Theology of John Wesley

Review

Last week we covered a ton of ground on the person of John Wesley. His background and history.

“A brand plucked from the fire.”

“Replacement child”

“Methodical by nurture, Methodist by name later”

I presented 3 dates to you as particularly critical:

Dates of Trajectory for JW

Aldersgate: May 24, 1738

Fetter Lane Watch Night: January 1, 1739

Kicked out of St. Mary’s Cathedral: August 24, 1744

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Today I want to introduce Wesley as a theologian.

primitive church

historically Christian

Practical theologian

Wesley: Practical Theologian

Wesley as a Practical Theologian

Wesley emphasized various types of divinity such as "practical," "speculative "controversial," "positive," "comparative," "mystic," and even the phrase "plain old Bible divinity," to articulate the full range of theological reflection. At times Wesley used the terms experimental and practical divinity interchangeably.

Practical Divinity

Practical divinity is participatory and engaging. It entails nothing less than the actualization and verification of the truths of Scripture with respect to inward religion by grace through faith) within the context of the Christian community.

Christians, in other words, test the truth of Scripture for themselves within the church.

Wesley had in reality become a specialist in the doctrines of sin and salvation whereby he took very seriously "the cure of souls.

Wesley's practical divinity is clearly a viable way of doing theology in its orientation to the mission of the church, in its attentiveness to the realization of Scriptural truth, and in its service to the poor.

So the difference is that he is not a primary systematic theologian in that he is not trying to exhaustively search out all possible knowledge of God. Wesley is not concerned with covering every nook.

Albert Outler called him “the most important Anglican theologian in his century.”

but this does not mean in the way we typically think of theologians, I think. Wesley’s theology comes out on the ground floor in an Anglican way in sermons, liturgy, prayers, creeds, journals, letters, etc.

His preface to his Sermons on Several Occasions:

“I have accordingly set down in the following sermons what I find in the Bible concerning the way to heaven, with a view to distinguish this way of God from all those which are the inventions of men. I have endeavored to describe the true, the scriptural, experimental religion, so as to omit nothing which is a real part thereof, and to add nothing thereto which is not.”

His goal was not epistemology (how we know) or cosmology (what we know). But practical and on the ground floor.

Style of Wesley’s Theology

Wesley develops a “third alternative,” to Pelagian optimism and Augustinian pessimism.

Who knows what I am referring to here? St. Augustine and Pelagius controversy?

Pelagius is the 5th century Welsh monk that eventually is pushed out of the boundaries of Christianity by subsequent councils for his view of human agency in salvation.

Pelagian optimism: Believed that humans were basically good and We have the natural capacity not to sin, he argued, and therefore are able to follow the example of Christ without a prior transformation of the heart.

August: This view was vigorously opposed by Augustine, who argued salvation was by grace alone, and that we are not free from sin until God changes our hearts through Christ.

Wesley: For Wesley grace is not irresistible (as it is for the Calvinists) but enabling, restoring our capacity to respond to God. Predestination, he believes, contradicts the biblical affirmation that God is love.

Conjunctive Theologian

Wesley lives in these tensions. Not either/or but both/and...

Such a style of theological reflection, sophisticated and well nuanced in many respects, has resulted in the designation that Wesley was a "conjunctive" theologian. Thus, the most able and consistent interpretations of Wesley's theology have realized that it is ever a matter of "both/ and" and not "either/ or." Indeed, the intricate theological synthesis that Wesley painstakingly crafted held together the grand project of much of his theological career, namely, the task of articulating "faith alone" and "holy living." Outler observes: It is easy for us to miss the originality of this Wesleyan view of faith alone and holy living held together. Here was a great evangelist preaching up sola fide and, at the very same time, teaching his converts to go on to perfection and to expect it in this life! His critics were quick to notice this strange move and to seize upon it as proof of Wesley's inconsistency. Actually, it was yet another of Wesley's characteristic "third alternatives"—maybe his most original one.

Examples:

faith alone and holy living

law and gospel

grace and works

grace as both favor and empowerment

justification and sanctification

instantaneous and process

universality of grace and limited actualization

divine initiative and human response

Holy Love and Grace

Hold together both of these realities.....

Holiness as Holy Love: The First Half of the Axial Theme

Wesley in a letter to "John Smith" in 1745 observes: "God would first, by this inspiration of his Spirit, have wrought in our hearts that holy love without which none can enter into glory."

Moreover, Wesley notes that this law is none other than the "law of love, the holy love of God and of our neighbor."

Thomas Oord and Michael Lodahl maintain that holiness equals love; but this is a tautology. Holiness describes something about love that we might otherwise miss.

For Wesley holiness as "simplicity and purity" informs God's love and sets it apart from all other loves. The love revealed at Golgotha is not just any love.

Avoids the error of theological liberalism in which "love" is equated with self will, the will of preferred political groups, or with sentimentality

Avoids the error of modern holiness teachers who have understood holiness apart from love, and at times in a dour, legalistic and unloving way.

Grace: The other Half of the Conjunction

The dynamic and intricate axial theme of Wesley's theology embraces, of course, not simply holiness (and the moral law) but grace as well.

Just as holiness was explicated in terms of the conjunction of holy/love so too is grace the summary of a number of key conjunctions in Wesley's theology

The Conjunctions of Grace:

Works of God alone: “We allow, it is the work of God alone to justify, to sanctify, and to glorify; which three comprehend the whole of salvation.”

Favor/Empowerment:

“Undeserved favor”

“the power of the Holy Ghost.”

Receiving and Responding:

Responding to the divine initiatives

receiving what are the gifts of God alone

Believers must receive before they can respond

This receiving (extending the hand) to receive the gift) is not really a human "work" at all, but is an openness, almost in a passive sense, that preserves the integrity of personhood in its measure of freedom (rejecting all forms of determinism) in order to receive what gifts are given not on the basis of prior co-operation but on the basis of the merits of Christ alone.

Instantaneous and Process

Theologian of the Ordo Salutis

Two questions are key in Wesley’s theology:

How do I become Christian?

How do I remain Christian?

Humanity in God’s Image

natural image: liberty, understanding and will

political image: humanity is the conduit of God’s blessing for creation

Moral image: righteous and true holiness

natural and political images are marred by the fall, but the moral image was completely shattered

The fall

in it’s adamic state, all of humanity’s faculties conformed to the moral law

Original sin

Humanity fell in Adam and with Adam

Calvinism

total depravity

Grace is the only way