Moses Lupton was born in Ripon, North Yorkshire, on 28th July 1800. He is my great-great-great-grandfather, my grandfather's great-grandfather.
I first learned of Moses' existence one Sunday afternoon around 2015. Typically, I had a raging hangover, and whilst surfing the internet, noticed an email from Ancestry - the genealogical company - offering free access to their archives that weekend. So it was that I embarked on researching my family tree. It wasn't at all difficult, given that I had access to census records dating back to around 1841, if I recall correctly. I knew my grandparents' names, their approximate dates of birth, and the places in which they had been born and had lived.
I was aware that some of my maternal ancestors were called Lupton. Indeed, after my grandfather's death, I had inherited an old daguerreotype of a man my grandfather referred to as 'Grandfather Lupton'. Nothing more about this man was known.
The Lupton side of the family interested me, because Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, also known as Kate Middleton, had Lupton ancestry, too. Her Lupton ancestors were also from Yorkshire, and so I was interested to discover whether we were related.
After discovering Moses' details I searched for him online and was shocked to discover that he was documented in a book called Paranormal Glasgow. I was shocked because I lived in Glasgow despite hailing from Worcestershire. Therefore, I ordered a copy that same day.
Beginning on page thirteen of the book is the story titled The Methodist's Dream. The book states that Moses and his family lived at 'No. 6, Rottenrow'. Interestingly, when I first came to Glasgow, I studied at Strathclyde University and spent time in the building on Rottenrow.
The book also states that Moses preached at, '...The Mechanics' Institution Hall, on the corner of North Hanover Street and George Street.' When I first came to Glasgow, my first job was working in Georgic's Bar, in The Millennium Hotel, which was located on the corner of North Hanover Street and George Street:
Now, I found that quite strange: I inherited a single portrait of a man, an ancestor, whose first name was unknown even to my grandfather. It was the only photograph he had of his ancestors beyond his own parents. I learned that he was my great-great-great-grandfather. Like me, he had moved to Glasgow, and like me, he had worked on the corner of North Hanover Street and George Street. That in itself is quite remarkable, is it not? However, it gets stranger! Moses helped resolve the struggle I had with accepting my faith.
It was Monday, 8 May 2017. I had a brief exchange via WhatsApp with John, a preacher at the church I attended. I cited the book of Job and explained that I was unable to reconcile the 'God of the Old Testament' with the teachings of Jesus. That God allowed Satan to torment Job in order to test his faith did not appear to me to be an act of a loving God, as personified in Jesus. I seem to recall John advised me to pray, and in any event, that's what I did. The following morning, I received my daily verse from The Berean:
'Can you fathom the mysteries of God? Can you probe the limits of the Almighty?' - Job 11:7
There are sixty-six books and more than thirty-one thousand verses in the Bible. Not only was the verse sent by The Berean from the book of Job, but it answered my specific prayer: 'How could I reconcile Jesus' teachings with God's actions as portrayed in the book of Job?'
My prayer had been answered. However, my doubts hadn't been fully resolved. They disappeared completely when I discovered Moses Lupton had published a sermon, The Pre-existent Glory and Abasement of the Saviour. Interestingly, it was written and published whilst he lived in Glasgow! To put that into context, Moses had twenty-three circuits in areas in the north of England, and he also lived in London for six years.
In the first full page of his sermon, Moses quoted Job 11:7! Not only that, but his sermon specifically addressed the problem of trying to understand God:
'The most exalted terms which human language can afford are necessarily inadequate to exhibit a full representation of the Divine attributes. What is not in the compass of reason to conceive, cannot be in the compass of language to describe. An infinite mind is infinitely above the reach of finite understandings. "Canst though by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is high as heaven; what canst thou do? Deeper than hell; what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth and broader than the sea," Job xi. 7, 8, 9. But the Gospel is an emanation from One whose thoughts are not our thoughts, and whose ways are not out ways; and instead of being dissatisfied with the truths of God, because there are some things contained therein beyond our comprehension, and consequently wander in the labyrinth of error, let us be grateful that there is so much that we can comprehend.'
There is no doubt in my mind that this remarkable set of 'coincidences' is the work of God. Whilst the Christian faith made sense to me - I understood the need for redemption - I had that one unanswered question I simply could not ignore. However, the answer is obvious: how can a mere mortal who struggles to understand a complex mathematical formula possibly comprehend the Divine plan put in motion by the Creator of all things, a being of infinite wisdom? It is extremely arrogant for me to believe that is even remotely possible.
Addendum: information about Moses gleaned from the internet
A few newspaper articles:
Sunderland Echo and Shipping Gazette, 23 Feb. 1934
Portadown News, 03 Sept 1859
The passage below has been reproduced as it appears on the UK Wells website:
Glory~ glory be to Jesus ! he has my heart, all of it.
Praise his name for ever ! he has " sanctified my soul." 0 for more of God-for a filling and letting into God. 0, John, live for God and souls ! Since I came into this circuit, the Lord has given me many souls ; perhaps within the last month I have had 80 souls. In my last round, my first Sunday in Malton, the converts, I think, were past counting ; for the cries of penitents for pardon and that of believers for holiness were so numerous that scarcely anything else could be heard. There likewise on Monday night 14 more, all crying for pardon and holiness. They tumble about like ewes on the floor. It continued through the week, and on the Sunday following at Malton, 6 or 10 professed to find the Lord : I think 2 on Monday night, 1 on Friday night, and 2 on Saturday at Coneysthorpe. On Wednesday 1 got liberty and rejoiced in God her Saviour. Yesterday, at Hovingham, 1 found the Son of David, and many more are wounded. Glory be to God! for he bath done marvellously.
From a letter by Moses Lupton that appeared in "The Autobiography or History of the Life of John Bowes," page 27.
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The following is a quote from Moses, published in the Primitive Methodist Magazine 1904
“In carefully examining my records and accounts, I find for the September Quarter-day, 1828 – when I began to enter the accounts of my stations - to June Quarter-day, 1866, inclusive (exclusive of the six years I was in office in London) making thirty-two years of accounts, that for these years of regular circuit work, I have had an increase of one thousand five hundred and sixty members, in addition to the making up of the losses by deaths, removals and falling away, being an average increase of forty-nine per cent., and averaging the income, that is to say, the increase on the income of my stations, fourteen per cent. For the same period will be found to be correct. I did not keep a record for March, 1822, to June, 1828, or had I done so the average for those six years would have been quite equal to the above; so that for thirty-eight years it would have stood thus - increase one thousand eight hundred and fifty-four for the thirty-eight years of my regular circuit ministry. I have taken no credit for the six years I was in London. I have travelled forty-four years and reckoning 3,000 as the average number of miles travelled on foot by me each year, which I believe to be considerably under the mark, I have walked 132,000 miles; and computing six sermons a week (a low average) for the forty-four years, I have preached 13,728 times; and I may confidently estimate thirty family visits per week for the same period - thus making 46,640 visits, in addition to all extra travelling, meetings, and circuit business. During the thirty-eight years I was in the superintendency, and this was the time of the greatest toil, exposure, anxiety, suffering, and poverty of the Connexion, at times the labours were Herculean, the privations many and severe, the anxiety intense, but my succour and support were from above.”
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The Dictionary of Methodism reports on both Moses and his brother, William, thus:
President of the PM Conference in 1870, born on 28 July 1800 at Ripon. He spent most of his circuit ministry in the Hull and Sunderland Districts. One estimate is that he walked an average of 3,000 miles a year and preached six times a week. He was secretary of the General Commission 1859-1864 and Mission Secretary 1864-1865. He retired to Darlington in 1866. After moving to Sunderland he supported the establishment of the Theological Institute there. He died on 9 June 1875.
His brother William Lupton (c.1803-1854, e.m. 1825/1828) became a PM itinerant in 1825, Having been sent to Ireland in 1827, he transferred to the Wesleyans in 1828 and served in Irish circuits. He published The Nature, Design and Perpetual Security of the Church of Christ (Belfast, 1839) and The Irish Convert, or Popish Intolerance Illustrated (1849) and was included in Sermons by Wesleyan Methodist Ministers (1853). He died at Limerick 'of a violent fever', on 19 June 1854, 'on the eve of Conference'.
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'He was one of our earliest missionaries in Scotland. He laboured in Glasgow during 1833-4-5, and they were years of abundant toils, amid sore and many difficulties; but remarkable were his successes. The old Glasgow Green was a favourite spot for him, as it has been for many another to speak the Gospel message to the thousands who then, as now, gather there.'
References:
- Primitive Methodist Magazine 1904/857: https://d35wuyehavsdko.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/cms/1/1904_Lupton_sketch.pdf
- A Dictionary of Methodism: https://dmbi.online/index.php?do=app.entry&id=1767
- UK Wells: https://ukwells.org/wells/malton
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