Bridging the Gap: Applying John Wesley

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Bridging the Gap Applying John Wesleys
Discipleship Model to 21st Century Africa
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Primary source

• Henderson, D. Michael. John Wesleys Class
  Meeting A Model for Making Disciples. Nappanee,
  Indiana Evangel/Francis Asbury, 1997.

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Secondary sources

• Collins, Kenneth J. The Theology of John Wesley
  Holy Love and the Shape of Grace. Nashville
  Abingdon, 2007.
• Heitzenrater, Richard P. Wesley and the People
  Called Methodists. Nashville, Tennessee Abingdon
  Press, 1995.

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• Pollock, John. John Wesley. Wheaton, Illinois
  Harold Shaw, 1989, 1995.
• Snyder, Howard A. The Radical Wesley And Patterns
  for Church Renewal. Eugene, Oregon Wipf and
  Stock, 1996.
• Watson, David Lowes. The Early Methodist Class
  Meeting Its Origins and Significance. Nashville,
  Tennessee Discipleship Resources, 1987.

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• Tracy, Wesley Economic Policies and Judicial
  Oppression as Formative Influences on the
  Theology of John Wesley. Wesleyan Theological
  Journal, 271 (1992), 30-56.

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Our challenge as Nazarenes in 2010

• However, as the Church continued to develop
  through the centuries, outside influences began
  to dilute and diminish its initial impetus. The
  tight focus on making disciples was lost, and
  many other activities gained priority. The task
  of maintaining Church institutions began to usurp
  the role that was originally assigned to making
  disciples, and the once dynamic Christian
  movement began to fossilize from within.
• - Michael
  Henderson, p. 14

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Our Task Today

• What can early Methodism teach us about
  discipleship that can help us avoid the
  fossilizing described by Henderson?

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Conditions in Wesleys England

• Housing conditions were outrageous. Ten
  persons per unfurnished room was common. Horse
  manure polluted the unpaved streets. It was
  sometimes piled 14 feet high on both sides of the
  street in London. Diseases like typhoid,
  smallpox, dysentery, and cholera ravaged almost
  unchecked. Starvation was a daily reality which
  stalked the poorest.

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• Violent crimes were common. Gambling and
  gin-drinking became the national pastimes. Every
  sixth building in London was an alehouse. Sports
  included boxing, bullbaiting, cockfighting, and
  hangings. For the children there were the streets
  or the sweatshops. Schools? Only one child in
  every 25 attended any school of any kind.
• -- Wes Tracy

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I. Who was John Wesley?

• b.1703 d. 1791
• With his brother, Charles, George Whitefield and
  others, was Gods revival instrument through a
  movement in England known as Methodism.

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II. Theological foundations for Wesleys
discipleship model

• Salvation as Gods free gift
• (Eph. 28-10)
• Rejected particular predestination
• Accepted prevenient grace
• (John 19)

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The Wesleyan middle way

• Was John Wesley Reformed, Catholic, or both?
• George Croft Cell called Wesleys theology a
  necessary synthesis of the Protestant ethic of
  grace and the Catholic ethic of holiness.
• -- cited by Collins, p.
  289

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Wesleys synthesisFaith that works through love

• For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor
  uncircumcision means anything but faith working
  through love.
• Galatians 56,
  NASB

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Sample use of Galatians 56

• Be we then continually jealous over our
  souls, that there be no mixture in our intention.
  Be it our one view in all our thoughts, and
  words, and works, to be partakers of the divine
  nature, to regain the highest measure we can of
  that faith which works by love

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• let us then labour to be made perfectly
  whole to attain the fullest conquest over this
  body of death, the most entire renovation of our
  nature.
• -- in John Wesleys
  sermon,
• The One Thing Needful (Luke 1042)

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Ideas related to the faith that works by love

• perfect love (1 John 418)
• Loving God with all our heart, soul, mind, and
  strength, and loving neighbor as oneself (Mark
  1228-34)
• Christian perfection (Matt. 543-48) or holiness
  (Hebrews 1214)
• Entire sanctification (1 Thess. 523-24)

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Summary from Henderson and Collins

• John Wesley believed in the perfection of
  humanitys intentions and behavior by Gods
  grace.
• - Michael Henderson, p. 86

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• Christian perfection, then, is another term
  for holy love. It is holy in that believers so
  marked by this grace are free from the impurities
  and drag of sin. It is loving in that believers
  now love God as the goal of their being, and they
  love their neighbors as they should.
• Ken Collins, p.
  302

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III. Educational foundations Three aspects of
faith (Henderson)

• 1) Christian faith is cognitive.
• Love the LORD your God withall your mind
  (Mark 1230)

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• 2) Christian faith is behavioral.
• Faith that doesnt show itself by good
  deedsis dead and useless (James 217, NLT).

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• 3) Christian faith is affective.
• Love one another deeply, from the heart (1
  Peter 122b, NIV).

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• How would John Wesley combine these three
  aspects into the Methodist community of faith?

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IV. Wesleys method discipleship in
community
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On faith in community

• Holy solitaries is a phrase no more
  consistent with the gospel than holy adulterers.
  The gospel of Christ knows of no religion, but
  social no holiness but social holiness. Faith
  working by love is the length and breadth and
  depth and height of Christian perfection.
• -- from the Preface to the 1739
• Hymns and Sacred Poems

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When discipleship is neglected

• I was more convinced than ever that
  preaching like an Apostle, without joining
  together those that are awakened and training
  them up in the ways of God, is only begetting
  children for the murderer. How much preaching has
  there been for these twenty years all over
  Pembrokeshire! But no regular societies, no
  discipline,

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• no order or connexion and the consequence is
  that nine in ten of the once awakened are now
  faster asleep than ever.
• John Wesley, Journal, 25 August 1763

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• The pursuit of Christian perfection was the
  stated aim of the classes and bands, the arenas
  where perfectibility was tested on an individual
  basis. The declared mission of Methodism shows
  the broad-based aim of perfection - to reform
  the nation, particularly the church, and to
  spread scriptural holiness over these lands.
  Wesley Tracy, 48

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The Church defined

• A visible Church (as our Article defines it)
  is a company of faithful (or believing) people
  coetus credentium. This is the essence of the
  Church, and the properties thereof are (as they
  are described in the words that follow), that
  the pure word of God be preached therein, and the
  sacraments duly administered.
• - John Wesley, in An Earnest
  Appeal to Men of
• Reason and Religion
  cited by Snyder, p. 74

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Howard Snyder on Wesley and the sacraments

• Wesley believed that the sacraments,
  especially the Lords Supper, were necessary if
  not for the being, at least to the well-being of
  a Church.
• - citing Wesleys An Earnest Appeal in The
  Radical Wesley,
• p. 102

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John Wesleys vision

• By Methodists I mean a people who profess to
  pursue (in whatever measure they have attained)
  holiness of heart and life, inward and outward
  conformity in all things to the revealed will of
  God who place religion in an uniform resemblance
  of the great Object of it in a steady imitation

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• of him they worship in all his inimitable
  perfections more particularly in justice, mercy,
  and truth, or universal love filling the heart
  and governing the life.
• -- in Wesleys 1745 Advice to the People called
  Methodists

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• Unite the two so long disjoined, knowledge
  and vital piety.
• -- C. Wesley hymn sung at the opening of the
  Kingswood School for Children, 1748
  Heitzenrater, 168, 219

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A. Cognitive tool the Society

• The Methodist Societies ultimately came to
  fulfill both historic functions of the Church
• - Bible preaching
• - the Sacraments administered

City Road Chapel, London
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Under Wesley, the Society meetings included

• prayer
• singing
• preaching

The New Room, in Bristol
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Other aspects of the Society

• Often met on Sunday evenings, and were open to
  one and all at this time. The emphasis was
  preaching, both doctrinal and evangelistic.
• Other society meetings (at 5 a.m.) were by ticket
  only, given to members faithful to their class,
  and after a quarterly review by the preacher.

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Conclusion re. the cognitive role of the Society
meeting

• The major aim (of the society meeting) was to
  present Scriptural truth and have it clearly
  understood.
• - Henderson, p. 93

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B. Behavioral tool the class meeting

• To the class meeting must go much of the
  credit which many historians have attributed to
  Methodism for the radical transformation of
  Englands working masses. It was a triumph, not
  of any human personality, but of an ingenious set
  of instruments designed for behavioral change.
  Henderson, p. 93

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Marks of the Class Meeting

• Was required for all Society members
• Met weekly in the evening in peoples homes
• organized by geographical zone
• Included members fifteen years or older
• Was co-educational (i.e. male and female)
• had from 10-20 in attendance
• Included people from all social standings
• Only allowed visitors every other week
• Atmosphere of love and acceptance
• A place where seekers could come to faith and
  believers were strengthened in their faith

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How the Class Meeting unfolded

• Always began with a short hymn and a short prayer
• The class meeting leader (either male or female)
  will share briefly about their own spiritual
  condition.
• In turn, the leader will ask each class member
  Well sister, well brother, how do you find the
  state of your soul this evening?
• Each class member brought a penny offering for
  the support of the Society, esp. the poor.
• - from
  Watson, p. 96

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Conclusion re. the behavioral role of the Class
Meeting

• (Wesley) saw in the class meeting a return to
  the societal norms of the first-century
  Christians.
• - Michael Henderson,
  p. 105

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• The ignorant and ignored lower classes found
  in Wesleys system new dignity and new self
  respect. Rich and poor, educated and unlearned
  sat together as peers in Methodist classes and
  bands. This was new for the poor. They had no
  privileges, owned no property, did not have the
  right to vote. They held no memberships in clubs,
  and no one cared for their opinion. Yet, in
  Methodism, they counted.
• - Wes Tracy,
  48-49

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C. Affective tool the band

• Charles Wesley was the first Methodist since he
  began the Holy Club at Oxford
• It became a tool for spiritual growth and service
  for a handful of Oxford friends, including his
  brother, John

Charles Wesley, 1707-88
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• It was John Wesley who over the years refined
  the band concept, drawing on various sources,
  but especially from the Moravians.

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Mark of the bands

• Were not required, but were encouraged
• Were for believers only
• Composed of 5-6 individuals
• Were all of the same gender
• Were grouped together by age and marital status
• Met weekly

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No appointed leader, but structured on 5
questions

1. What known sins have you committed since our last
   meeting?
2. What temptations have you met with?
3. How were you delivered?
4. What have you thought, said, or done of which you
   doubt whether it be sin or not?
5. Have you nothing you desire to keep secret?

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Conclusion re. the affective role of the band

• Wesley had great regard for those who cared
  enough about him to ask him searching, probing
  questions concerning his inner life.
• -Henderson, p. 121

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General Conclusion from Henderson

• The design of the Wesleyan program had the
  goal of holiness in constant focus The societies
  proclaimed and explained the doctrine, the class
  meeting was designed to implement the behavioral
  quest for the holy lifestyle, and the bands
  facilitated the cultivation of inner purity and
  the purging of the attitudes. p. 115

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• Questions 15 minutes

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Bridging the Gap Applying John Wesleys
Discipleship Model to 21st Century Africa
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Where do we go from here?

• Session 2 2-3 p.m.
• Meet in your group of ten for 30 minutes for a
  trial class meeting, then combine to a group of
  twenty to discuss the questions in the last
  section of your handout.
• Session 3 4-5 p.m.
• Each groups spokesperson will give a 5 minute
  summary of findings from your group discussion.

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