Charles Grandison Finney was born on August 29, 1792, in Warren, Connecticut, USA. He passed away at the age of 82 on August 16, 1875, in Oberlin, Ohio. Finney was a contentious American Presbyterian minister and revivalist during the Second Great Awakening in the United States. He is often referred to as the “Father of Old Revivalism.”

Charles Finney was an advocate for social justice. He spoke out against slavery and championed abolition. Finney often condemned slavery during his sermons, labelled it a “major national sin,” and denied Holy Communion to those who owned slaves.

He taught at Oberlin College, which was the first American educational institution to admit black students and women. Finney was appointed president of Oberlin College and held the position for more than a decade. He was an energetic individual, both in his personal life and while preaching. He is recognized as the first minister to use altar calls to motivate people to make a commitment to Christ.

The theological beliefs and doctrines of Charles Finney present an intriguing subject. Finney refuted the idea that humans inherit a sinful nature from Adam. He posited that our sinful behaviour stems from personal moral choices instead of being innate. In Finney’s view, Christ’s crucifixion was not primarily an atonement for sins but rather a clear indication of God’s commitment to upholding the Law. He considered the transformation of an individual’s morality to be the core of Christianity. According to Finney, it is the sinner who holds the responsibility for his own rebirth; although the Holy Spirit may guide the decision, the choice to attain salvation ultimately lies with the individual: “The sinner actually changes, and is therefore himself, in the most proper sense, the author of the change.” Finney dismissed a significant portion of conventional Reformed theology.

Charles Finney is famously recognized for presenting the concept of Christian perfection or sinless perfection. This belief is rooted in Matthew 5:48, where Jesus states, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” In his sermons about perfection, Finney posits that God would not demand perfection from us if it were unattainable. He takes care to differentiate between what he refers to as natural perfection, which relates to God’s “nature, essence, or constitution,” and moral perfection, defined as “perfect obedience to the law of God.”

Charles Finney declared that “the law of God requires perfect, disinterested, impartial benevolence, love to God and love to our neighbor. It requires that we should be actuated by the same feeling, and to act on the same principles that God acts upon; to leave self out of the question as uniformly as he does, to be as much separated from selfishness as he is; in a word, to be in our measure as perfect as God is. Christianity requires that we should do neither more nor less than the law of God prescribes” (Lectures to Professing Christians, Lecture 19). Finney held the view that Christians can fall away from their faith, potentially reaching a stage where they forfeit their salvation.

Finney’s view on eschatology was postmillennial, signifying that he thought the Millennium would commence prior to the Second Coming of Christ. He believed that Christians could usher in the Millennium by eliminating “great and sore evils” from the world.

Finney experienced widowhood twice and was married three times. In 1824, while residing in Jefferson County, he married Lydia Root Andrews (1804–1847), with whom he had six children. Following Lydia’s passing in 1848, he married Elizabeth Ford Atkinson (1799–1863) in Ohio. In 1865, he took Rebecca Allen Rayl (1824–1907) as his wife, also in Ohio. All three of Finney’s spouses joined him on his revival journeys and participated in his evangelistic work. Finney’s great-grandson, sharing the name Charles Grandison Finney, gained recognition as an accomplished author.