|
HISTORICAL SUMMARY OF METHODISM
Early "Protracted" Methodist Camp Meeting
Methodism
is a name designating several Protestant groups. Methodism has its
roots in the work of John and Charles Wesley, sons of an Anglican
rector and his wife, Susannah. A friend and Oxford classmate of the
Wesleys, George Whitefield, was also instrumental in forming the Holy
Club (c. 1725), which stressed "inward religion, the religion of
the heart." These awakenings coupled with the club's insistence
on exacting discipline in scholastic as well as spiritual matters
earned its members the jeering title of "Methodists" by
1729.
In
1735 the Wesleys sailed to America as missionaries, but not before
John, a somewhat troubled young Anglican priest, noted: "My
chief motive is the hope of saving my own soul." In the spring
of 1738 John Wesley returned to England filled with a troubled sense
of failure. He was attracted to the piety and feelings of inward
assurance so notably evidenced among the Moravians. Wesley knew this
was lacking in his own life despite his outward discipline. He saw
himself failing to bear fruits of "inward holiness."
Convinced of the necessity for faith and the inner witness, Wesley
passed through a torturous spring, fearing that at the advanced age
of thirty five both life and God were passing him by.
Unwillingly,
he writes later, he was persuaded to attend a Bible study meeting on
May 24, 1738, in Aldersgate Street, where an unknown layman was
expounding on Luther's commentary on Romans. There, Wesley writes, "I
felt my heart strangley warmed. I felt I did trust Christ, Christ
alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken
away my sins." The Aldersgate experience, definitely a turning
point in Wesley's life, was not so much an outright conversion
experience of the type that came to be associated with the revival
movements of England and America as it was a firm receiving of
assurance of this priest's own salvation. Aldersgate was what Wesley
needed.
By
1739 the distinct and aggressively evangelistic and highly
disciplined Methodist movement spread like wildfire through field
preaching, lay preaching, bands, and societies. The "Rules of
Bands" demanded a highly disciplined life, an exacting schedule
of meetings in which the society members were expected to share
intimate details of their daily lives, to confess their sins to one
another, to pray for each other, and to exhort members of the class
toward inner holiness and good works. The enthusiasm of the revivals
came under the control of the bands or societies. The weekly prayer
meetings; the use of an itinerary system of traveling preachers; the
annual conferences; the establishment of chapels; the prolific
outpouring of tracts, letters, sermons, and hymns; and the general
superintendency of John Wesley became the hallmark of what emerged as
a worldwide Methodist movement.
Beginning
with Church of England congregations banning John Wesley from their
pulpits in 1738, before Aldersgate, tensions with the Established
Church were inevitable and eventually disruptive. As
the revivalistic awakening came to include Methodism, work extended
from England to Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, where a Calvinistically
oriented minority formally established themselves in 1764.
Soon lay
preachers were active in America, establishing circuits along the
midAtlantic states under the supervision of Francis Asbury, sent by
Wesley in 1771. In 1744 a conference was held in London and standards
for doctrine, liturgy and discipline were adopted. The Wesleys
maintained their personal ties (ordination) and devotion to the
Church of England with its emphasis on the sacraments and its
antipopery views. Episcopal in its organization, the Methodist
Connexion was autocratically controlled by John Wesley.
By
1784 Wesley concluded that no one individual would be a suitable
successor. He therefore moved to record a "Deed of Declaration"
in which he declared a group of one hundred of his most able leaders
(the "Legal Hundred") his legal successor. This established
that Methodist societies were now duly constituted as legal entities,
conceived of as ecclesicla in ecclesia but formally separate entities
from the Church of England. This also established the Annual
Conference as the primary authority in the Methodist system.
In
September of that same year Wesley yielded to American pressure to
have his preachers administer the sacraments by ordaining two lay
helpers as elders and Thomas Coke as general superintendent without
consulting with his conference. He was persuaded to this act by Peter
King's Account of the Primitive Church (1691) that presbyters held
the same spiritual authority as bishops to ordain in the early church
and by the Bishop of London's refusal in 1780 to ordain any of
Methodism's preachers in America. The three newly ordained men were
dispatched to build up the full work of Methodism in America.
At the
Christmas Conference in Baltimore in 1784 Coke ordained Asbury, and
the Methodist Episcopal Church was organized. Coke and Asbury were
elected general superintendents. A Sunday Service based on the Book
of Common Prayer and Twenty five Articles of Religion abridged by
Wesley from the Thirty nine Articles were adopted by the new
denomination.
Continuing
his work among the various societies, Wesley ordained a number of
presbyters in Scotland and England, and for the mission field. Unlike
Methodism in America, no formal separation was consummated in England
until after Wesley's death in 1791. A conciliar effort by the Church
of England in 1793 prompted a formal "Plan of Pacification"
in 1795. But final separation occurred in 1797, as the Rubicon had
been crossed in 1784, and the formal organization of Methodism was
well under way by the beginning of the nineteenth century.
In
England a number of Methodist bodies splintered from the main
Methodism movement. The Ecumenical Methodist Conferences formalized a
renewed conciliar spirit. From 1907 to 1933 various groups united to
become part of the Methodist Church. On July 8, 1969, a plan calling
for merger of the Methodist and Anglican communions faced defeat at
the hands of the Anglican Convocations where the concept of historic
episcopacy as an office and not an order proved unacceptable. In
Canada the Methodist Church of Canada joined with the Presbyterian
Church and selected Union Churches together with the Congregational
Churches to form the United Church of Canada.
In
the United States numerous Methodist - oriented bodies exists. Some
came into being in disputes over doctrinal issues. Others arose out
of social concerns. The Wesleyan Methodist Church, organized in the
1840s, drew its inspiration from Orange Scott, a New Englander
lacking formal education but committed to the Abolitionist movement.
The Methodist Protestant Church, opposing the episcopacy, separated
in 1828. By 1860 both doctrinal and social tensions were intense, and
the Free Methodist Church was founded, largely under the inspiration
of B T Roberts. In 1844 the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, was
formed over the slavery issue.
Other
significant Methodist denominations in the United States are the
African Methodist Episcopal (1816), the African Methodist Episcopal
Zion (1820), and the Christian Methodist Episcopal (1870), all black,
totaling more than 2.5 million members. The year 1939 brought the
reunion of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, the Methodist
Protestant Church, and the Methodist Episcopal Church to form The
Methodist Church.
A
group of German pietists under Jacob Albright were attracted to
Methodism and in 1807 organized the Newly Formed Methodist Conference
or the German Methodist Conference. The English speaking Methodist
lay preachers were unable to serve this German speaking immigrant
group, so the Evangelical Association was formed in 1816.
During this
same period Phillip Otterbein, friend of Asbury, together with Martin
Boehm founded the United Brethren in Christ among German speaking
immigrants with its organizing General Conference in 1815. In 1946
these two German immigrant churches merged to form the Evangelical
United Brethren (E U B) Church. With its ethnic distinctiveness on
the wane, and clearly Methodist in polity and theology, the E U B
merged in 1968 with The Methodist Church to form The United Methodist
Church.
Long
distinguished by an emphasis on practical faith, Methodism and its
various offshoots have sought to avoid a strict confessionalism. The
addition of a new section to the 1972 Discipline, "Our
Theological Task," which formalizes a posture of doctrinal
pluralism that appeals to Wesley's sermon "Catholic Spirit",
was an acknowledgment of the wide diversity of views within modern
Methodism over the proper balance of Wesleyan orthodoxy and a
theology of experience.
Concurrent
with this development North American Methodism is undergoing the
emergence of a neo Wesleyan theology associated with J Robert Nelson,
Albert Outler, Robert Cushman, and Carl Michalson. African Methodist
Episcopal minister James Cone combines the insights of black theology
with his Methodist heritage. John B Cobb, Jr, and Schubert M Ogden
explore their Wesleyan theology from the perspective of process modes
of thought.
Long distinguished by an emphasis on practical faith, Methodism and its
various offshoots have sought to avoid a strict confessionalism. The
addition of a new section to the 1972 Discipline, "Our Theological
Task," which formalizes a posture of doctrinal pluralism that appeals
to Wesley's sermon "Catholic Spirit", was an acknowledgment of the wide
diversity of views within modern Methodism over the proper balance of
Wesleyan orthodoxy and a theology of experience. It can be easily said
that Wesleyan Methodism emphasizes the doctrine of sanctification,
which is nothing more than a desire and commitment to become
Christ-like in one’s personal life and build a life of character.
Currently, two evangelically based Methodist renewal groups are calling
Methodism to return to its traditional Wesleyan theological heritage.
(Adapted
from an essay by P. A. Mickey
Elwell
Evangelical Dictionary)
Bibliography
F
A Norwood, ed., Sourcebook of American Methodism; E S Bucke, ed., The
History of American Methodism; H Bett, The Spirit of Methodism; H
Carter, The Methodist Heritage; W J Townsend, H B Workman, G Eayrs,
eds., A New History of Methodism; C H Crookshank, History of the
Methodist Church in Ireland; G Smith, History of Wesleyan Methodism;
W F Swift, Methodism in Scotland; W W Sweet, Methodism in American
History; M Simpson, ed., Cyclopedia of Methodism; M Edwards,
Methodism and England; G G Findlay and W W Holdsworth, The History of
the Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Church; F F MacLeister, History of
the Wesleyan Methodist Church of America; R Chiles, Theological
Transition in American Methodism; T A Langford, Practical Divinity.
|
About Us 
