The wealth and complexity of his writings have had professional scholars and trainee local preachers alike debating his theology and values ever since. While the country-wide character of his pastoral and preaching activity generated enthusiasm and helped raise the Methodist profile, Wesley also had energy enough to write, write as well as to “ride, ride” (as the 1970s Wesley musical had it). During the half century since his conversion experience in Aldersgate Street, he and his brother Charles, together with countless local networks of inspired Methodists, had re-energised the expression of Christian faith in Britain, arguably transforming it quite as radically as other of the nation’s great Church reformers. John Wesley died on Wednesday March 2, 1791, aged 88. John Wesley on his deathbed © 2016 Thinkstock UK, a division of Getty Images Words by Andrew Pratt © 2008 Reproduced by permission of Stainer & Bell Ltd You can also download this article as a PDF Reproduced on StF+ with kind permission of the Methodist Recorder. This article was first published in the Methodist Recorder’s Hymns and Spirituality series, 2015-16.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |