WESLEY'S RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE.
MR. WESLEY'S religious experience deserves special notice. If he was
raised up by God for any purpose, it was to revive spiritual
Christianity, which included justification by faith, entire
sanctification, and the witness of the Holy Spirit. To understand his
own experience on these doctrines is the object of this chapter.
Let us first notice the external religious life which Mr. Wesley
maintained prior to the wonderful change which occurred soon after his
return from America. From his journals we learn that he said prayers
both public and private, and read the Scriptures and other good books
constantly. He experienced sensible comfort in reading a Kempis,
resulting in an entire change in his conversation and life. He set apart
two hours each day for religious retirement, and received the sacrament
every week. He watched against every sin, whether in word or deed. He
shook off all his trifling acquaintances, and was careful that every
moment of his time should be improved. He not only watched over his own
heart, but urged others to become religious. He visited those in
prison, assisted the poor and sick, and did what he could with his
presence and means for the souls and bodies of men. He deprived himself
of all the superfluities and many of the necessaries of life that he
might help others. He fasted twice each week, omitted no part of
self-denial which he thought lawful, and carefully used in public and
private at every opportunity all the means of grace. For the doing of
these things he became a byword, but rejoiced that his name was cast out
as evil. His sole aim was to do God's will and secure inward holiness.
Sometimes he had joy, sometimes sorrow; sometimes the terror of the law
alarmed him, and sometimes the comforts of the Gospel cheered him. He
had many remarkable answers to prayer, and many sensible soul comforts.
Let us next notice Mr. Wesley's estimate of his own religious state at
this time.
He found that he had not such faith in Christ as kept his heart from
being troubled in time of danger, for in a storm he cried unto God every
moment, but in a calm he did not. His words he discovered to be such as
did not edify, especially his manner of speaking of his enemies. By
these he was convinced of unbelief and pride. He gives a dark picture of
his state at this time, much darker than the light of after years
justified. "I went to America," he says, "to convert the Indians, but
O, who shall convert me? O, who will deliver me from this fear of
death?"
On landing in England he writes: "It is now two years and almost four
months since I left my native country in order to teach the Georgia
Indians the nature of Christianity, but what have I learned myself in
the meantime? Why, what I least of all expected--that I, who went to
America to convert others, was never myself converted to God."
He further says: "This, then, have I learned in the ends of the
earth--that I am fallen short of the glory of God, alienated from the
life of God; I am a child of wrath, an heir of hell."
In later years, when carefully reconsidering his early experience, Mr.
Wesley was not disposed to form the same severe judgment of his
religious state. He wisely added several qualifying remarks which should
not be omitted when his early language is employed. He could not say
that he was not converted at this time, or that he was a child of wrath.
To the expression, "I was never myself converted to God," is added this
note: "I am not sure of that," strongly intimating that he believed he
was then converted.
To the expression, "I am a child of wrath, an heir of hell," is added
this note: "I believe not." It seemed to his own mature judgment that
he was not the wretched sinner he had fancied himself to be in those sad
hours of his early history. He says, "I had then the faith of a
_servant_, though not that of a _son_." What he means by this expression
may be gathered from a sermon which he preached some fifty years later.
He says: "But what is the faith which is properly saving? what brings
eternal salvation to all those that keep it to the end? It is such a
divine conviction of God and the things of God as even in its infant
state enables everyone that possesses it to fear God and work
righteousness. And whosoever in every nation believes thus far, the
apostle declares, is accepted of him. He actually is at that very moment
in a state of acceptance. But he is at present only a _servant_ of God,
not properly a _son_. Meantime let it be well observed that the 'wrath
of God' no longer abideth on him.
"Indeed, nearly fifty years ago, when the preachers commonly called
Methodists began to preach that grand scriptural doctrine, salvation by
faith, they were not sufficiently apprised of the difference between a
servant and a child of God. They did not clearly understand that
everyone who feareth God and worketh righteousness is accepted of him.
In consequence of this they are apt to make sad the hearts of those whom
God hath not made sad. For they frequently asked those who feared God,
'Do you know that your sins are forgiven?' And upon their saying 'No,'
immediately repeated, 'Then you are a child of the devil.' No, that does
not follow. It might have been said (and it is all that can be said with
propriety), 'Hitherto you are a _servant_; you are not a _child_ of
God.' The faith of a child is properly and directly a divine conviction
whereby every child of God is enabled to testify, 'The life that I now
live I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself
for me.' And whosoever hath this, the Spirit of God witnesseth with his
spirit that he is a child of God."
Again he says: "The faith of a servant implies a divine evidence of the
invisible world so far as it can exist without living experience.
Whoever has attained this, the faith of a servant, 'feareth God and
escheweth evil;' or, as is expressed by St. Peter, 'feareth God and
worketh righteousness.' In consequence of which he is in a degree, as
the apostle observes, 'accepted with him.' Elsewhere he is described in
these words: 'He that feareth God and keepeth his commandments.'"
A careful examination of these quotations will convince anyone that the
difference in Mr. Wesley's opinion between being a _servant_ and a _son_
is not that one is converted and the other is not, not that one is
accepted by God and the other rejected, but that one has the direct
witness of the Spirit that he is a child of God and the other has not.
This was Wesley's religious state when he returned to England. He was
not that lost soul, that heir of hell, which he reckoned himself to be,
but an accepted servant of God without the direct witness of the Spirit
to his sonship.
Meeting Peter Boehler, February 7, 1738, he (Boehler) was made the
instrument of a great blessing to his soul. Boehler was a Moravian, nine
years the junior of Wesley; a most devout man, deeply versed in
spiritual things, and well qualified to lead the earnest Oxford student
into the path of peace. Wesley was astonished at the announcement of
Boehler that true faith in Christ was inseparably attended by dominion
over sin, and constant peace arising from a sense of forgiveness. He
could in no way accept the doctrine until he had first examined the
Scriptures and had heard the testimony of three witnesses adduced by
Boehler. But what staggered him most was the doctrine of instantaneous
conversion. This he could not accept. But a careful appeal to the Bible
and the testimony of Boehler's witnesses settled the question. Thus "this
man of erudition," says Mr. Tyerman, "and almost anchorite piety sat at
the feet of this godly German like a little child, and was content to be
thought a fool that he might be wise."
But the time drew near when the veil was to be rent, and he who had been
for half a score of years a seeker was to behold the glories of the
inner temple. His brother Charles had already received the gift of the
Spirit, and Whitefield was rejoicing in the same blessing; but John
still lingered. He became so oppressed with his spiritual state that he
thought of abandoning preaching; but Boehler said: "By no means. Preach
faith till you have it, and then because you have it you will preach
it." So he began. He uttered strong words at St. Lawrence's and St.
Catherine's, and was informed that he could preach no more in either
place. At Great St. Helen's he spoke with such plainness that he was
told he must preach no more there. At St. Ann's he spoke of free
salvation by faith, and the doors of the church were closed against him.
The same result attended his preaching at St. John's and St. Bennett's,
until he found the words of a friend addressed to his brother true in
his own case, that "wherever you go this 'foolishness of preaching' will
alienate hearts from you and open mouths against you."
The simplicity of faith staggered the youthful philosopher. Boehler, in
writing of the Wesleys to Zinzendorf, says: "Our mode of believing in
the Saviour is so easy to Englishmen that they cannot reconcile
themselves to it; if it were a little more artful, they could much
sooner find their way into it."
Wesley's distress of soul continued until the 24th of May. At five in
the morning of that auspicious day he opened his Testament and read:
"There are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by
these ye may be partakers of the divine nature." Later in the day he
opened the word and read: "Thou art not far from the kingdom of God."
Having attended St. Paul's Cathedral in the afternoon, where the anthem
was a great comfort to his soul, he went with great reluctance to a
society meeting at night at Aldersgate Street. There he found one
reading Luther's preface to the Romans; and at about a quarter before
nine, while the change which God works in the heart through faith in
Christ was being described, "I felt," he says, "my heart strangely
warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ--Christ alone--for salvation; and
an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and
saved me from the law of sin and death; and then I testified openly to
all there what I now felt in my heart."
From this moment a new spiritual world opened upon the mind and heart of
John Wesley. He not only began at once to pray for those who had
ill-used him, but openly testified to all present what God had done for
his soul. And from that hour onward, for fifty-three years, he bore
through the land a heart flaming with love.
In 1744, more than six years subsequent to that blessed experience at
Aldersgate, Mr. Wesley relates another experience which we must not
overlook. It is related in these words: "In the evening while I was
reading prayers at Snowfield I found such light and strength as I never
remember to have had before. I saw every thought, as well as action or
word, just as it was rising in my heart, and whether it was right before
God or tainted with pride or selfishness. I never knew before--I mean
not at this time--what it was to be still before God. I waked the next
morning by the grace of God in the same spirit; and about eight, being
with two or three that believed in Jesus, I felt such an awe and tender
sense of the presence of God as greatly confirmed me therein; so that
God was before me all the day long. I sought and found him in every
place, and could truly say, when I lay down at night, 'Now I have lived
to-day.'"
In 1771, referring to this experience, he says: "Many years since I saw
that 'without holiness no man shall see the Lord.' I began by following
after it, and inciting all with whom I had any intercourse to do the
same. Ten years after God gave me a clearer view than I had before of
the way how to attain it; namely, by faith in the Son of God. And
immediately I declared to all, 'We are saved from sin, we are made holy,
by faith. _This I testified in private, in public, in print_; and God
confirmed it by a _thousand witnesses_. I have continued to declare this
for about thirty years; and God has continued to confirm the work of
grace."
These experiences flamed out in his whole life. He claimed that he knew
whereof he affirmed. While he advocated strongly the doctrines of
Christianity, he was most earnest in promoting the experience of
personal holiness.
A question has been propounded here eliciting much controversy, namely,
"Did Mr. Wesley ever profess to have experienced the blessing of entire
sanctification?" It does not appear to us to be a question of as much
importance as many seem to imagine. The more important question is: Did
Mr. Wesley believe and teach that such an experience was possible in
this life? Did he encourage his people to seek such a blessing, and,
when obtained, profess it in a humble spirit? This question among others
was submitted to Dr. James M. Buckley: "Have we any record of Mr.
Wesley's professing to be entirely sanctified; if so, where may it be
found?" His answer will be regarded as entirely satisfactory to all
unprejudiced minds.
"This question reappears from time to time, as though of great
importance. We know of no record of his explicitly professing or saying
in so many words, 'I am entirely sanctified;' no record of uttering
words to that effect. But we have no more doubt that he habitually
professed it than that he professed conversion. The relation John Wesley
sustained to his followers, and to this doctrine, makes it certain that
he professed it, and almost certain that there would be no special
record of it.
"1. All Wesley's followers assumed him to be what he urged them to be.
Before they were in a situation to make records his position was so
fixed that to record his descriptions of this state would have been
unthought of.
"2. He preached entire sanctification, and urged it upon his followers.
"3. He defended its attainability in many public controversies.
"4. He urged and defended the profession of it, under certain conditions
and safeguards; made lists of professors; told men they had lost it
because they did not profess; and said and did so many things, only to
be explained upon the assumption that he professed to enjoy the
blessing, that no other opinion can support it."[D]
Soon after this experience at Aldersgate Chapel Mr. Wesley made a
journey to Herrnhut, Germany, to visit the Moravian brethren, but soon
withdrew from them because of their errors in doctrine. He antagonized
the dogma of Zinzendorf, that men are entirely sanctified at the moment
when they are converted. His opinion of the count differed materially
from his estimation of Boehler.