Francis Asbury's admonition to preachers

As Francis Asbury drew closer to the end of his life his health was in terrible condition, however he refused to quit preaching. His traveling companion reflected, "Such was the shattered state of his lungs in the latter part of his life, that it afflicted him very much to preach: especially to large congregations. His cough was always greatly irrited by it."

Asbury said, "Ah! I may always calculate on losing half the nights sleep at least, after preaching in the day. But I will freely give that, to have an opportunity of inviting poor sinner to my blessed Savior." He was determined that nothing should have precedence over preaching to the lost. He advised his preachers: "Preach as if you had seen heaven and its celestial inhabitants and had hovered over the bottomless pit and beheld the tortures and heard the groans of the damned."