John Wesley and the History of Methodism — Unit 1: Who Are the People Called Methodists?

Key Verse

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." (Matthew 22:37-39, NKJV)

Learning Objectives

When you finish this unit, you should be able to:

1. Explain where the name "Methodist" came from and what it meant when it was first used.

2. Describe John Wesley in a few sentences and say how Methodism began as a renewal movement inside the Church of England.

3. State the central Wesleyan teachings: salvation for all, grace that goes before us, justification by faith, the new birth, assurance, and holiness of heart and life.

4. Name the main churches of the conservative Wesleyan family today and say how they are related.

5. Give a fair statement of two objections to Methodism, and the Wesleyan answer to each.

The Voice of This Course

This course is written from inside the Wesleyan tradition, for students who belong to it or want to understand it. It is conservative and evangelical. It holds that the Bible is the inspired Word of God and our final authority, and it confesses one God in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. When the course says "we" or "our tradition," it means the Wesleyan-Holiness churches and the evangelical Methodists who keep the doctrine of John Wesley.

Not every church that carries the name Methodist keeps that doctrine. Some older Methodist bodies have been shaped by theological liberalism, which questions the authority of Scripture. We describe this honestly and we do not adopt it. Other Christians, and many historians, see Wesley and his movement differently from the way we do. We state their views fairly and then give our answer. Scripture says, "Test all things; hold fast what is good" (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

Why Begin with a Name?

Many of you pastor churches with the word Methodist, Wesleyan, Nazarene or Free Methodist on the sign. Who are the people called Methodists, and why do they have this name? The name was not chosen by the first Methodists. It was given to them by others, and it was meant as a joke.

Where the Name Came From

In the late 1720s a small group of students met at Oxford University in England. They prayed together, studied the Bible, received the Lord's Supper often, fasted on certain days, and visited prisoners and the poor. They kept a strict daily schedule. Other students laughed at them and gave them several nicknames. One of these was "Methodists," a word pointing to their careful method of living. Another nickname was the "Holy Club." The next unit tells their story.

In time the first Methodists accepted the name. Wesley cared less about the name than about the life that Scripture describes.

What did that life look like? In 1742 Wesley published a short tract called The Character of a Methodist. Its main point is that a true Methodist is a person who loves God with all the heart and loves his neighbor as himself. This is exactly the teaching of our key verse. Wesley said that the Methodists were not marked out by special opinions, by a style of worship, or by outward customs. They were marked by love, a love that is the gift of the Holy Spirit and that shows itself in a holy life. Methodism is not mainly a set of rules or a church structure. At its heart it is a way of salvation and a way of life, rooted in the love of God.

John Wesley in Brief

John Wesley was born in 1703 in the village of Epworth, England, and he died in 1791. He was a priest of the Church of England. He was educated at Oxford, taught there, and became a leader of the Oxford students just described. In 1738 he had an experience of assurance of faith that changed his preaching, and from 1739 he traveled through Britain and Ireland, preaching to crowds and organizing those who believed into small groups. Later units give the details.

Wesley never intended to leave the Church of England, and he lived and died as one of its priests. His brother Charles wrote thousands of hymns that taught the people the faith. George Whitefield, a friend from Oxford, preached with great power on both sides of the Atlantic. Lay preachers, mostly working men, carried the message into villages where no clergyman went. Out of this work came societies, classes and bands in Britain, and after the American Revolution an independent church in America in 1784. In the nineteenth century the Holiness movement produced new churches such as the Wesleyan Methodists (1843), the Free Methodists (1860) and the Church of the Nazarene (1908). Each of these will have its own unit.

What Methodists Believed

Wesley was a practical man, and he did not think of himself as an inventor of new doctrine. He said that he taught the faith of the Bible and of the early church, as the Church of England had received it. Still, certain truths stand out in his preaching, and they became the marks of the tradition. This course will return to them often.

Scripture first. Wesley described himself as a man of one book. He wrote Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament to help ordinary readers, and his sermons are full of Scripture. "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:16). Our tradition teaches that the Bible is the final rule of faith and life.

Salvation is for all. Wesley taught that Christ died for every person, and that God sincerely invites everyone to be saved. "For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:3-4). This is the truth that sent the Methodists into fields and streets to preach to anyone who would listen.

Grace goes before us. Wesley taught that no one can turn to God without God's help. Sin has damaged us so deeply that we cannot save ourselves. But God does not leave us alone. His grace comes first, awakening the conscience and drawing the sinner toward Christ. This is called prevenient grace, a word that means "grace that comes before." Because of it, every person is able to respond to the gospel, and every person is responsible for the response.

Justification by faith. We are accepted by God not by our works but by faith in Christ, who died for our sins. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9). Here Wesley stood with the Reformers.

The new birth and assurance. Justification is what God does for us. The new birth is what God does in us. The Holy Spirit gives new life, and He also witnesses to the believer that he is a child of God. "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Romans 8:16). Wesley taught that a Christian may know that he is saved.

Holiness of heart and life. God does not only forgive; He changes. Wesley taught that the goal of salvation is to be renewed in the image of God and made perfect in love. Nazarene and Wesleyan churches teach that God can cleanse the believer's heart entirely, by faith, in a moment, as a second work of grace after new birth. Some Methodists have understood Wesley's "Christian perfection" as a more gradual growth. Course 3 treats this carefully. Our tradition leans toward the first view, and we present the second fairly. Both views agree that holiness is the purpose of the gospel and that we must not stop short of it.

How Wesley Judged His Teaching

Modern writers often speak of the "Wesleyan quadrilateral," a four-part rule of Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. It is a useful summary, but we should use it with care. The word was coined in the twentieth century by the scholar Albert Outler. Wesley himself never used it. Historians debate how to read it. Some say it puts four sources of authority side by side. Others say that Wesley put Scripture first and used the other three to understand and apply it, not to correct it.

We follow the second reading, and we think Wesley's own words and practice support it. He tested everything by the Bible. Tradition helped him to see how the church had read the Bible. Reason helped him to think clearly about it. Experience confirmed it in the lives of believers. But if an experience did not agree with Scripture, Wesley set it aside. This matters for pastors today. We value the work of the Spirit in the heart, but we do not trust a feeling that contradicts the Word.

The Wesleyan Family Today

The churches that come from Wesley's movement are many, and they differ in structure and sometimes in doctrine. For the purposes of this course, the conservative mainstream includes the following.

• The Church of the Nazarene, one of the largest of the Holiness bodies, with churches on every continent.

• The Wesleyan Church, formed from the Wesleyan Methodists and a Pilgrim body.

• The Free Methodist Church, which began in 1860.

• The Global Methodist Church, formed in 2022 by evangelical Methodists who left the United Methodist Church or hoped to leave it.

• Methodist churches in Latin America and Africa that keep Wesley's doctrine. The Iglesia Metodista de México is one that you may know.

The United Methodist Church, formed in the United States in 1968, is a large Methodist body that has been divided in recent years over questions of biblical teaching, especially about marriage and the authority of Scripture. We tell this story in Unit 9, as history. We hold that the doctrine of Scripture is the deeper question under all such disputes.

Questions Historians and Critics Ask

Was Methodism a church or a movement?

Historians disagree about what Wesley wanted. Some say that he always meant to renew the Church of England and never to found a church. Others say that his actions, such as ordaining ministers for America in 1784, show that a separate church was in the end the logical result. Both are partly right. Wesley wanted renewal, and he stayed in the Church of England all his life. But when the American colonies lost their Anglican clergy in the war, he saw a need that his own church could not meet, and he acted. We hold that Methodism began as a movement of renewal and became a church because the mission required it. Wesley's concern was always for souls.

Did Methodism change a nation?

The French historian Élie Halévy argued in the early twentieth century that Methodism helped to keep England from the kind of violent revolution seen in France, by giving working people hope and discipline. Later historians, including E. P. Thompson, argued the opposite: that Methodism taught the poor to accept their situation and so harmed them. Other historians have answered that Methodists built schools, cared for the sick and the poor, and trained many working men as speakers and leaders. Wesley himself spoke and wrote against the slave trade, and he gave much of his own money to the poor. The more important point is that Wesley's goal was not to shape politics. It was to bring people to Christ and to holiness. Social change followed, as the fruit of changed hearts.

Two Objections and Our Answers

Objection 1: Methodism is only emotion. In Wesley's day, critics in the Church of England called the Methodists "enthusiasts," meaning people who claimed to be moved by God without any sound basis. Today some say the same of any teaching on assurance and the new birth.

Our answer. Wesley took this charge seriously. He did not teach that feelings are the proof of salvation. He taught that assurance rests first on the promises of Scripture and then on the inner witness of the Spirit, and that the fruit of the Spirit confirms both. "By their fruits you will know them" (Matthew 7:20). He also wrote and preached against fanaticism and against the claim to special revelation that goes beyond the Bible. A Methodist is to be warm in heart and clear in mind.

Objection 2: A teaching of holiness leads to pride or to salvation by works. Reformed critics say that if believers can be made holy, they will boast, and that the gospel of grace is in danger.

Our answer. Wesley agreed that salvation is by grace through faith alone and that no one earns it. He taught that holiness itself is a gift received by faith, and that the more a person is filled with God's love, the more humble he becomes. "Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on" (Philippians 3:12). The Wesleyan teaching is not "I have arrived" but "I belong wholly to God, and I must go on." Later units, especially in Course 3, give the full answer.

Pastoral Application

A pastor in a growing town serves a small church that has the word Methodist on its sign. A young couple visits, and afterward the wife asks him, "What does it mean that you are Methodist? Is it just a name, like a family name?"

First, the pastor does not answer with a list of rules. He tells her that the name began as a joke and became a calling, and that it points to a life of love for God and neighbor.

Second, he explains in plain sentences that Christ died for everyone, that we are saved by faith and born again by the Spirit, and that God wants to make us holy.

Third, he invites the couple to join a small group where they can learn these truths with others, as the first Methodists did.

Fourth, he keeps the conversation open. If they come from a church with a different view, he honors them as brothers and sisters in Christ.

Summary

The name "Methodist" began at Oxford in the late 1720s as a nickname for a small group who lived by a strict method of prayer, study and service. John Wesley (1703-1791), an Anglican priest, became their leader, and with his brother Charles, George Whitefield and many lay preachers he led a renewal movement that spread through Britain and America. Wesley taught the authority of Scripture, salvation for all, prevenient grace, justification by faith, the new birth, assurance, and holiness of heart and life. He is best understood as a man of one book who used tradition, reason and experience to serve Scripture. His family of churches today includes the Nazarene, Wesleyan, Free Methodist and Global Methodist churches and many Methodist churches in Latin America and Africa. Historians ask whether Methodism was a church or a movement, and whether it helped or harmed the working poor. Critics charge it with emotion and with a holiness doctrine that leads to pride. We answer from Scripture and Wesley's own teaching.

Further Reading

• John Wesley, The Character of a Methodist (1742).

• John Wesley, The Journal of John Wesley.

• John Wesley, Sermons on Several Occasions, especially "Salvation by Faith" and "The Scripture Way of Salvation."

• John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament (1755).

• John Wesley, The Nature, Design, and General Rules of the United Societies (1743).

• Charles Wesley, hymns, in A Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodists (1780).

• Holiness Through the Ages (Coleman, Danielson and Parry), the CTS textbook.

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