History of the M.E. Church, Vol. IV - Media Sabda Org

ut we may well hesitate to admit that there is any such problem. I have failed to interpret aright the
whole preceding record, if it does not present, on almost every page intelligible reasons of its
extraordinary events. A principal error in most of the discussions of this alleged problem has been
the attempt to find some one fact or reason as its explanation. The problem (if such it may be
admitted to be) is complex, and no single fact can suffice for its solution. Doubtless the theology of
Methodism has had a potent influence on its history -- its Arminianism, its doctrines of
Regeneration, the Witness of the Spirit, and Sanctification. But it should be borne in mind that
Calvinistic Methodism was, during most of the last century, as energetic as Arminian Methodism.
It is as much so today in Wales, where it presents the best example of Sabbath observance and
Church attendance in the Christian world. Whitefield was an ardent Calvinist, but was he less a
Methodist, less a flaming evangelist, than Wesley? Moravianism shared the theology of Methodism,
especially its most vital, most experimental doctrines; but not its prosperity. Indisputably one of the
greatest responsibilities of the denomination, for the future, is the maintenance and diffusion of its
theology; but this cannot be assigned as the single, or the special, cause of its success.
The legislative genius of Wesley, to practical system of Methodism, has been pronounced the
chief cause of its progress. It has been, doubtless, hardly less important than its theology; we have
seen its power throughout this whole narrative. But neither of them explains the problem, for neither
of them, nor both together, could have succeeded without something else. The whole Methodistic
system, introduced into some of our comparatively inert modern denomination, could only result in
a prodigious failure. Could they tear up their ministerial families by the roots every two or three
years, and scatter them hither and thither? Could they drive out their comfortably domiciled pastors
to wander over the land without certain homes or abiding places, preaching night and day, year in
and year out? Could they throw their masses of people into class-meetings for weekly inspection
respecting their religious progress or declension? The system, momentous as it has been,
presupposes prior and infinitely more potential conditions.
If we must narrow the explanation to the fewest possible conditions, it may be said that there have
been two chief causes of the success of Methodism, one primary, the other proximate.
First, it was a necessity of the times, a providential provision for the times. The government of
God over our world is a unit; the history of his Church is a unit; and however unable we may still
be to correlate its divers parts, yet in ages to come, perhaps after hundreds of ages, the world will
behold its perfect symmetry. History, if not as much under the sway of laws as physics, is
nevertheless a providential process. The apostolic ministry founded the kingdom of Christ in the
world, but the apostles themselves predicted the rise of Antichrist and the great "falling away." The
medieval night, a thousand years long, followed; the Renaissance, with the Reformation, began the
modern history of the world. The Reformation proclaimed the right and responsibility of the
individual conscience in the interpretation of the word of God, and reproclaimed the apostolic
doctrine of justification by faith. It went far, if not as far as it might have gone; but in the eighteenth
century its progressive power seemed ab out exhausted. It had made no great territorial advancement
after about its first half century, and in the eighteenth century the Historical Criticism and
Rationalism arose, and, with the prevailing popular demoralization, threatened, as Burnet affirms,
not only the Anglican Church, but "the whole Reformation." It had become necessary that some new
development of Christianity should take place. It was a providential necessity, and God provided for