Wesley Corpus

Wesley's usual style when trying to demonstrate the nature of something (in this case, a Methodist), began with an examination what it wasn't. In this paragraph Wesley claims that as far as beliefs go, Methodism is mainstream Christianity. Along with other Christian denominations we share basic beliefs about Jesus, God, sin, salvation, etc. When you compare Methodists with, say, Baptists, Pentecostals, or Episcopalians, most of what they believe they believe in common. Methodists differ from the Catholic church - and this difference is common to other Protestant churches (Baptists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, etc., are all considered Protestant churches) - in a reliance on the bible as the “sufficient rule both of Christian faith and practice.” (Note: In the 18th century they called the Catholic church, the “Romish” church sometimes.) Two questions to discuss: What beliefs “strike at the root of Christianity?” What beliefs have you observed that you have in common with friends from other churches? Have you noticed in peculiarly Methodist ways of talking? Which movements or groups in our world today should we be contrasting ourselves with? 2. Neither are words or phrases of any sort. We do not place our religion, or any part of it, in being attached to any peculiar mode of speaking, any quaint or uncommon set of expressions. The most obvious, easy, common words, wherein our meaning can be conveyed, we prefer before others, both on ordinary occasions, and when we speak of the things of God. We never, therefore, willingly or designedly, deviate from the most usual way of speaking; unless when we express scripture truths in scripture words, which, we presume, no Christian will condemn. Neither do we affect to use any particular expressions of Scripture more frequently than others, unless they are such as are more frequently used by the inspired writers themselves. So that it is as gross an error, to place the marks of a Methodist in his words, as in opinions of any sort. This was truer in Wesley's day than today. All groups that continue for any length of time develop peculiar vocabularies and ways of speaking. Wesley's objective was to - as he said elsewhere - “speak plain truth for plain people.” Though high educated, he sought to speak in a way that his audiences could understand. He didn't baby them or coddle them, but he started where they were.