The Foundation of Methodism: Deliverance from a Zeal for the Church

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On April 21, 1777, John Wesley preached a sermon on a very special occasion, the laying of the foundation of the New Chapel near the City-Road in London. The New Chapel would become the de facto headquarters of Methodism, which by this time had become a global movement. Wesley lived his last twelve years in the house next door, which was completed in 1779, and died there in 1791.

In the sermon he delivered onsite in 1777, Wesley rehearsed Methodism's success – the reach of the revival, he remarked immodestly, was matched only by "the purity of the religion which has extended itself so swiftly and deeply" – but he also addressed concerns that had arisen from it. The spread of Methodism, and the enthusiasm of its adherents, had led many to conclude that the movement represented an intrinsic threat to the unity of the established Church. 

Wesley's defense, while ingenious and heartfelt, laid bare Methodism's true foundation – an  ambivalent, even paradoxical, ecclesiology that has characterized the movement down through the generations, even to the present day.

To Wesley's superiors in the Church of England, the mere name of "Methodism" smacked of schism. To them, Wesley's practice of organizing semi-autonomous "societies" looked very much like planting new churches; his practice of commissioning and sending lay preachers looked very much like ordaining new priests; and his practice of procuring or building meeting houses looked very much like demarcating new parishes. The construction of a major Methodist Chapel in the heart of London seemed to confirm their suspicions that Wesley's real intent was to establish an independent church.

Well aware of this concern, Wesley addressed it head on as he solemnized the laying of the New Chapel's foundation. Methodism was no "new religion," he insisted. In fact, it was the "old religion, the religion of the Bible, the religion of the primitive Church, the religion of the Church of England." Rehearsing the argument he had made in an earlier sermon, "An Earnest Appeal to Men of Reason and Religion," he elaborated that this religion was "no other than love, the love of God and of all mankind; the loving God with all our heart, and soul, and strength, as having first loved us."

He distanced himself sharply from former colleagues who, having "contracted strong prejudices" against the Church of England, had separated formally from it. In leaving the Church of England, Wesley explained, men like George Whitefield and William Cudworth and Thomas Maxwell abandoned "any manner of connection with the original Methodists," as well. They were, Wesley insisted, "branches broken off from the tree" and the true Methodists could not be held accountable for their separation.

These true Methodists, Wesley went on, had "heard abundance" on the subject of separation, and in fact had "spent several days in a General Conference upon this very question: Is it expedient ... to separate from the Established Church?" Their answer was a decisive "no," a posture that Wesley heralded as "the peculiar glory of the Methodists. However convenient it might be, they will not, on any account or pretence whatever, form a distinct sect or party."

Before addressing directly these suspicions of schismatic intent, however, Wesley did something he liked to do on special occasions such as anniversaries and inaugurations - he rehearsed the founding of Methodism itself. He did so to prove his own intentions honorable, and to demonstrate that the wildfire spread of Methodism was not something he had conspired to organize. Rather, he argued, Methodism was "a work of God." 

Much of Wesley's rendering of the movement's early history will be familiar to even beginning students of Methodism. Wesley recalled how, as "a young student at Oxford [he] was much affected by reading Kempis's 'Christian Pattern' and Bishop Taylor's 'Rules of Holy Living and Dying.'" Across years he sought out companions to share the sincerity of his devotion, and those who finally joined him embraced the mocking moniker of "Methodists" that was given to them by a classmate. The group did not anticipate their efforts would live beyond their time at Oxford, but when he and his brother Charles were "induced, by a strange chain of providences, to go over to the new colony in Georgia," they determined to continue their rigorous practices there. Upon their return to England in early 1738, they earned both the mistrust of their superiors and a following that experienced explosive growth. 

Buried in this particular rendering, however, is a telling recollection. As Wesley told the story, the movement of spiritual renewal that came to be known as Methodism was unleashed only once he and others from within its inner core had been set loose from their unqualified devotion to the church.

In Georgia, Wesley remembered, both he and his brother Charles "were as vehemently attached to the church as ever," and they returned to England in 1738 "full of these sentiments of this zeal for the church, from which I bless God, he has delivered me." It was this deliverance that impelled him to preach his "unfashionable doctrine," to be "excluded from one and another church," and, finally, to make "a virtue of necessity" by preaching outdoors in the middle of Moorfields. The fruits born from this deliverance were abundant.  "Here were thousands upon thousands, abundantly more than any church could contain," he recalled, "and numbers among them, who never went to any church or place of public worship at all." 

"More and more of these," he continued, were "cut to the heart" and inquired "with utmost eagerness what they must do to be saved."  To this Wesley responded, "If all of you will meet on Thursday evening, I will advise you as well as I can." He went on: "Thus, without any previous plan or design, began the Methodist society in England - a company of people associating together, to help each other to work out their own salvation."

Within this story is found a simple truth, as Wesley understood it: the spiritual power of the early Methodist movement was set loose only when its leaders were "delivered" from their "zeal for the church." 

In Wesley's understanding, true Methodists abhor separation and division within the church AND AT THE SAME TIME they abhor an unwarranted "zeal for the church." The mission of Methodism - to "raise up a holy people" - can be fulfilled powerfully through institutionalized expressions of the Church, but the great temptation of those within the Church is to consider the institution God's primary concern. The institutional Church is not the mission of God in the world, and an undue devotion to the former can suck the lifeblood from the latter. Those who develop too great a passion for the church, as Wesley himself did in his early years, do so at the cost of great spiritual peril for themselves, and at the cost of great loss to the true work of God.

This ambivalent, even paradoxical, ecclesiology lies at the root of Methodism's founding, and it has characterized the movement down through the generations.(1) True Methodists abhor separation and division, but when push comes to shove they prioritize mission over a "zeal for the church."

In 1784, just seven years after laying the New Chapel's foundation, John Wesley ordained Thomas Coke and Francis Asbury to the work of superintendency in North America. His critics crowed that this action laid bare Wesley's true intentions, and made evident for all to see his lack of loyalty to the Church of England.

Without rehearsing this much-considered history, I prefer to take Wesley at his word that he did not seek out or desire separation from the established church.  But neither was he willing to compromise the mission God had given him for the sake of the church. His ecclesiology was neither establishmentarian nor sectarian.(2) Ultimately, he allowed for the possibility that the mission of Methodism allowed for a variety of institutional forms.

It is evident that in the sermon he delivered on April 21, 1777, Wesley knew his protestations would not satisfy his critics. And so he concluded with a plea for all, whatever their ecclesiastical position, to examine their own hearts:

Judge not one another; but every man look into his own bosom. How stands the matter in your own breast? Examine your conscience before God. Are you an happy partaker of this scriptural, this truly primitive, religion? Are you a witness of the religion of love? Are you a lover of God and all mankind? Does your heart glow with gratitude to the Giver of every good and perfect gift, the Father of the spirit flesh, who giveth you life, and breath, and all things; who hath given you his Son, his only Son, that you "might not perish, but have everlasting life?" Is your soul warm with benevolence to all mankind? Do you long to have all men virtuous and happy? And does the constant tenor of your life and conversation bear witness of this? Do you "love, not in word" only, "but in deed and in truth?" Do you persevere in the "work of faith, and the labor of Love?" Do you "walk in love, as Christ also loved us, and gave himself for us?" Do you, as you have time, "do good unto all men;" and in as high a degree as you are able?

And who, at the end of the day, will prove the "true" Methodist? Wesley's answer:

Whosoever thus "doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." 

And with this established, he closed with an appeal for unity of a spiritual kind and in the shared work of promoting the religion of love:

Whosoever thou art, whose heart is herein as my heart, give me thine hand! Come, and let us magnify the Lord together, and labor to promote his kingdom upon earth! Let us join hearts and hands in this blessed work, in striving to bring glory to God in the highest, by establishing peace and good-will among men, to the uttermost of our power! First. Let our hearts be joined herein; let us unite our wishes and prayers; let our whole soul pant after a general revival of pure religion and undefiled, the restoration of the image of God, pure love, in every child of man! Then let us endeavor to promote, in our several stations, this scriptural, primitive religion; let us, with all diligence, diffuse the religion of love among all we have any intercourse with; let us provoke all men, not to enmity and contention, but to love and to good works; always remembering those deep words, (God engrave them on all our hearts!) "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him!"

The Rev. John Fanestil, Ph.D. serves as pastor of  discipleship at First United Methodist Church in San Diego, Calif. He describes himself as  am "an educator, executive, pastor and historian of American religion, politics and culture. I try to write across the lines of faith and public life, and across political, cultural and geographic lines that divide us." This post is republished with permission from his blog, Across the Lines.