Towering wave - 1837
Titus Coan, tireless missionary to Hawaii.
Introduction
Titus Coan was a missionary to Hawaii who settled on the island of Hilo. At the time, there were about 16,000 inhabitants. He visited with and prayed for every single one. Following a great tidal wave, revival broke out when the unsaved realized how desperately they needed to prepare for eternity. Soon Coan’s church became the largest in the world at the time, with 13,000 members.
Here is Coan’s description of the tidal wave that struck on this day 7 November 1837. The wave was so unexpected that no one had time to prepare for it.
Quote
“On the 7th of November, 1837, at the hour of evening prayer, we were startled by a heavy thud, and a sudden jar of the earth! The sound was like the fall of some vast body upon the beach, and in a few seconds a noise of mingled voices rising for a mile along the shore thrilled us like the wail of doom. Instantly this was followed by a like wail from all the native houses around us. I immediately ran down to the sea, where a scene of wild ruin was spread out before me. The sea, moved by an unseen hand, had all of a sudden risen in a gigantic wave, and this wave, rushing in with the speed of a race-horse, had fallen upon the shore, sweeping everything not more than fifteen or twenty feet above high water mark into indiscriminate ruin. . . .
“[H]ad this catastrophe occurred at midnight when all were asleep, hundreds of lives would undoubtedly have been lost. Through the great mercy of God, only thirteen were drowned.”
The Gospel Truth. “Hawaii’s Great Awakening, 1835 – 1840.” http://www.gospeltruth.net/hawaii_revival.htm (retrieved 2011-11-29).