Real People

When I first started thinking about my sabbatical, it was with vague thoughts of making some small contribution to the field of Wesley studies, but that probably isn't going to be the outcome of this venture.  I simply didn't have time to explore the masses of material held at the John Rylands, but being there whetted my appetite, and I learned new things, and perhaps I will write some sort of devotional rather than an academic piece.

One thing I discovered is real people.  Remember the TV show by that name in the late 1970's/early 1980's?  Well, these were real people who struggled with their health and worried about their children and prayed for God to be real to them.  John Wesley, while a gifted and Spirit-filled preacher, had a wretchedly unhappy marriage, and as is the case with most things, there was plenty of blame to go 'round.  Charles Wesley thought his brother was going too far with some of his actions that took the Methodist movement slowly but steadily out of the Anglican fold, and he blasted him in verse, and oh, yeah, he didn't exactly help with John's love life.  (That is perhaps the subject of another post sometime later.) 

Sarah Ryan had a bit of a checkered past, rather like the Samaritan woman, a bit like Charles and John's sister Hetty, and she became a leader of a class, a surrogate mother in an orphanage, a preacher, and a Mother in the faith to other preaching women like Mary Bosanquet Fletcher, who was before, during, and after her marriage an example of a woman exhibiting a gospel-changed, Christ-focused life.  She was half of a clergy couple before such things even existed, and between her preaching, pastoral care, and spiritual direction (especially of women), she became known as a "Mother in Israel," high praise from Wesley and other Methodist leaders indeed!  She left masses of written material, a treasure trove of letters, manuscripts of a sermon or two, an account of the life of her friend Sarah Ryan, and more.  Someday, perhaps, I will revisit the John Rylands and delve more deeply into the riches of her written legacy.

And then coming back again to John Wesley.  Here was a man whose passion for  God sustained him through threats of violence, pain and heartbreak, grief, loss, and spiritual uncertainty, taking him in directions he never imagined or even wanted. He sometimes gave rough, seemingly unfeeling counsel, yet he ruthlessly applied the same to himself.  Into old age, with fading eyesight, wavering hand-writing, quavering voice, and failing physical strength, he could write in a letter at age 86, a few months before his death,"But all is well:  I can still write almost as easily as ever, and I can read in a clear light; and I think, if I could not read or write at all, I could still say something for God."

His voice and hands are now stilled in death, yet he still has something to say for God.    Among his last words were these:  "The best of all is, God is with us."  And the epitaph on his tombstone, not written by him, contains these words, after several glowing, mellifluous phrases --
"Reader, if thou art constrained to bless the instrument, give God the glory."  To that, he would heartily agree because even in death, he is still pointing to the one his brother called the Lover of our souls.  And for that, and so much more, thanks be to God!