John Wesley

John Wesley
File:Jwesleysitting.JPG
Born	June 28 [O.S. June 17] 1703 Epworth, Lincolnshire, England
Died	March 2, 1791(1791-03-02) (aged 87)
Nationality	British
Education	Charterhouse School Christ Church, Oxford
Occupation(s)	Preacher and theologian
Known for	Founder of the Methodist movement
Spouse	Mary Wesley (née Vazeille)
Parent	Samuel & Susanna Wesley

For other people named John Wesley, see John Wesley (disambiguation).

John Wesley (/ˈwɛslɪ/) (28 June [O.S. 17 June] 1703 – 2 March 1791) was an Anglican cleric and Christian theologian who founded the Arminian Methodist movement. The Wesley Methodist Movement was thought to begin when Wesley took over open-air preaching started by George Whitefield at Hanham Mount, Kingswood, Bristol.

In contrast to George Whitefield's Calvinistic Methodism, which preached a doctrine of pre-destination, Wesley believed that each person could be saved by faith in God. Methodism in both forms was a highly successful evangelical movement in the United Kingdom, which encouraged congregants to experience Christ personally.

Wesley was a brilliant organizer and formed societies throughout England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. He divided his religious societies further into classes and bands, small groups that developed intensive personal accountability and religious instruction among members. His great contribution was to appoint itinerant, unordained preachers who travelled widely to evangelise and care for people in the societies. Young men who acted as their assistants were called "exhorters". Expanding active roles for new people was a way to bring more people into the church, in addition to spreading the word of salvation.

Under Wesley's direction, Methodists became leaders in many social justice issues of the day, including prison reform and abolitionism movements. Wesley's contribution as a theologian was to propose a system of opposing theological stances. His greatest theological achievement was his promotion of what he termed "Christian Perfection," or holiness of heart and life. Wesley insisted that in this life, the Christian could come to a state where the love of God, or perfect love, reigned supreme in one's heart. His evangelical theology, especially his understanding of Christian perfection, was firmly grounded in his sacramental theology. He continually insisted on the general use of the means of grace (prayer, Scripture, meditation, Holy Communion, etc.) as the means by which God transformed the believer.

Throughout his life, Wesley remained within the Church of England and insisted that his movement was well within the bounds of the Anglican Church. His maverick use of church policy put him at odds with many within the Church of England, though toward the end of his life he was widely respected.

Youth

"Remembering John Wesley", Wroot, near Epworth

John Wesley was born in 1703 in Epworth, 23 miles (37 km) of Lincoln, England, the fifteenth child of Samuel Wesley and his wife Susanna Annesley. His father was a graduate of Oxford and Church of England rector. In 1689 Samuel had married Susanna Annesley, twenty-fifth child of Dr. Samuel Annesley, a Puritan pastor. Wesley's parents had both become members of the Established Church (Anglican Church) early in adulthood. Susanna bore Samuel Wesley nineteen children. In 1696 Wesley was appointed rector of Epworth, where John, the fifteenth child, was born.

At the age of five, John was rescued from the burning rectory. This escape made a deep impression on his mind, and he regarded himself as providentially set apart, as a "brand plucked from the burning". As was typical of many families, the Wesley parents gave their children their early education. Each child, including the girls, was taught to read as soon as one could walk and talk. In 1714 at age 11, John was sent to the Charterhouse School, London (under the mastership of John King from 1715), where he lived the studious, methodical and, for a while, the religious life in which he had been trained at home. During his early years, Wesley had enjoyed a deep religious experience. The early biographer Tyerman said that the boy went to Charterhouse a saint but became negligent of his religious duties and left a sinner. John Wesley also experienced trauma as he was picked on by children of his own age; they took his underpants, tore them from his rear end, and made him eat them. Descriptions of this in his own diary were stated to have "created a trembling in his own hands", but also gave him a more reverent "fear of God, for if mere children do these things, could not also God do worse?"

The beginning of the revival

John Wesley's house on City Road, London. (January 2006)

Wesley returned to England depressed and beaten. It was at this point that he turned to the Moravians. Wesley had encountered the Moravians three years earlier on his voyage to Georgia. At one point in the voyage a storm came up and broke the mast off the ship. While the English panicked, the Moravians calmly sang hymns and prayed. This experience led Wesley to believe that the Moravians possessed an inner strength which he lacked. His Aldersgate experience of 24 May 1738, at a Moravian meeting in Aldersgate Street, London, in which he heard a reading of Luther's preface to the Epistle to the Romans, and penned the now famous lines "I felt my heart strangely warmed", revolutionized the character and method of his ministry. The previous week he had been highly impressed by the Pentecostal sermon of Dr. John Heylyn, whom he was assisting in the service at St Mary-le-Strand, an occasion followed immediately by news of the death of his brother Samuel. A few weeks later, Wesley preached a remarkable sermon on the doctrine of personal salvation by faith, which was followed by another, on God's grace "free in all, and free for all."

Wesley Statue at Indiana Wesleyan University

Though his understanding of both justification and the assurance varied throughout his life, Wesley never stopped preaching the importance of faith for salvation and the witness of God's Spirit with the belief that one was, indeed, a child of God.

Wesley allied himself with the Moravian society in Fetter Lane. In 1738 he went to Herrnhut, the Moravian headquarters in Germany, to study. On his return to England, Wesley drew up rules for the "bands" into which the Fetter Lane Society was divided, and published a collection of hymns for them. He met frequently with this and other religious societies in London, but did not preach often in 1738, because most of the parish churches were closed to him.

Wesley's Oxford friend, the evangelist George Whitefield, upon his return from America, was also excluded from the churches of Bristol. Going to the neighbouring village of Kingswood, in February 1739, Whitefield preached in the open air to a company of miners. Later he preached in Whitefield's Tabernacle. Wesley hesitated to accept Whitefield's call to copy this bold step. Overcoming his scruples, he preached the first time at Whitefield's invitation sermon in the open air, near Bristol, in April of that year.

Wesley was unhappy about the idea of field preaching as he believed the Anglican Church had much to offer in its practice. He would earlier have thought that such a method of saving souls was "almost a sin." Wesly recognized the open-air services were successful in reaching men and women who wouldn't enter most churches. From then on he took the opportunities to preach wherever an assembly could be gotten together, more than once using his father's tombstone at Epworth as a pulpit. Wesley continued for fifty years — entering churches when he was invited, and taking his stand in the fields, in halls, cottages, and chapels, when the churches would not receive him.

Late in 1739 Wesley broke with the Moravians in London. Wesley had helped them organize the Fetter Lane Society; and those converted by his preaching and that of his brother and Whitefield had become members of their bands. But he believed they fell into heresy by supporting quietism, so he decided to form his own followers into a separate society. "Thus," he wrote, "without any previous plan, began the Methodist Society in England." He soon formed similar societies in Bristol and Kingswood, and wherever Wesley and his friends made converts.

Persecutions; lay preaching

From 1739 onward, Wesley and the Methodists were persecuted by clergymen and magistrates because they preached without being ordained or licensed by the Anglican Church. This was seen as a social threat that disregarded institutions. Ministers attacked them in sermons and in print, and at times mobs attacked them. Wesley and his followers continued to work among the neglected and needy. They were denounced as promulgators of strange doctrines, fomenters of religious disturbances; as blind fanatics, leading people astray, claiming miraculous gifts, attacking the clergy of the Church of England, and trying to re-establish Catholicism.

Wesley felt that the church failed to call sinners to repentance, that many of the clergymen were corrupt, and that people were perishing in their sins. He believed he was commissioned by God to bring about revival in the church; and no opposition, or persecution, or obstacles could prevail against the divine urgency and authority of this commission. The prejudices of his High-church training, his strict notions of the methods and proprieties of public worship, his views of the apostolic succession and the prerogatives of the priest, even his most cherished convictions, were not allowed to stand in the way.

Unwilling that people should perish in their sins and unable to reach them from church pulpits, Wesley began field preaching. Seeing that he and the few clergymen cooperating with him could not do the work that needed to be done, he was led, as early as 1739, to approve local preachers. He evaluated and approved men and women who were not ordained by the Anglican Church to preach and do pastoral work. This expansion of lay preachers was one of the keys of the growth of Methodism.

Chapels and organizations

As his societies needed houses to worship in, Wesley began to provide chapels, first in Bristol at the New Room, then in London and elsewhere. The Bristol chapel (1739) was at first in the hands of trustees; a large debt was contracted, and Wesley's friends urged him to keep it under his own control, so the deed was cancelled, and he became sole trustee. Following this precedent, all Methodist chapels were committed in trust to him until by a "deed of declaration", all his interests in them were transferred to a body of preachers called the "Legal Hundred."

When disorder arose among some members of the societies, Wesley adopted giving tickets to members, with their names written by his own hand. These were renewed every three months. Those deemed unworthy did not receive new tickets and dropped out of the society without disturbance. The tickets were regarded as commendatory letters.

When the debt on a chapel became a burden, it was proposed that one in twelve members should collect offerings regularly from the eleven allotted to him. Out of this, under Wesley's care, grew, in 1742, the Methodist class-meeting system. In order to keep the disorderly out of the societies, Wesley established a probationary system. He undertook to visit each society regularly in what became the quarterly visitation, or conference. As the number of societies increased, Wesley could not keep personal contact, so in 1743 he drew up a set of "General Rules" for the "United Societies." These were the nucleus of the Methodist Discipline, still the basis.

General Rules: It is therefore expected of all who continue therein that they should continue to evidence their desire of salvation,

First: By doing no harm, by avoiding evil of every kind . . . ;

Secondly: By . . . doing good of every possible sort, and, as far as possible, to all . . . ;

Thirdly: By attending upon all the ordinances of God

As the number of preachers and preaching-places increased, doctrinal and administrative matters needed to be discussed; so the two Wesleys, with four other clergymen and four lay preachers, met for consultation in London in 1744. This was the first Methodist conference. Two years later, to help preachers work more systematically and societies receive services more regularly, Wesley appointed "helpers" to definitive circuits. Each circuit included at least thirty appointments a month. Believing that the preacher's efficiency was promoted by his being changed from one circuit to another every year or two, Wesley established the "itinerancy", and insisted that his preachers submit to its rules. When, in 1788, some objected to the frequent changes, Wesley wrote, "For fifty years God has been pleased to bless the itinerant plan, the last year most of all. It must not be altered till I am removed, and I hope it will remain till our Lord comes to reign on earth."

Ordination of ministers

Life-size statue at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, KY

As the societies multiplied, they adopted the elements of an ecclesiastical system. The space between Wesley and the Church of England widened. The question of division from that church, urged, on the one side, by some of his preachers and societies, but most strenuously opposed by his brother Charles and others, was apparent. Wesley refused to leave the Church of England, believing the Anglican church to be "with all her blemishes, [...] nearer the Scriptural plans than any other in Europe". In 1745 Wesley wrote that he would make any concession which his conscience permitted, in order to live in peace with the clergy. He could not give up the doctrine of an inward and present salvation by faith by itself. He would not stop preaching, nor dissolve the societies, nor end preaching by lay members. As a clergyman within the Established Church, he had no plans to go further. "We dare not," he said, "administer baptism or the Lord's Supper without a commission from a bishop in the apostolic succession."

When in 1746 Wesley read Lord King on the Primitive Church, he became convinced that the concept of the apostolic succession in the Anglican Church was a fiction. He wrote he was "a scriptural episkopos as much as many men in England." Many years later Stillingfleet's Irenicon led him to decide that ordination could be valid when performed by a presbyter rather than a bishop. Forty years later, Wesley ordained by his own "laying on of hands", but that was only for those who would serve outside of England.

In 1784 Wesley ordained preachers for Scotland, England, and America, with power to administer the sacraments. He believed he had waited long enough for the Bishop of London to ordain a minister for the American Methodists, who were without the sacraments after the American Revolutionary War. The Anglican Church had been disestablished in the United States, where it had been the state church in most of the southern colonies. The Church of England had not yet appointed a United States bishop to what would become the Protestant Episcopal Church in America. Wesley consecrated Dr. Thomas Coke by laying on of hands. Coke was already a presbyter in the Church of England. Wesley appointed him to be superintendent of Methodists in the United States. He also ordained Richard Whatcoat and Thomas Vasey as presbyters. Wesley intended that Coke and Asbury (whom Coke ordained) should ordain others in the newly founded Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States.

His brother Charles grew alarmed and begged Wesley to stop before he had "quite broken down the bridge," and not embitter his [Charles'] last moments on earth, nor "leave an indelible blot on our memory." Wesley replied that he had not separated from the church, nor did he intend to, but he must and would save as many souls as he could while alive, "without being careful about what may possibly be when I die." Although Wesley rejoiced that the Methodists in America were free, he advised his English followers to remain in the established church; and he himself died within it.

Advocacy of Arminianism

Wesley entered controversies as he tried to enlarge church practice. The most notable of his controversies was that on Calvinism. His father was of the Arminian school in the church. Wesley came to his own conclusions while in college, and expressed himself strongly against the doctrines of Calvinistic election and reprobation.

Whitefield inclined to Calvinism. In his first tour in America, he embraced the views of the New England School of Calvinism. When in 1739 Wesley preached a sermon on Freedom Of Grace, attacking the Calvinistic understanding of predestination as blasphemous, as it represented "God as worse than the devil," Whitefield asked him not to repeat or publish the discourse, as he did not want a dispute.

Wesley published his sermon anyway. Whitefield was one of many who responded. The two men separated their practice in 1741. Wesley wrote that those who held to unlimited atonement did not desire separation, but "those who held 'particular redemption' would not hear of any accommodation."

Whitefield, Harris, Cennick, and others, became the founders of Calvinistic Methodism. Whitefield and Wesley, however, were soon back on friendly terms, and their friendship remained unbroken although they travelled different paths.

In 1770 the controversy broke out anew with violence and bitterness, as people's view of God related to their views of men and their possibilities. Toplady, Berridge, Rowland, Richard Hill, and others were engaged on the one side, and Wesley and Fletcher on the other. Toplady was editor of The Gospel Magazine, which had articles covering the controversy.

In 1778 Wesley began the publication of The Arminian Magazine, not, he said, to convince Calvinists, but to preserve Methodists. He wanted to teach the truth that "God willeth all men to be saved." A "lasting peace" could be secured in no other way.

Doctrines and theology

20th century Wesley scholar Albert Outler argued in his introduction to the 1964 collection John Wesley that Wesley developed his theology by using a method that Outler termed the Wesleyan Quadrilateral. In this method, Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in Scripture; and the Bible was the sole foundational source of theological or doctrinal development. The centrality of Scripture was so important for Wesley that he called himself "a man of one book" -- meaning the Bible -- although he was well-read for his day. However, he believed that doctrine had to be in keeping with Christian orthodox tradition. So, tradition was considered the second aspect of the Quadrilateral.

Wesley contended that a part of the theological method would involve experiential faith. In other words, truth would be vivified in personal experience of Christians (overall, not individually), if it were really truth. And every doctrine must be able to be defended rationally. He did not divorce faith from reason. Tradition, experience and reason, however, were subject always to Scripture, Wesley argued, because only there is the Word of God revealed 'so far as it is necessary for our salvation.'

The doctrines which Wesley emphasized in his sermons and writings are prevenient grace, present personal salvation by faith, the witness of the Spirit, and sanctification. Prevenient grace was the theological underpinning of his belief that all persons were capable of being saved by faith in Christ. Unlike the Calvinists of his day, Wesley did not believe in pre-destination, that is, that some persons had been elected by God for salvation and others for damnation. He understood that Christian orthodoxy insisted that salvation was only possible by the sovereign grace of God. He expressed his understanding of humanity's relationship to God as utter dependence upon God's grace. God was at work to enable all people to be capable of coming to faith by empowering humans to have actual existential freedom of response to God.

Wesley defined the witness of the Spirit as: "an inward impression on the soul of believers, whereby the Spirit of God directly testifies to their spirit that they are the children of God." He based this doctrine upon certain biblical passages (see Romans 8:15-16 as an example). This doctrine was closely related to his belief that salvation had to be "personal." In his view, a person must ultimately believe the Good News for himself or herself; no one could be in relation

Sanctification he described in 1790 as the "grand depositum which God has lodged with the people called `Methodists'." Wesley taught that sanctification was obtainable after justification by faith, between justification and death. He did not contend for "sinless perfection"; rather, he contended that a Christian could be made "perfect in love." This love would mean, first of all, that a believer's motives, rather than being self-centred, would be guided by the deep desire to please God. One would be able to keep from committing what Wesley called, "sin rightly so-called." By this he meant a conscious or intentional breach of God's will or laws. A person could still be able to sin, but intentional or wilful sin could be avoided.

Secondly, to be made perfect in love meant, for Wesley, that a Christian could live with a primary guiding regard for others and their welfare. He based this on Christ's quote that the second great command is "to love your neighbor as you love yourself." In his view, this orientation would cause a person to avoid any number of sins against his neighbour. This love, plus the love for God that could be the central focus of a person's faith, would be what Wesley referred to as "a fulfillment of the law of Christ."

Wesley believed that this doctrine should be constantly preached, especially among the people called Methodists. In fact, he contended that the purpose of the Methodist movement was to "spread scriptural holiness across [England]." His system of thought has become known as Wesleyan Arminianism, the foundations of which were laid by Wesley and Fletcher (see Jacobus Arminius, Arminianism).

Three comparatively recent works which explain Wesley's theological positions are Randy Maddox's 1994 book Responsible Grace: John Wesley's Practical Theology, Kenneth J. Collins' 2007 book The Theology of John Wesley: Holy Love and the Shape of Grace, and Thomas Oden's 1994 book John Wesley's Scriptural Christianity: A Plain Exposition of His Teaching on Christian Doctrine.

Personality and activities

Statue of John Wesley at Wesley's Chapel City Road, London. (January 2006)

Wesley traveled constantly, generally on horseback, preaching two or three times a day. Stephen Tomkins writes that he "rode 250,000 miles, gave away 30,000 pounds, . . . and preached more than 40,000 sermons[.]"

He formed societies, opened chapels, examined and commissioned preachers, administered aid charities, prescribed for the sick, helped to pioneer the use of electric shock for the treatment of illness, superintended schools and orphanages, received at least £20,000 for his publications, but used little of it for himself. His charities were limited only by his means. He died poor. He rose at four in the morning, lived simply and methodically, and was never idle if he could help it.

He is described as below medium height, well proportioned, strong, with a bright eye, a clear complexion, and a saintly, intellectual face. He married very unhappily at the age of forty-eight to a widow, Mary Vazeille, and had no children. Vazeille left him fifteen years later. He died peacefully, after a short illness, leaving as the result of his life-work 135,000 members, and 541 itinerant preachers under the name "Methodist." He is buried in a small graveyard behind Wesley's Chapel in City Road, London.

Despite his achievements, he never quite overcame profound self-doubt. At the age of 63, he wrote to his brother, "I do not love God. I never did. Therefore I never believed, in the Christian sense of the word. Therefore I am only an honest heathen...And yet, to be so employed of God!"

Wesley died on Wednesday 2 March 1791, in his eighty-eighth year. As he lay dying, his friends gathered around him, Wesley grasped their hands and said repeatedly, "Farewell, farewell." At the end, summoning all his remaining strength, he cried out, "The best of all is, God is with us," lifted his arms and raised his feeble voice again, repeating the words, "The best of all is, God is with us."

Literary work

Wesley was a logical thinker, and expressed himself clearly, concisely and forcefully in writing. His written sermons are characterized by spiritual earnestness and simplicity. They are doctrinal but not dogmatic. His Notes on the New Testament (1755) are enlightening. Both the Sermons (about 140) and the Notes are doctrinal standards. Wesley was a fluent, powerful and effective preacher. He usually preached spontaneously and briefly, though occasionally at great length.

As an organizer, a religious leader and a statesman, he was eminent. He knew how to lead and control men to achieve his purposes. He used his power, not to provoke rebellion, but to inspire love. His mission was to spread "Scriptural holiness"; his means and plans were such as Providence indicated. The course thus mapped out for him he pursued with a determination from which nothing could distract him.

Wesley's prose Works were first collected by himself (32 vols., Bristol, 1771–74, frequently reprinted in editions varying greatly in the number of volumes). His chief prose works are a standard publication in seven octavo volumes of the Methodist Book Concern, New York. The Poetical Works of John and Charles, ed. G. Osborn, appeared in 13 vols., London, 1868–72.

Besides his Sermons and Notes already referred to, are his Journals (originally published in 20 parts, London, 1740-89; new ed. by N. Curnock containing notes from unpublished diaries, 6 vols., vols. i.-ii., London and New York, 1909-11); The Doctrine of Original Sin (Bristol, 1757; in reply to Dr. John Taylor of Norwich); "An Earnest Appeal to Men of Reason and Religion (originally published in three parts; 2d ed., Bristol, 1743), an elaborate defence of Methodism, describing the evils of the times in society and the church; a Plain Account of Christian Perfection (1766).

Wesley adapted the Book of Common Prayer for use by American Methodists. In his Watch Night service, he made use of a pietist prayer now generally known as the Wesley Covenant Prayer, perhaps his most famous contribution to Christian liturgy.

In spite of the proliferation of his literary output, Wesley was challenged for plagiarism for borrowing heavily from an essay by Samuel Johnson, publishing in March 1775. Initially denying the charge, Wesley later recanted and apologized officially [See Abelove, H. 1997. John Wesley’s plagiarism of Samuel Johnson and its contemporary reception. The Huntington Library Quarterly, 59(1) 73–80].

Legacy

Statue of John Wesley outside Wesley Church in Melbourne, Australia

Today, Wesley's influence as a teacher persists. He continues to be the primary theological interpreter for Methodists the world over; the largest Wesleyan bodies being the United Methodist Church, the Methodist Church of Great Britain, the African Methodist Episcopal Church and the Wesleyan Church. The teachings of Wesley also served as a basis for the Holiness movement, from which Pentecostalism, parts of the Charismatic movement, the Church of the Nazarene and the Christian and Missionary Alliance are offshoots. Wesley's call to personal and social holiness continues to challenge Christians who struggle to discern what it means to participate in the Kingdom of God.

Wesley's legacy is also preserved in Kingswood School, which he founded in 1748 in order to educate the children of the growing number of Methodist preachers. He is commemorated in the Calendar of Saints of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America on 2 March with his brother Charles Wesley, and in some calendars of churches of the Anglican Communion.

One of the four form houses at the St Marylebone Church of England School, London, is named after John Wesley.

Wesley is listed as #50 on the BBC's list of the 100 Greatest Britons.

References

• Daniel B. Stevick. The altar's fire. Charles Wesley's Hymns on the lord's supper, 1745. Introduction and exposition. Peterborough: Epworth, 2004, Pp. xix+276.

See also

• The Supernatural Occurrences of John Wesley
• Alexander Knox (1757-1831)
• Dusty Miller, Methodist martyr of World War II.
• List of Methodist theologians

External links

• John Wesley at the Christian Classics Ethereal Library
• Sermons by John Wesley
• John Wesley as a British abolitionist
• John Wesley info from the United Methodist Church
• John Wesley and the Anglo-Catholic Revival, by G.W. Taylor 1905 article.
• John Wesley in the Georgia Encyclopedia
• Wesley's Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible produced between 1754 and 1765
• BBC Humber article on Wesley's life
• Epworth Bells newspaper, History of the Wesleys

Further

John Wesley after attending a performance in Bristol Cathedral in 1758 said: "I went to the cathedral to hear Mr Handel's Messiah. I doubt if that congregation was ever so serious at a sermon as they were during this performance. In many places, especially several of the choruses, it exceeded my expectation." Byers, D. 2008. Handel in Ulster Orchestra programme Friday 12 & Saturday 2008. Belfast Waterfront.