Most of us don’t get what we want because we quit praying. We give up too soon. We quit praying right before the miracle happens.”             Mark Batterson

 Wednesday, September 23, 1857 – New York City: Jeremiah climbed the creaking stairs to the small room on the third floor of the grand old North Dutch Reform Church. He took out his pocket watch and placed it on the table. It was 12 noon. He waited patiently at the rear of the church on Fulton Street, which was in the heart of the business district just around the corner from Wall Street in Lower Manhattan.

At 12:10, Jeremiah paced around the empty room. The flyer on the table read, “Prayer Meeting Wednesday from 12 to 1 p.m. Stop for 5, 10, or 20 minutes, or the whole hour if your schedule permits.” At 12:30 Jeremiah wondered if his prayer meeting idea had been a mistake.

Forty-eight-year-old Jeremiah Lanphier, originally from Coxsackie, New York, had run a successful mercantile business in New York City for 20 years before putting his business on hold to become a missionary to business owners in New York City. His idea had been a bold, unique undertaking. After uttering a simple prayer, “Lord, what would you have me do?” he felt led to start a weekly prayer meeting for businesspeople.

He had visited shops, businesses, hotels, and boarding houses for almost two months, inviting men to his meeting. He published handbills to advertise the prayer meeting and placed them throughout the city. On the day of the event, he arrived early. And now at 12:30 he sat alone. He decided to give it 10 more minutes. At 12:35, just as he was thinking of leaving, he heard someone coming up the stairs.

Six men attended Jeremiah’s first prayer meeting. He read scripture, and they prayed. The group included a Baptist, two Methodists, a Presbyterian, a sailor, and a 21-year-old from Philadelphia. On the second Wednesday, about twenty men came, and the number doubled to 40 in the third week. Encouraged by the response, attendees asked Jeremiah to move the prayer meeting to a daily noon event.

America needed prayer. In the summer of 1857, a recession had begun in New York City. On August 30, the Ohio Life Insurance Company and its bank failed. A week later, the New Haven Railroad failed, and by the time of Jeremiah’s first prayer meeting, 29 banks had failed in New York City. Three weeks later, the Bank of New York, the oldest and largest bank in the city, failed along with 14 other banks, triggering the Financial Crisis of 1857. Then the bond market failed, and panic spread from New York City across the country and to Europe.

Spurred by the financial crisis, Jeremiah’s prayer meeting numbers grew exponentially. Within a few months, the North Dutch Church participants overflowed to the John Street Methodist Church near Broadway. Soon, the Metropolitan Theater on Chambers Street was packed at noon daily with up to 2,000 people praying. Six months after the prayer meeting began, an estimated 10,000 people were meeting at noon across New York City to pray. Many businesses shut down during the lunch hour so their employees could attend prayer meetings.

The prayer meetings were simple. Led by laymen, rather than preachers, they consisted of reading a few scriptures followed by the earnest prayers of those attending. No one was allowed to pray for more than five minutes. The New York Herald and New York Tribune provided daily updates on the number of those attending and the number of conversions. News of the revival traveled west by telegraph.

The mid-day prayer meetings spread to Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Cincinnati, Pittsburg, St. Louis, Omaha, and then to the West Coast. In Chicago, a 21-year-old shoe salesman named Dwight L. Moody felt a call to Christian service. He would become one of the greatest evangelists in American history.

The period from 1857 to 1859 is considered one of the greatest awakenings of human hearts in American history. An estimated one million lives were changed at noon prayer meetings. It began in the upper lecture room of the old North Dutch Reformed Church on Fulton Street in Manhattan, with one patient man on his knees. His simple prayer, willing heart, and obedience led to a nationwide revival.