Christian History and Denominations: The Quakers
Christian History and Denominations: The Baptists
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Methodism was a movement promoted by the brothers John (1703–1791) and Charles (1707–1788) Wesley. It soon became a separate denomination and now refers to members of the Methodist Church.

John had a conversion experience in 1738, and like his brother Charles, it strengthened his resolve to dedicate himself to evangelistic work.

John formed a group that became known as the ‘Holy Club’ or ‘Methodists’. He was ordained as a priest in 1728, and in 1735 he went on a missionary journey to Georgia, but he alienated the colonists and fled home just two years later.

Charles and John were traveling preachers. John favored delivering sermons outside, a style influenced by George Whitefield (1714–1770), who was well-known for his sermons delivered in open-air meetings.

With the help of lay preachers, John established his own organization and expanded his work throughout the British Isles. He began hosting lay preacher conferences in 1744, and they eventually became yearly gatherings for which a formal charter was drafted in 1784. Methodism began to take shape in the 1760s, and while John wanted the movement to stay within the Church of England, it became increasingly autonomous.

In 1784, John made provision for the continuance as a corporate body of the ‘Yearly Conference of the People called Methodists’. He nominated 100 people whom he claimed to be its members and laid down the method by which their successors were to be appointed. The Conference appointed preachers to the various Preaching Houses, which later were called ‘Chapels’. Following John’s death in 1791, there was dispute over the movement’s future relationship with the Church of England.

During the first part of the nineteenth century, a number of Methodist congregations split off from the Wesleyan Methodist Church. Among them were the Bible Christians, the Wesleyan Methodist Association, the Primitive Methodist Church, and the Wesleyan Reformers, a group of which amalgamated to establish the United Methodist Free Churches in 1857.

In 1907, the Methodist New Connexion, the Bible Christians, and the United Methodist Free Churches came together to form the United Methodist Church. It merged with the Primitive Methodist Church and the original, or “Wesleyan,” Methodist Church in 1932 to become the Methodist Church in Great Britain. The Wesley Reform Union and the United Methodists continue to be distinct bodies.

From a theological perspective, John combined faith in the supernatural with appeals to scripture, reason, the Church Fathers, and personal experience. Additionally, he combined the doctrine of justification by faith alone with an emphasis on the pursuit of holiness to the point of ‘Christian perfection’

The notion of perfection has had a central position among the Methodists, who regard entrance on the way of perfection as an instantaneous experience, which takes place some time after conversion, and convinces those who receive it that sin is rooted out in them.

References

Livingstone, E. A. 2013. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford University Press.

Crowcroft, Robert., and Cannon, John. 2015. The Oxford Companion to British History. Oxford University Press.