DAY 11
Methodist Theology
Read: First Kings 12
John Wesley taught a theology of grace. He wrote about salvation and the disciplines taught as means of grace toward entire salvation. What is “entire salvation” about, as if you could be partially saved?
Well, I have never met a human being, who could give the ultimate reality of the entire understanding of God. I sense that Wesley is correct in his teaching that entire salvation comes in death. In other words, our journey is incomplete until we make it home. Allow me the joy of expressing this theology by comparing it to a baseball diamond. Being in New York, as well as being a Yankees’ fan, what I’m about to do is a departure for me, but to make my point and stay true to my Methodist roots,
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Justifying Grace is first base. (Some might argue that it should be 2nd base.)
Today some call God's justifying grace "conversion" or being "born again." When we experience God's justifying grace, we come into that new life in Christ. Wesley believed that people have freedom of choice. We are free to accept or reject God's justifying grace.
3. Regenerating Grace is second base. (Some might argue that it should be 1st base.)
The Wesleyan argument would be that there no regeneration before new birth, so that regeneration follows being born again. The strangeness in the warming of the heart is life transforming by which in dying with Christ, believers are regenerated unto the new life with Christ.
4. Sanctifying Grace is third base.
Wesley believed that, after we have accepted God's grace, we are to move on in God's sustaining grace toward perfection. Wesley believed the people could "fall from grace" or "backslide." We cannot just sit on our laurels, so to speak, and claim God's salvation and then do nothing. We are participants in what Wesley called "the means of grace" and continue to grow in Christian life.
5. Glorifying Grace is home plate. The goal is that in time, “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians
Grace is freely given favor or pardon, unmerited, unconditional god-like love. This grace has been shown in the many instances of unmerited love and forgiveness freely given in the book, The Grace That Keeps This World. In the beginning of the story, Kevin and his Dad, Gary Hazen, were at odds with one another. After the tragic accident where Gary Hazen accidentally shot his son, and Officer Roy’s fiancé, Gary David, Kevin, and his father, Gary Hazen, and Officer Roy, all extended grace toward one another. Then Gary extended grace toward himself. This grace helped to emotionally and physically sustain them, hence the title The Grace That Keeps This World.
John Wesley read Isaac Watts at Oxford and was familiar with his writings and theology Further, there can be no doubt that Wesley greatly respected Watts as a theologian. In a 1765 journal entry Wesley wrote of his positive relationship with the Dissenters, although, "... many of them did, however, differ from me both in opinions and modes of worship. I have the privilege to mention Dr. Doddridge, Dr. Watts, and Mr. Wardrobe." (1) Wesley thought so highly of some of Watts' theology that he included forty-four pages of Watts' text on original sin, The Ruin and Recovery of Human Nature, in his own volume titled, On Original Sin. (2) That Watts and John Wesley had a relationship of mutual respect, and that Wesley recognized Watts' preeminent reputation
Reason is the first of the complimentary Quadrilateral factors. Wesley’s belief went against that of the “Enlightenment Period” which believed that reason was above scripture. This is confirmed by Wesley’s ideology that scripture is first and through scripture we gain faith and faith comes through hearing the Word of God. He also belie...
May (1988) writes that “grace is the active expression of God’s love” (p. 120), which is the ultimate desire of all humans. Grace is a difficult concept to understand because there is nothing a person can do to receive it; rather, it is freely given as a gift from God. Grace is given to all who believe in Him, regardless of their sins. Guilt is almost always attached to addiction. The Christian counselor can use the concept of spiritual grace and the supporting theology to help the client change his or her feelings of guilt into feelings of hope for personal change and forgiveness through
When beginning to work to understand Wesley’s Scripture way of salvation in his sermons, it is perhaps best to start with his sermon titled The Scripture Way of Salvation, preached in 1765. In this sermon, Wesley again clarifies what he means by the word salvation. He states early in his message that “[…] the salvation which is here spoken of might be extended to the entire work of God, from the first dawning of grace in the soul till it is consummated in glory.” Here Wesley is reminding Christians that salvation is an ongoing process that starts with prevenient grace that is with Christians from the time we are born and works to prepare Christians to live in Christ, then moves to justifying grace that actually brings Christians into living in Christ, and then finally ends with sanctifying grace that moves Christians on to perfection. And if salvation is an ongoing process, then one could potentially assume that there must be other things happening continually as well throughout it.
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith… it is a gift of God” (NIV). Grace, according to Merriam Webster Dictionary is defined as “unmerited divine assistance given humans for their regeneration or sanctification,” (Theopedia) but is more commonly defined as God giving us what we don’t deserve. God’s grace was presented to us in the form of hi only Son, Jesus, dying on the cross so that we could go to heaven. Now that it is understood what grace is and what form the gift of grace came in, the remaining question is who the gift of grace available to. John Calvin and Jacobus Arminius had different views on to whom grace was imparted but only through careful study and examination of scripture can the truth be found.
Grace is arguably the most important idea in the Bible, Christianity, and the universe. Grace is “the love of God shown to the unlovely; the peace of God given to the restless; the unmerited favor of God,” (Holcomb). It’s the idea that humans are granted salvation by God, and that He has the ability
On the issue of predestination Wesley held that “God has decreed that those who believe will be saved; those who do not believe will not be saved” (p. 174, Abraham). Wesley went ever farther in the “God makes the decree, but the decree does not exclude genuine human agency and freedom; indeed, it builds the exercise of such freedom into the very content of the decree” (p. 174, Abraham). He held that if one would come to God that they should have no doubts about their salvation. God has a drive for our salvation but it is an active choice that we must make, even those God knows what the decision will be from the very beginning.
Wesley thought there was "nothing of greater consequence" than the doctrine of atonement. Without belief in the atonement, religion becomes merely deism, Wesley feared
The Dictionary of the Accademia della Crusca, dating from 16th century Italy, defines grace as "belleza... che rapisce altrui ad amore." Grace is beauty which seduces one unto love. Grace is the prayer before nourishment, it is the passing of power through blood, it is a classical muse, it is a verb, it is liberation, it is a head-ransom, it is a gazelle, it is simplicity, it is complexity, it is sanctifying, it is controversial, it is desired, it is metrical, it is ubiquitous, it is rare, it is actual. "Grace is in all, yet beyond all," quotes a medieval anchoress. According to Castiglione, grace springs from "that virtue opposite to affectation," as an unconscious extension of a certain je ne sais quoi within the soul. Grace is the nature of language, of number, of beat, of silence. Grace is pervasively elusive.
As the founder of the Methodist movement, and later the Methodist Church, it is important to examine John Wesley’s influence and worship within the church. Before the establishment of the Methodist Church, John Wesley frequented the scholars of his local university and realized there was more to Christianity than what he was receiving through the Anglican Church. He pondered what worship meant to him, what he believed, and in what capacity those two things should be undertaken.
Methodism began as a sect of the Anglican Church founded by John Wesley, an educated, articulate theologian and pastor who focused at least as much on the heart as on the head. Born in 1703, John Wesley was the “fifteenth of nineteen children born to Samuel and Susanah Wesley,” (Cairns 382). His father was the pastor of a small church called Epworth. His parishioners, to say the least, did not care for him. Bruce Heydt says that “their worldly ways and fierce independence left little room in their hearts for a curate who took his work too seriously,” (Heyd...
Grace In order to completely understand the theology of grace. you have to take a look at Augustine, Aquinas, Luther. Rahner, Segundo, and Boff, and how they understood what. grace was.
I believe in the three types of grace that John Wesley believed in and preached on. These three types of grace given by God are Prevenient, Justifying, Sanctifying Grace. God’s grace is free and open to anyone. The first type of grace, prevenient, “it is an elemental form of grace found in everyone.” It is the spark that exists within us that opens humans up to the concept of God. Humans don’t ask for Prevenient Grace, it just exists. “That is the significance of Prevenient Grace. God seeks us before we ever seek
Rainey, David. "The Established Church and Evangelical Theology: John Wesley's Ecclesiology." International Journal of Systematic Theology 12, no. 4 (2010): 420-434.