One of John Wesley’s most controversial beliefs was that Christians could achieve perfection in this life. Since this could only be the work of the Holy Spirit, on this first Sunday after Pentecost, Pastor Anne introduced us to what Wesley thought about perfection, why he thought it, and how it came back to bite him.
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“Sola Scriptura!” was the rallying cry of the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century; Scripture alone was to guide our lives and decisions. John Wesley had a more nuanced view than the earlier reformers, and Wesley scholars have come to call his approach to making decisions the “Quadrilateral.” This sermon, being delivered on Mother’s Day 2024, also celebrates Susanna Wesley, John Wesley’s mother, and the impact she had on John’s education and spiritual development.
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We’ve already visited two of Wesley’s “Means of Grace” in Communion and Baptism. But there are more. In this sermon, Pastor Anne Robertson invites us to look at how Wesley saw meeting together in “holy conferencing” as a means of receiving God’s grace. In addition and as an example, she reviewed some of the most significant decisions made at the 2024 General Conference which ended 2 days prior to her delivery of this sermon.
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With Earth Day approaching, we’ll look at the plain text of that question: “Can we still save the earth as a home fit for human habitation?” But we’ll also look at what John Wesley thought about the theological aspects of that question: “Can this planet be redeemed?” Wesley had some thoughts on whether it was really only people that God was concerned with redeeming.
— Pastor Anne
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Last week we looked at the sacrament of Holy Communion and why John Wesley called it a “Means of Grace.” He gave that label to baptism, too, so this week we’ll look at the various ways that Christians baptize, and what it means for us when we do it the way we do.
— Pastor Anne
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While still under the year’s umbrella of “A Time for Choosing,” we’re going to be spending the spring taking a closer look at Methodism. At the end of April, the General Conference of our denomination is going to be making some enormous choices of its own; and it will be all over the news. Many of our members (including me!) came from other denominations or from no church background at all; so, it seemed like a good time for a refresher about why United Methodists do things the way we do them and how those are either like or unlike other Christian churches. Since this is a communion Sunday, we’ll start with that, and what Methodism’s founder, John Wesley, meant by the phrase, “Means of Grace.” See you Sunday!
— Pastor Anne
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