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Commentary
GEN-X RISING: True to our roots Andrew C. Thompson, Apr 3, 2007
Andrew C. Thompson
By Andrew C. Thompson Special Contributor
Going back to school offers me the great joy of providing some time to read. I experience that joy every day now, with the added bonus that most of my reading is centered on the Christian tradition.
And from time to time, I am reminded why I entered my doctoral program in the first place.
Reading some essays that John Wesley wrote late in life for his Arminian Magazine, this statement of his stopped me dead in my tracks: "I am not afraid that the people called Methodists should ever cease to exist either in Europe or America. But I am afraid lest they should only exist as a dead sect, having the form of religion without the power. And this undoubtedly will be the case unless they hold fast the doctrine, spirit, and discipline with which they first set out."
Wesley wrote those words in his "Thoughts Upon Methodism" in 1786, when he was into his ninth decade of life. He had lived to see Methodism spread to both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Because of the Revolutionary War, the Methodist movement in America had become a full-fledged church.
But Wesley was not one to rest on such outward "success."
He consistently feared that a decline was already setting in among his followers. They had grown wealthier and were forgetting their commitment to the poor. They had grown more comfortable and were failing to live lives of holiness. They had grown more headstrong and were clamoring (in Britain) to separate from the Church of England.
And so he was afraid that the Methodists' outward "success" would lead to a real failure: that they would become "a dead sect, having the form of religion without the power."
United Methodists today should take heed of his words. Our own church is at a pivotal point in its history.
After almost two centuries of growth, the past few decades have seen a significant decline in our numbers. Conventional wisdom about church renewal today often focuses on church-growth strategies. A return to "success" as a church is linked with more warm bodies in the pews of our churches. Of course, increased programs and increased budgets are considered further markers of success.
Wesley would have little patience for this thinking.
For Wesley, Methodist "success" is always linked with success in nurturing holiness of heart and life in believers. And this must be guided by the doctrine, spirit and discipline that marked the movement from its beginning.
So much of our current confusion over the inward life of the church and its outward witness to the world is based in an ignorance of our own history. But when we try to go about being Methodists today in a way that is disconnected from those things that guided Wesley in the beginning, confusion is what we should expect.
To put it another way, Methodist renewal depends on our holding doctrine, spirit and discipline together.
Renewal of the church in our day requires a commitment to doctrinal integrity. Such integrity forms the outward witness of the church to embody a spirit of evangelism and mission. It shapes the inward life of the church to embody the discipline of holy living.
For Wesley, doctrine, spirit and discipline are not just high-sounding ideals. They are the means by which we come to know God more fully. They thus allow us to walk the way of salvation.
Getting serious about church renewal will make many uncomfortable. Some who hold to orthodox doctrine have no stomach for the discipline of holy living. Others who live quite pious lives shy away from embracing an evangelistic spirit. Still others who are on fire for mission do not ground their zeal in right doctrine.
But it is exactly our tendency to separate the essentials of Methodism that makes a devotion to the whole of our tradition that much more important.
Focusing on numbers is misguided. If we learn to embrace the Wesleyan essentials of our faith, numbers will take care of themselves.
The Rev. Thompson is working on a doctoral program at Duke Divinity School. He blogs at www.genxrising.com.
Andrew C. Thompson
