LET LIGHT SHINE OUT OF DARKNESS – Part 2 of 2

“Our concert of praise
To Jesus we raise,
And all the night long
Continue the new evangelical song:
We dance to the fame
Of Jesus’ name;
The joy it imparts
Is heaven begun in our musical hearts.”  
(Charles Wesley in “Hymns for the Watch-Night”)

There could hardly be a better time to preach the gospel of Christ, and surely no better time to sing it. The gospel has always been needed, since it is God’s solution for the human race, but in our day the need is more poignant and more dramatic. Whether one looks at the penultimate threat of nuclear destruction, or the private anguish of the lonely soul in an impersonal society, one cannot imagine a world more starkly in need of a Savior. There could hardly be a more demanding, more exhilarating time to preach the good news of Jesus Christ. We have never been more needed.

But we must have a song to sing. Without a song, we will only add to the dissonance of the times. 

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley” (1984)

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LET LIGHT SHINE OUT OF DARKNESS – Part 1 of 2

“The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”  (2 Corinthians 4:4-7 NIV)

Let us remember that it is a full salvation that we offer. Some… have been content to save their people and leave them to heaven. John and Charles Wesley insisted that we are saved so that we can grow. They believed that their somewhat ragtag group of butchers, miners, and household servants could become saints. We are challenged to believe as grandly for the computer generation, for a century of skeptics, and the spiritually cautious.

And we are saved to serve our present age. Traditionally, we have believed we could spread scriptural holiness throughout the land. Now we must do so in a time when family structures are under assault, while political systems build their new Babels, and when the evils of misery, poverty, and war seem more entrenched than ever. 

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley” (1984)

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RECONCILIATION: THE MESSAGE OF CHRISTMAS – Part 1 of 2

“Now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by setting aside in His flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in Himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross…”  (Ephesians 2:13-16 NIV)

God has broken into this world in an astounding story of divinity and humanity that boggles the brain even as it transforms the heart…

In the words of the late Samuel Hines, “God has a one-term agenda, listed in one expressive and inclusive word: reconciliation.”  It is a bold statement. It suggests that God’s intention, purpose, and desire for the world can be captured in this one word.

Reconciliation implies that a relationship has suffered damage. It indicates division exists where there was once harmony. Such division marks all humanity. Through sin and disobedience, we have separated ourselves from God and from one another…

In Christ, through Christ, and with Christ that “dividing wall of hostility” has been torn down. According to Charles Wesley, reconciliation is… the message of Christmas:

          Hark the herald angels sing,
          “Glory to the newborn King;
          peace on earth, and mercy mild,
          God and sinners reconciled!”

 -- Kevin Baker in “Hail the Heaven Born” 

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A WORLD IN NEED OF A SAVIOR

Let us remember that it is a full salvation we offer. Some movements have been content to save their people and then leave them to heaven. [From early on] Methodism has insisted that we are saved so that we can grow. John and Charles Wesley believed that their somewhat ragtag group of butchers, miners, and household servants could become saints. We are challenged to believe as grandly for the computer generation, for a century of skeptics, and for the spiritually cautious.

And we are saved to serve our present age. Traditionally, we have believed we could “spread scriptural holiness throughout the land.” Now we must do so in a time when family structures are under assault while political systems build their new Babels, and when evils of misery, poverty, and war seem more entrenched than ever.

There could hardly be a better time to preach the gospel of Christ, and surely no better time to sing it. The gospel has always been needed, since it is God’s solution for the human race, but in our day the need is more poignant and more dramatic. Whether one looks at the penultimate threat of nuclear destruction, or the private anguish of the lonely soul in an impersonal society, one cannot imagine a world more starkly in need of a Savior. There could hardly be a more demanding, more exhilarating time to preach the Good News of Jesus Christ.

But we must have a song to sing. Without a song, we will only add to the dissonance of our times… On one of his birthdays, Wesley wrote:

          In rapture of joy
          My life I employ,
          The God of my life to proclaim:
          ‘Tis worth living for this,
          To administer bliss, 
          And salvation in Jesus’ name.

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley”

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GOD’S GRACIOUS GUIDANCE

“To you, O Lord, I offer my prayer; in You, my God, I trust… Teach me Your ways, O Lord; make them known to me. Teach me to live according to Your truth, for You are my God, who saves me. I always trust in you... He leads the humble in the right way and teaches them His will. With faithfulness and love He leads all who keep His covenant and obey His commands.”  (Excerpts from Psalm 25 GNT)

A letter came from a minister who, [after hearing a call to mission work}, felt obliged to leave his congregation and denomination, and now, like Abraham, goes out not knowing [to what place or situation]. In his letter, he quoted from a hymn by Charles Wesley on the sovereignty and security of God’s guidance. Guidance, like all God’s acts of blessing under the covenant of grace, is a sovereign act. Not merely does God will to guide us in the sense of showing us His way, that we may tread it; He wills also to guide us in the more fundamental sense of ensuring that, whatever happens, whatever mistakes we may make we shall come safe home. Slippings and strayings there will be, no doubt, but the everlasting arms are beneath us; we shall be caught, rescued, restored. This is God’s promise; this is how good He is… Here is the verse from Wesley:

“Captain of Israel’s host and Guide
Of all who seek the land above,
Beneath Thy shadow we abide,
The Cloud of Thy protecting love;
Our strength, Thy grace; our rule, Thy Word;
Our end, the glory of the Lord.”

 -- Adapted from J. I. Packer in “Knowing God” (1973)

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THE HYMNS OF CHARLES WESLEY – Part 3 of 3

And can it be that I should gain
An int'rest in the Savior's blood?
Died He for me, who caused His pain?
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! how can it be
That Thou, my God, should die for me?  (Charles Wesley)

I think Charles Wesley would be somewhat baffled by our [present day] controversies over the nature of the scriptures… In a sense, he hardly thought it necessary to defend the scriptures; they were a given, a taken-for-granted, and there was no need to plead their case.

But on the other hand, scholar though he was, he would wonder at the kind of biblical study which is more concerned with sources and settings and evidences of authenticity than with nurture. He was a poet, not a critic. He came to the scriptures for food and for the language of redemption and adoration. I am not saying that he would be unsympathetic with the scholar’s research, but he would be concerned lest in the process of measuring the sun’s rays we should miss the glory of its rising or setting.

And he would probably be troubled by the style of the modern pulpit. He would see that our language is an amalgam of politics, sports, sociology, psychology, economics, and faddish jargon. He had only one language, the language of Zion. The scriptures were his native tongue. 

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley”

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THE HYMNS OF CHARLES WESLEY – Part 2 of 3

O that the world might know the all-atoning Lamb!
Spirit of faith, descend and show the virtue of His name;
The grace which all may find, the saving power, impart,
And testify to humankind, and speak in every heart.  (Charles Wesley)

The most impressive factor in Wesley’s hymns of salvation, and in his work in general, was the massive biblical content.  J. Ernest Rattenbury contends that a skillful person, if the Bible were lost, “might extract much of it from Wesley’s hymns…”

…Wesley wrote 5,100 hymns in Select Passages of Scripture, most of which are unread today, but which effectively retold the biblical story, in the form of a kind of devotional commentary.

Very few contemporary congregations can do full justice to the singing of Wesley’s hymns because they don’t have the biblical knowledge to appreciate what they are singing.  Rattenbury says that Holy Scripture was Wesley’s “sole literary inspiration,” because even when he took phrases from other authors, they were generally nothing other than a recasting of some biblical truth. But Wesley’s weaving of phrases, allusions, and biblical insights is so masterful that even the careful reader will find it hard to catch them all.

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley”

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THE HYMNS OF CHARLES WESLEY – Part 1 of 3

 O Love divine, what hast Thou done!
Th’incarnate God hath died for me!
The Father’s co-eternal Son
Bore all my sins upon the tree!
The Son of God for me hath died:
My Lord, my Love, is crucified.  (Charles Wesley)

There was substantial content in Charles Wesley’s hymns, and this must have played a great role in the nurture of the first generation of people called Methodists. Whatever other books they had, or whatever other training, one could be sure that every time they sang one of Wesley’s hymns -- especially those dealing with salvation -- they would get some solid theology. The text encouraged analysis, thought, meditation, and growth.

And of course it was classical theology. There is nothing trendy in Wesley’s theology. His doctrine was ancient and catholic (universal). It was never incidental or peripheral. A modern publisher might feel Wesley’s theology wouldn’t sell, at least if it were in prose. One often has a feeling that much contemporary theology is aimed for the marketplace, either in the scholarly journals or perhaps, at the extreme, something popular enough to get a sensational book review. Wesley was always sensitive to his times, but his theology was classical and catholic. He worried not so much about what was currently popular in the universities as what was needed on the streets and in the mines. 

-- J. Ellsworth Kalas in “Our First Song: Evangelism in the Hymns of Charles Wesley”

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WALKING WITH CHRIST

“Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to Me.’”  (Matthew 25:34-36 NKJV)

Many assert that John Wesley was the world’s most influential social reformer of his day. While some will question the depth of his influence, none question his remarkable ability to link piety with justice and to translate doctrine into daily living. From the early days at Oxford until a few days before his death, Wesley was about the ministry of caring for the poor, the oppressed, and the imprisoned. And all of this while living a rigorous life of prayer, study, and reflection.

This commitment to neighbor and passion to proclaim the gospel story was so great that John and Charles [his brother] rode in a cart with a condemned prisoner so that they could sing and pray on the way to the hangman’s scaffold…

Holy living is a direct result of and inseparable from a holy heart. To experience Christian perfection is to live as Jesus lived. It is to be obedient to the One proclaimed as Savior and Lord. Matthew 25 is a text to be taken seriously. To know Christ and to be known by Christ means to walk with Christ in the everyday business of life. 

– Rueben P. Job in “A Wesleyan Spiritual Reader”

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OUR DAILY LABOR

Let us consider a hymn of daily life, written by Charles Wesley and published in 1749...
Forth in Thy Name, O Lord, I go,
My daily labor to pursue;
Thee, only Thee, resolved to know
In all I think or speak or do.

What is your daily labor? You and I share at least one task in common: prayer. Jesus Christ calls us to pray. Our prayers cast out fear and open us to hospitality and friendship. Our prayers give us wisdom and courage to initiate relationships, to extend grace to strangers, and to entertain angels unaware. Our daily labor in prayer encourages us to fast from apathy, to serve others, feed the hungry, challenge injustice, and be the body of Christ in the world.

-- George Hovaness Donigian in “A World Worth Saving”, used by permission of Upper Room Books.

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ALREADY BUT NOT YET

“And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue His work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.”  (Philippians 1:6 NIV)

It has been said that Charles Wesley’s hymns always begin on earth and end in heaven. So it is with John Wesley’s theology. He was firmly convinced of the coming day of Christ, which is not yet, but toward which humankind, with the whole of creation, is moving. For Wesley, it was necessary to stress God’s ultimate victory; but it was also important to affirm the penultimate reality of God’s presence, now experienced as life that is drawn to God in increasingly focused love. John Wesley had a doctrine of final things, an eschatology, in which God’s Kingdom is being presently realized even as it points toward a consummating future. The Christian lives with the lively hope that God, who has begun a good thing, will fulfill it in the day of Jesus Christ.

-- Thomas Langford in “Practical Divinity”


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CHRISTMAS AND EASTER BELONG TOGETHER

We only know about the birth of Jesus because Jesus died on a cross and rose again on the third day. Mark, the earliest Gospel account of Jesus' life, does not even bother with a birth narrative but begins with Jesus' baptism and adult ministry. It was only after there was an empty tomb that later Christians would become interested in the details of Jesus' birth.

Paul's letter to the Romans begins with what some scholars believe is part of an ancient Christian creed. It is easy to see why one might think so. It even reads like one, especially if you write it out in creedal form:
            The gospel concerning His Son,
                        who was descended from David
            according to the flesh
                        and was declared to be Son of God with power
            according to the Spirit of holiness
                        by resurrection from the dead.
            Jesus Christ our Lord,
                        through whom we have received grace
                        and apostleship. (Romans 1:3-5)

These words reveal that Christmas and Easter belong together. One cannot be fully comprehended without the other. Each event in Jesus' life interprets and harmonizes with the other. The great hymns "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" and "Christ the Lord Is Risen Today" share more in common than Charles Wesley's authorship.

-- Kevin Baker in “Hail the Heaven Born”

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HER CHILDREN CALL HER BLESSED

When my children were very young I came across a biography of Susanna Wesley, mother of John and Charles Wesley. I was thinking about this book the other day, and how that when I read of her life I was truly inspired. Susanna birthed possibly nineteen children, schooled them all herself, (homeschooled) and raised her children to be devout Christians. She kept a well-run household by herself, without the help of servants, (if I remember correctly). She ran this household strictly and orderly with the older children helping with the younger ones and each given responsibilities as soon as they were able. The children made bread, sewed and learned to do many other necessities from an early age. This was all done in the days of growing and preserving their own food, making everything from scratch, making their own candles for light, making their own clothing, usually after making their own cloth! All without modern conveniences, of course!

John and Charles Wesley, as adults, gave much credit to their mother as the molder of their character and of their souls. It is said that John and Charles Wesley together won tens of thousands to the Lord, preaching the gospel of the grace of God. And thus, Susanna Wesley lived to see the fruit of her labor.

Proverbs 31:28 says of the virtuous woman, "Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her."  

-- Mary Atwood

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THE JOURNEY

Remember that . . . the journey of growing in Christ never ends.  It is a journey that will take us through this life and the next, a road that takes us ever deeper into that love that came down at Christmas until, as Charles Wesley put it, we are "lost in wonder, love and praise."  

-- Larry R. Kalajainen in An Advent Journey  (Nashville, Tenn.: Upper Room Books, Used with permission)

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