fountain House” which had been a former hotel and health spa. Lillian’s father was one of the MCA’s most successful evangelists. This meant that Lillian and her family were constantly moving from city to city each time her father would receive a fresh appointment, and so it was only once or twice yearly at Camp-Meeting season, that she would come into contact with the Harvey family. When she enrolled as a student in the MCA Bible College, however, she would see Edwin in the weekly services, prayer-meetings, and outreach activities carried on by the young people. He had even been her teacher in at least one class. His zeal and earnestness had been a symbol to her of the revival which had struck the church and changed the lives of a group of influential young men, Edwin included. He and his friends had a goal, an inner purpose which drove them—a fire which burned in their bones. After being posted to Scotland as director of the MCA in Great Britain, Edwin shocked Lillian with a letter which was, in effect, a marriage proposal. Finding it increasingly difficult to remain single in his leadership position, he had prayed about a helpmeet. "Whether I remain in Scotland or whether I am brought back to this country or sent elsewhere,” he wrote Lillian, “I am persuaded that you are the one that would make the helpmeet needed. I trust it can be arranged for me to see you face to face for at least one good talk. . . .You can consider this letter as a proposal of marriage or, at least, a request for a closer acquaintance which will eventually lead to marriage.” Within twelve months, Edwin and Lillian were married. Trying to adapt to her new environment, Lillian felt as if she were on show, and if it had not been for Edwin’s Aunt Gertrude, widow of the founder of the MCA, her position would have been pretty impossible. But “Aunt Gerty” as she was called by all, ever gracious and a born diplomat, smoothed the way, helped Lillian learn British customs and culture, and saw to it that the young couple had the privacy they needed. The following year, 1939, Edwin and his aunt were recalled for camp-meeting in the States and Lillian bravely offered to stay and run things as best she could in their absence. Edwin barely made it back before war broke out and all travel to Britain was curtailed. The next few years were not easy. Until America entered the war, Edwin and Lillian were considered aliens and their travel and activities were restricted. So they opened a home for bombed out children and became temporary parents to frightened, lonely boys and girls. But of course, they both wanted a child of their own. After one still birth and one miscarriage, it was easy to become despondent, but kneeling together, they made a vow—if God would hear their prayer they, like Hannah of old, they would dedicate their child to His service. Lillian, especially, found her faith sorely tested as an answer to this prayer seemed pretty impossible but, six years after their marriage and following a very risky pregnancy, she gave birth to a healthy though tiny baby daughter, Gertrude, or Trudy as she became commonly called. Trudy, was never allowed to forget the vow her parents had made before her birth but, at thirteen and attending school in the elite Lake District community, she seemed in danger of being enticed by the world. Her concerned parents reminded God of their vow and of His answer and asked Him “at any cost” to keep their child in the paths of righteousness. Their prayers were answered, but not in the way they thought or wished. Their daughter came down with peritonitis one week later, and sensing that it was touch and go if she would make it through another night, she made her parents’ vow her own. If God would let her live, she promised that she would devote her life to serving Him. As the years wore on, Edwin & Lillian began to have problems with the exclusive attitude of their home church. After much heartache, they founded Message of Victory Evangelism (M.O.V.E.) with some of the younger workers who, like them, were open to a radical new way of obedience. MOVE engaged both in earnest evangelism efforts and promoting holiness of life through publishing a bi-monthly magazine and books. Lillian and Edwin were an ideal balance to each other: Lillian was the visionary, the idealist, while Edwin was the faithful plodder and superb organizer. He found changes disconcerting. This often meant clashes of opinion which were always solved but not easily. Once, however, it seemed particularly difficult for an agreement to be reached. While M.O.V.E. was definitely less community oriented than the MCA had been, it still involved sharing a meal with their fifteen or sixteen full-time workers, and, more importantly, it meant constant team work as they traveled extensively in evangelistic efforts. Edwin was in his element. He loved organizing and he was never happier than when evangelizing. But Lillian’s poor health often confined her to bed with bronchitis, especially during the long, damp British winters. She not only felt left out, but also realized how much the young workers depended on her husband and were failing to develop in their own spiritual character. At last, she could take it no longer. She would move to another apartment, she told Edwin, where she would continue to be a loving and dutiful wife, but he would have to commute between their new home and the mission headquarters. She was also troubled about her own spiritual experience which seemed at odds with the doctrine she had grown up to believe as indispensable to Christian progress. Edwin was distressed and reluctant to change the status quo. Finally, he drove his wife and a friend across England and France to the Alps where Lillian could recover from her bronchitis and take time to discover what God was trying to tell her. To his joy, when Edwin returned to bring Lillian home six weeks later, he discovered a new wife! God had renewed her spirit and enlarged her vision. Edwin, for his part, had literally been at sea without his beloved partner and so they struck a healthy compromise—he would agree to allow their workers more leeway and independence in both living and working, while she would become more involved with his projects and plans. As the years progressed, their emphasis gradually shifted from evangelism to compiling Christian literature which would minister to the Body of Christ. Edwin’s knowledge of English and his organized style of writing balanced his wife’s more imaginative and rambling style. She would research the material and lay it out for Edwin to edit. Not that they always agreed, however, as to the finished product. Lillian would often think Edwin too precise and matter-of fact, while he would remonstrate over his wife’s rather wordy though generally inspired descriptions. Often it took long hours of hard work and much prayer before a compromise was reached. To family and friends, however, it often seemed as if Lillian were the stronger of the two. She was the one who seemed to receive outstanding guidance and revelations from the Lord. And her husband respected her for this. But when, after moving back to the States in 1981, Edwin died two years later at age seventy-five, Lillian felt very much alone. They had already written and compiled twelve books together. Lillian now viewed the many unfinished manuscripts stowed away carefully in her files and remembered their joint charge to “Walk about Zion,” and knew what she must do. She would finish the work she and Edwin had begun together. Lillian often found herself working on manuscripts which dealt with subjects such as loneliness and frustration. Her heart still breaking from her recent loss, tears would frequently roll down her cheeks and splash onto the keyboard. If it had not been for her family, several faithful helpers and the inner sense of divine commission, she could never have completed the twenty-five books which went to the press in the years which followed Edwin’s death, nor would she have continued to write until age ninety. As the years passed, however, it became clear, that something or someone vital was missing in Lillian’s life and family. With Edwin no longer present to act as balance and brake, Lillian’s interpretation of both doctrine and practice tended to run to extremes which caused those around her much pain and concern. As a friend put it so aptly, “The enemy used the frailty of old age.” At age ninety-one, she was diagnosed with progressive vascular dementia. In the years which followed, Lillian was often confused and frustrated. Her love for God and the Scriptures, however, never waned, nor did her memory of Edwin, whose almost life-sized portrait, hung on her wall. He never seemed far away, even when nearly everyone else seemed to blur and fade into oblivion. And when she could say little else, she would look up at his picture and mutter, “He’s good,” or something of that nature. At times, during those difficult years, it may have seemed as if God was often standing in the shadows, but it was always clear that He had not vanished from the scene. In spite of her failing powers, Lillian mellowed and ripened for Heaven during those final years of her long life. In August of 2008 and at ninety-seven years of age, she joined her husband in the throng above who worship the Lamb day and night.