It was Christmas day in 1766, in a poor Welsh home, that a baby boy was born. His parents decided to name him Christmas.

As a child, after the death of his father, Christmas Evans had no opportunity for an education. When he was fifteen he still could not read. But at the age of eighteen he was born again through the work of an evangelistic Presbyterian minister. At that point, excited about the things of God, by serious application, in a matter of weeks Christmas learned to read his Bible. In the following months he read every book available to him, and he began to learn Hebrew, Greek and English as well.

Intending to become a Protestant preacher, he started preparing a message against the Anabaptists. In the process he studied what the Bible taught about baptism and learned the truth. At the age of twenty-two he was immersed in the River Duar by the Baptist pastor, Timothy Thomas. And soon after, he began to preach the gospel of free grace.

Christmas Evans went on to become one of the most God-blessed Welsh preachers in history. He led hundreds of his country-men to Christ and helped to establish dozens of churches. The exact numbers have been lost to history.
He was six feet tall, built like an athlete, and he had only one eye, the other apparently was sown shut. The picture of Christmas Evans in “The Baptist Encyclopedia” makes him look like he had a perpetual wink. After his death, on this day (July 19) in 1838, Robert Hall said of him, “He was the tallest, stoutest, greatest man he ever saw; that he had but one eye, if it could be called an eye; it was more a brilliant star; it shined like Venus! And could lead an army through a forest on a dark night.”