Wesleyan Grace
Howdy friends,
I’d like to take a moment to talk about one of the aspects of the Wesleyan tradition that makes the United Methodist Church (UMC) unique. But before I begin, I want to be clear about 2 things:
1. As Methodists, the UMC is founded upon the principles and theological interpretation of John Wesley, an 18th century priest in the Anglican Church. While the interpretive theological world view of Wesley is something we turn to regularly when trying to understand the gospel message of the Bible, Wesley is simply one of many voices that influence our understanding of the identity, work and impact of God, fully incarnated in the person of Jesus Christ. Our foundational understanding in the United Methodist church, in the Wesleyan tradition, is that Jesus of Nazareth is the full and complete revelation of God. We worship God the Father, through the grace of Jesus Christ, which we receive by the power of the Holy Spirit. We do NOT worship John Wesley… but we are deeply influenced by the way that Wesley understands and explains the gospel of Jesus Christ.
2. As I will explain below, Methodists have historically focused most actively on the transformative power of God’s grace, and our response to the blessing that is forgiveness through the sacrifice of Jesus. While we place much focus and significance on the spirit of James 2: 14-26 which is most notable for its claim that “…faith without works is dead,” I want to be clear that our tradition does not understand this statement to mean that we must do good works to earn our place in the kingdom of God. Our theological understanding is rooted in grace by faith alone, and it is only the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross that offers humanity a reconciled relationship with God the Father. However, once that relationship has been restored by the grace of Jesus, in the Wesleyan tradition, the power of the Holy Spirit inspires our response to that grace. We are saved to life by Jesus, but this is only the beginning of our relationship with God.
With these two caveats specified, I want to begin discussing the Wesleyan understanding of grace, as there are some aspects of this understanding that bring a unique flavor to Methodists, and specifically the United Methodist Church. While Wesley recognizes that there is only one grace, which comes through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. He also identifies 3 distinct nuances to the grace of Christ. These 3 aspects to the grace of Jesus work together to reconcile humanity to God, restore God’s good intention for creation, and sustain a reconciled and restored people. The three aspects of grace that Wesley identifies are: prevenient, justifying and sanctifying. Prevenient grace recognizes that before we were even aware that God was working to restore fallen humanity, the Lord was stepping out in love, and inviting humanity into relationship with God’s self. This would be similar to the sentiment, “We love God, because God first loved us.” Creation itself is an act of prevenient grace. God establishing the people of Israel as a way of revealing God’s self to all the world, Jesus dying on the cross for a sinful humanity, the survival and development of the church, your own birth, experiences you have had that have developed gifts which you can use on behalf of the kingdom of God… are all examples of prevenient grace. These are ways that God has extended the hand of love and invitation to all people, and to you specifically. This is God’s effort towards reconciliation, and while one is still unaware of these expressions of love coming from God, it is prevenient grace.
Along the way, when one becomes aware that these acts of grace and love are from God, one has the opportunity to receive and embrace this grace from God. When one becomes aware, we call this justifying grace, because if a person chooses to receive and embrace this grace, and they accept forgiveness for their sins, then they are justified before the Lord. This restores the relationship between that person and God. The choice to embrace God’s grace is each person’s free will. When becoming aware of Gods effort towards reconciliation, if a person chooses to reject the invitation into relationship, they are stepping out of the grace of God, and continuing their life with a break in their relationship with God. Thus, they are not justified.
When a person embraces the grace of God, and they are justified, they now begin an interactive relationship with God, whereby they begin responding to the love of God. This is what Wesley calls, sanctifying grace. It is in this aspect of grace that a person’s life begins to transform. As they engage the Holy Spirit in their relationship with the Father, they move away from their own will, and they move towards God’s will. At some level, this can all be thought of as a process. Prevenient grace leads to justifying grace, which begins the process of sanctifying grace. Wesley, however, did not identify this in such finite linear terms. He saw this more as a cycle: prevenient grace makes us aware that God loves us -> if we embrace that love, we are justified -> now in healthy relationship with God, the Holy Spirit begins reshaping us -> the Holy Spirit begins making us aware of sin in our lives -> as we become aware of that sin, if we choose to allow God to free us from that sin, we are justified -> as our relationship grows, we become more submissive to the movement of the Holy Spirit -> we are made more aware of things we didn’t realize were separating us from God -> as we become aware, if we let God free us, we are justified…… and on goes the cycle. Prevenient grace -> justifying grace -> sanctifying grace -> prevenient grace -> justifying grace -> sanctifying grace… and so on.
What makes this understanding unique is that the efficacy of grace comes in the sanctifying part of the process, not the justifying moment. Each nuance is of equal importance, but the significance of grace is not in justification, it is in sanctification. The focus is less on salvation, and more on transformation. This is why I personally like to flip our usual colloquialism, “Jesus is my Lord and Savior.” The thrust of this statement says, “If I will let Jesus be my Lord, then He will save me.” From a Wesleyan view of grace, we would say, “Jesus is my savior and Lord.” This reverses the order of things and realigns the emphasis. Because Jesus has saved me, He is now my Lord. The emphasis is not on salvation, but the result of salvation, which is submission to God. Submission to God means embracing God’s will over our own will.
So… is the United Methodist Church a church of social Justice and works righteousness, demanding we earn our way into God’s good graces by proving our devotion through our obedience? Absolutely not! We are a church of broken people, who have become aware that even in our brokenness God loves us and is reaching out to us. We know this because when we were yet sinners, Jesus went to the cross and died for us. This proves His love. We are a church that accepts the invitation to a loving relationship with the Father, through the sacrifice of Jesus, and we understand that the consequences of accepting that invitation are that the Holy Spirit will begin to heal our brokenness and transform our will, to be reflective of the will of God. And thus, acts of justice, mercy and righteousness will simply begin to flow from us, because God is just, merciful and righteous. We believe that scripture is clear; God is repairing a broken creation, and the gospel is that through Jesus and the Holy Spirit, God is using people to do the work of restoration. God does not simply save us, but rather, God saves us to be a part of the restorative work of the kingdom. Salvation is not the point of it all, but it is the light that illumines the point… the point is that God is erecting the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, using the hands of people to do it.
