A Wesleyan Approach to Faithful Academic Life
Mission Statement of Point Loma Nazarene University Point Loma Nazarene University exists to provide higher education in a vital Christian community where minds are engaged and challenged, character is modeled and formed, and service becomes an expression of faith. Being of Wesleyan heritage, we aspire to be a learning community where grace is foundational, truth is pursued, and holiness is a way of life.
Preface As a community of faithful learners, Point Loma Nazarene University’s purpose for learning is to engender greater and deeper love for God and all neighbors, exploring the world in the confidence of God’s prevenient grace. As a university seeking faithfulness to the Wesleyan tradition, we do not see learning and faith as two separate and distinct spheres that need to be forced together. Rather, we engage in the learning process as a people striving to live faithfully toward Jesus Christ, who calls us to this love of God and neighbor. We pursue such faithful learning, living and loving in community. As John Wesley insisted, there is “no holiness but social holiness” for the gospel of Christ does not have room for “holy solitaires.” In this paper we intend to explore salient themes in Wesley’s preaching that contribute to the task of consciously pursuing excellence as an institution of higher learning in the Wesleyan tradition. The themes or doctrines we have chosen for this purpose are prevenient grace, the means of grace, Christian perfection and catholic spirit. We trust that Wesley’s vision of the Christian life as “faith working through love” will infuse and direct our interpretations of each of these themes. As a preface to those explorations, we offer the following introductory remarks on the importance of the idea of the Wesleyan quadrilateral of Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. As a community of learners striving to be faithful to the gospel in the spirit of the Wesleyan tradition, we understand the Scriptures to bear trustworthy testimony to God’s fullest and decisive revelation in Jesus Christ. We confess also that the God revealed in Christ is the Creator and Sustainer of all things, and thus that no subject matter or discipline exists outside the purview of the gospel. Our understanding of this gospel arises out of communal engagement with the Scriptures in the light of tradition, reason and experience. This model for theological reflection has a wider application in the university’s quest for truth and wisdom, for it affirms that there are multiple sources of knowledge, a variety of modes of knowing. Scripture, tradition, reason and experience are inextricably related and highly complex sources for reflection upon the world in which we live, and upon the One we believe to be its Creator. As a conscientious Anglican, Wesley readily affirmed the centrality of Scripture reading within the Christian community. This act of reading necessarily and inevitably requires tradition (as in universally, or at least widely, held teachings of the Christian church through the centuries) and reason (interpretation, argumentation and persuasion). To these standard Anglican sources, Wesley added a distinctive emphasis upon experiential evidence. For Wesley, experience first involved “the witness of the Spirit” or divinely-given “assurance” that one has become a child of God, adopted by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Assurance is the experience of being loved directly and deeply by God—whether in the moment of receiving forgiveness for sins (in justification), or even subsequently in the cleansing of “the being of sin” (in entire sanctification)—and of sensing the immediate presence of the Holy Spirit within us. Second, experience involved for Wesley our sensory interactions with God’s creation as interpreted and ordered by human reason. Third, Wesley appealed to the lives and testimonies of his Methodists as providing evidence of how God usually works in human hearts and lives. Consequently, our interpretation of the Bible must be tested and tried—verified and validated, or else disputed and disbanded—in the crucible of actual human living. In sum, Scripture always provides the starting-place and touchstone for Christian reflection and life-in-community, but is always read (interpreted via the use of reason) in a multi-layered context (denominational beliefs, traditional modes of interpretation, social and personal experiences). Thus we recognize that the Bible never stands, alone, “speaking” to us. We read, we interpret, and we do so always as creatures of reason—not of a “pure” unadulterated reason, but of a reason informed by a complex variety of traditions. Further, we always come to the biblical text with a rich fund of experiences that flow seamlessly into and through our reasoning capacities. For us who intend to be a faithful Wesleyan community of learners in the liberal arts, all of this implies a confident openness to new knowledge of God’s creation gained through the complex interweavings of experience and reason—and a dedication of that knowledge to the Lordship of Jesus Christ as testified in Scripture and interpreted through the wisdom of Christian tradition. In the midst of study in the variety of academic disciplines, with their various ways of seeking truth, we labor in the confidence that the Holy Spirit may indeed grant us assurance of God’s love in Jesus Christ. We learn together from a variety of sources, trusting in the grace of God subtly guiding us into all truth. Practically, such dedication to learning, and such confidence in divine grace working within and among us, must be embodied as an increasing love of God and of all neighbors.
Prevenient Grace The doctrine of prevenient grace plays a critical role in John Wesley’s teachings about God, humanity and salvation. Accordingly, we believe it should exercise comparable influence upon our attempt to shape the educational vision and practice of Point Loma Nazarene University. Prevenient grace—from the Latin terms veni (“come”) and pre (“before”)—is a way of speaking about God’s initiative in reaching out toward fallen humanity. Thus, the doctrine refers to the Spirit’s prior laboring in all human lives to draw them toward salvation in Christ Jesus. For Wesley, prevenient grace is offered to all people and is the door that God opens to all people. Salvation of the human being begins with “the first dawning of grace in the soul,” brought about by the active presence of the Holy Spirit, and extending throughout the human journey “till it is consummated in glory.” Further, Wesley rejected the Enlightenment notion of “natural conscience,” insisting instead upon the supernatural presence of the Holy Spirit as the instigator and inspirer of the “public sense” (i.e., empathy, or “fellow-feeling”) and the “moral sense” (i.e., ideals of justice). Drawing upon the prologue of John’s gospel, he interpreted this prevenient grace Christologically, as “all that ‘light’ wherewith the Son of God ‘enlighteneth everyone that cometh into the world.’” This immediately implies that no human, anywhere or any time, lives apart from the faithful, loving, enlightening presence of the Spirit of Christ. Significantly, Wesley did not restrict this universal work of prevenient grace to matters only of salvation and morality. Following church fathers like Justin Martyr, Origen, Augustine and Anselm, Wesley believed that this universally bestowed grace enlightens all legitimate explorations and experiments of the human mind. In his Survey of the Wisdom of God in Creation, for instance, Wesley wrote that “the particular and full discoveries” of scientific observation yield “knowledge by the light of nature”—and then immediately added, “I believe all ‘the light of nature’, so called, to flow from [prevenient] grace.” True to this theological vision, Wesley was a man of virtually insatiable curiosity about the nature and wonders of creation. He was confident, too, that he could learn about the world from unexpected sources—say, for example, about the nature and properties of electricity from the American deist Benjamin Franklin—precisely because of his conviction that God’s Spirit is present and active in the act of human knowing. This does not mean that all purported knowledge is necessarily true or complete, nor that we need not exercise critical thinking and a questioning mind. Wesley was also realistic about the subtle (and not-so-subtle) power of human sin to distort our knowing, to compromise our interpretations. So, for example, while he believed that this power of sin in the world “is confirmed by daily experience,” he also suspected that it was a fact readily overlooked or suppressed by all who are bound up by this power; “so long as men [and women] remain in their natural blindness of understanding they are not sensible of their spiritual wants, and of this [enslaving power of original sin] in particular.” Wesley’s doctrine of prevenient grace, then, encourages us to approach God’s creation with a sense of wonder, expectation, and anticipation of what we may learn as we employ the human powers of reason—such as careful observation, experimentation, research, conversation, reading and writing. We do so with a confidence that God empowers and enlightens our rational attempts to understand all that we can. We also exercise a measure of confidence that God’s prevenient grace in the world has led many other scholars—in the sciences, the humanities, the arts, the academy in general—to discover and to publish worthwhile truth, regardless of their particular faith commitments. But this same confidence in God’s prevenient grace gives rise to the need for discernment, for a healthy doctrine of prevenient grace does not necessitate naïve acceptance of every deliverance of our academic guilds. It should, nonetheless, encourage a humility, a teachability, a receptivity to new theory and knowledge, that we as professors will model for our students. Specific recommendations: Practically speaking, this implies that while we are a community of faithful Christian learning, we will not construe ourselves to be narrowly so. We will assume that the “Son of God” who “enlighteneth everyone that cometh into the world” has enlightened people in unexpected quarters. Invitations to guest speakers from outside the Christian community, which PLNU has frequently offered to leading figures in (for example) the sciences and in literature already, should be encouraged and continued. Similarly, our confidence in God’s prevenient grace should embolden our efforts to invite leading scholars of other religious traditions as our guests to enrich our learning. The doctrine of prevenient grace also bestows a certain confidence, a spirit of expectation, to the classroom experience. We believe that God’s Spirit is always “coming before” us, students and professors, enkindling the desire for growth in knowledge and in character. The doctrine of prevenient grace assures us that God is already there, at work, in every student’s (and every professor’s!) heart and mind. Those who serve as professors in the classroom should act in this confidence, and also seek to nurture in themselves, and in their students, a lively sense of God’s empowering and enlightening grace. We pursue the vocation of learning together in the very presence of the God of the universe, freeing us to ask hard questions about our beliefs, ourselves and our world. Indeed, if prevenient grace truly is present and active universally, then this confidence extends well beyond the classroom to every facet of university life together. From this theological vision we can enthusiastically affirm such extracurricular activities as the Film Forum and Brewed Awakening. We hope through all of these avenues to alert us to the signs of God’s prevenient grace laboring in the human spirit’s creative longings in activities such as art and music, environmental caretaking, just economic practices, and the struggle for the dignity of all human beings—for all are graced by God and beckoned to salvation through Jesus Christ.
Means of Grace John Wesley consistently described God’s grace as working in and through us, as well as through the rest of God’s creation. Wesley linked the traditional teachings about “means of grace” with “prevenient grace” (or “preventing grace”): “By ‘means of grace’ I understand outward signs, words, or actions ordained of God, and appointed for this end—to be the ordinary channels whereby [God] might convey to [humanity] preventing, justifying, or sanctifying grace.” Such a view of grace precludes the notion that God’s grace might be an abstract force that overwhelms passive believers. In his discussions of the means of grace, Wesley highlighted acts of piety and works of mercy. The works of mercy, such as caring for the poor and visiting the sick, are not exclusively Christian practices, but become means of grace as they are performed in Jesus’ name, i.e., as a manifestation of God’s love. Some of the acts of piety are “universal Christian practices [such] as fasting, prayer, eucharist, and devotional readings,” while other acts of piety are “distinctively Methodist practices like class meetings, love feasts, and special rules of holy living.” Despite the variability in his lists and the particularity of certain practices to the Wesleyan tradition, the means of grace should not be seen as mere suggestions. As Wesley insists, “…according to the decision of Holy Writ, all who desire the grace of God are to wait in the means which [God] hath ordained; in using, not in laying them aside.” Although Christians should pursue all the means of grace, certain means may be more readily and appropriately applied within Christian education than others. Among the various practices mentioned by Wesley, three will be closely examined here: Christian conference, Scripture reading, and visiting those in need. Wesley maintained that “Christianity is essentially a social religion, and… to turn it into a solitary religion is indeed to destroy it.” Wesley further observed that those who were not “united together, grew faint in their minds, and fell back into what they were before.” In contrast, those who “united together” grew in love of Christ. Thus, wherever he went, Wesley set up bands, classes, and other fellowship and accountability groups. At PLNU, we have established chapel, Bible studies, covenant groups, and other opportunities to worship together and/or hold each other accountable. These meetings and groups must avoid becoming empty rituals that merely serve to maintain the status quo. Instead, all these programs must seek to deepen our understanding of God’s mercy, and increase our love for God and neighbor. Wesley also noted that Jesus “direct[ed] them to search the Scriptures, that they might believe in him.” Such searching of scripture includes” hearing, reading and meditating.” Scripture reading does not approach the Bible as a textbook or an answer key, but in order that we “might believe” in Christ as God’s Incarnate Word. Devotional reading should additionally “read [Scripture] with a single eye, to know the whole will of God, and a fixt resolution to do it.” Although our reading of Scripture has a singular purpose, it is not, thereby, a simple process. We cannot simply read Scripture in isolation from its context on our own, but must take into account tradition, reason and experience (the other components of the Wesleyan quadrilateral). Thus Christian academia should read scripture thoughtfully as a community. This reading should take into account interpretive traditions, Christian practices, modern biblical scholarship, as well as input from other disciplines. Thus Christian scholars may articulate together the various ways texts can be read and listened to communally with an eye toward transformation in Christ. Among the works of mercy, John Wesley particularly emphasized visiting with the sick and the poor—the vulnerable and excluded members of society. For Wesley, charity could never be reduced to financial donations or political solutions, but required actual, physical contact. Indeed, Wesley keenly observed that “one great reason why the rich, in general, have so little sympathy for the poor, is, because they so seldom visit them.” A Wesleyan university should thus resist the temptation to reduce poverty and disease to mere academic puzzles. Instead, Christian, scholarly approaches that address the vulnerable members of our neighborhoods and our world should always involve hospitality and friendship with these “others” both as part of the theoretical development and in the application of solutions. By visiting with and listening to the vulnerable and excluded, we will find ourselves identifying with them. This identification will further lead us to true hospitality in the university. Instead of viewing categories of people as “others,” we will seek to embrace them as “us.” We will become a diverse campus, transforming and healing societal boundaries of race, class, ability, and gender. Specific recommendations: At Point Loma Nazarene University, we would suggest the following actions. First, we must maintain programs through Spiritual Development that increase Christian community and accountability. Second, PLNU should provide opportunities for Scripture to be read as a community. Again, chapel should be an integral part of this, but other avenues of searching Scripture together should also be available. These opportunities should encourage members of the campus community to bring their disciplinary insights alongside their theological commitments into the discussion, with the hope that we “might believe” with integrity in Christ the Word and Lord. Third, we should visit with the sick and the poor, listening to their stories and identifying with them. Fourth, PLNU must increase the ethnic and socioeconomic diversity of its various populations. If Christians are called to befriend those who were once understood as “other,” then we must become a community that models and nurtures relationships across societal boundaries of race, class, ability, and gender.
Christian Perfection John Wesley held that all the means of grace have been given us as “the way wherein God hath appointed his children to wait for complete salvation,” or “full sanctification.” Wesley utilized a host of phrases to describe this goal of the Christian journey: “Christian perfection”; “perfection in love”; “renewal in love”; “renewal in the image of God”; “It is love excluding sin, love filling the heart, taking up the whole capacity of the soul.” Simply put, Wesley’s vision of salvation in Jesus Christ was profoundly holistic. The doctrine of Christian perfection pushes beyond popular notions of salvation simply as forgiveness of sins, or assurance of heavenly bliss, and holds forth the hope of our being renewed or restored in this life to the divine image for which all humans are created, and to which all humans are called in Jesus Christ. No aspect or dimension of human existence is excluded from this vision of sanctifying, restoring grace: not only the spiritual, but also the emotional, the physical, the mental, the cultural, the social, the ecological. The optimism of grace in the Wesleyan doctrine of Christian perfection insists that all of these dimensions of human life can be truly healed, redeemed, and redirected, through Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit, toward an ever greater love for God and all neighbors. Wesley understood this pure love of God filling the human heart to be the essence of the “scriptural holiness” that he and the Methodists were called to proclaim and to live. “For as long as love takes up the whole heart, what room is there for sin therein?” He acknowledged that this was a high and demanding calling, this call unto holiness, but that the hunger and expectation for entire sanctification should serve well as a dynamic goad to growing in Christlikeness. The implications of this doctrine for Christian higher education perhaps become most obvious when it is understood as the “renewal in the love and image of God.” Wesley understood the imago most fundamentally in terms of a divinely-bestowed capacity for “knowing, loving, and obeying” God. This capacity or calling, in turn, demands that we function as God’s image, i.e., that we “image” or represent God in, and to, the rest of creation. Since “God is love” (1 Jn. 4:8, 16), Wesley believed we image God most faithfully when we love as God loves. Thus, Scripture’s testimony that “God’s compassion is over all of his creatures” (Ps. 145:9) should, in Wesley’s words, “encourage us to imitate him whose mercy is over all his works.” The human vocation described in Genesis 1—finally reducible to proper relations to God, to one another, and to the rest of creation—is to be fully restored to us in the life of entire sanctification that is shared together among us in the body of Christ. Specific Recommendations: The doctrine of Christian perfection should encourage professors and students at PLNU to pursue their academic disciplines, and their learning together, for the sake of greater and deeper love for God, all neighbors, and all of God’s creation. Knowledge is valuable not primarily for its own sake, but to equip us all to love more fully, more intelligently. We learn all we can about the mysteries, intricacies and relations of God’s vast creation so that we might truly and more adequately love God and all of God’s creatures. In this sanctified life, that is the greatest good, the “heaven of heavens.” The holistic nature of “full sanctification,” further, should be explicitly taught as the fundamental reason for campus pursuits like Creation Care, the Center for Women’s Studies, and the Center for Justice and Reconciliation. Precisely because Christian perfection aims for the full healing and redemption of all spheres of creaturely existence through Jesus Christ in the empowering presence of the Spirit, these concerns and practices are perfectly appropriate avenues for Christian participation. Finally, university administration, faculty and staff must faithfully strive to model our communal quest for Christian perfection. If indeed “there is no holiness but social holiness,” there is also no education shaped by the doctrine of Christian perfection that is not profoundly social. This Wesleyan teaching calls us especially to recognize that we administrators, professors and staff are “to be the neighbor” (Lk. 10:36) to one another, to all of our students, and indeed to all people—especially the poor, the marginalized, the forgotten.
Catholicity For John Wesley, theology, worship, acts of piety, and works of mercy must always have love for God and neighbor as their end. Thus, even as Wesley fervently defended various beliefs and particular practices, he felt compelled by this love to maintain a “catholic spirit” with other Christians who might disagree with him on these matters. Wesley further acknowledged human finitude, our existence as limited creatures who can only know “in part.” Thus all Christians must humbly recognize that beliefs and practices will unavoidably vary, even as they together assent to a love of God and neighbor. A life of faith will unavoidably be contextualized within a community and its particular commitments. Even so, a catholic spirit does not suggest an “indifference to all opinions,” “indifference as to public worship or as to the outward manner of performing it,” or “indifference to all congregations.” Instead, by recognizing the limits of our knowledge Christians are taught “a lesson of faith, of confidence in God. A full conviction of our own ignorance may teach us a full trust in [God’s] wisdom.” When applied to Christian higher education, Wesley’s vision for catholicity encourages our institutions to be true to their theological heritage. Schools should not aim to “halt between two opinions”—and thus end up generically Christian (or even generically academic). By living out of their particular faith convictions, Christian schools introduce a true diversity to academia. The Wesleyan tradition has clear commitments to prevenient grace, human agency and responsibility, identity with the poor, Christian community, and personal transformation through Jesus Christ. Scholarship, teaching, reading and devotional practices should thus seek ways to make these and other Wesleyan commitments an integral dimension of a Wesleyan university. At the same time, these commitments must be open to examination and questioning. Wesleyan scholars must be free to critique Wesleyan commitments, since they recognize that “no [one can] be assured that all his [or her] own opinions taken together are true.” This examination should not seek to undermine the Wesleyan tradition or to destroy faith, but should be carried out with humility, aiming for a greater love of God and neighbor. Wesleyan institutions of higher learning will also create room for Christians from other traditions. For Wesley, the central criteria for fellowship include love for God and a love for all people (“without exception”) that results in works of mercy. Under these conditions, members of the campus community who are from other Christian traditions can respectfully contribute to the devotional and intellectual life of the school. The work of non-Wesleyan faculty, staff, and administrators should help the institution to more carefully articulate and examine Wesleyan distinctives—emphasizing both common Christian beliefs and practices, and the particularities of the tradition. Employees rooted in other Christian traditions should also be committed to love and to prayer, and should “provoke” the school “to love and to good works.” Additionally, many PLNU students attend churches that are not Wesleyan; they are also called to teach us of God’s love and work throughout the Body of Christ. On the other hand, some students enrolled at PLNU are only nominally Christians and others may identify themselves as entirely outside the Church. PLNU should also lovingly grant room for these students in the confidence that God’s prevenient grace already surrounds them, and that the Spirit may use these educational means of grace to draw them to the God who is love. And they may also teach us to examine our preconceptions and our failings, and challenge us to truly love all people as our neighbors. Specific recommendations: First, true catholicity at Point Loma Nazarene University requires us to be true to and honest about the school’s Wesleyan heritage and Nazarene identity. This means that PLNU needs to be explicit about its Wesleyan and Nazarene roots not only in Bible and theology classes, but throughout the curriculum, particularly in required general education classes such as Psychology 101. Student life and spiritual life should not only devise programs that emphasize Wesleyan and Nazarene particularities, but should also explicitly identify these beliefs and practices as Wesleyan and/or Nazarene. Second, catholicity at PLNU implies an openness to questions, critiques, and explorations of Christian beliefs and practices. The administration should thus support faith-full work of faculty, even when such work creates discomfort or anger among our various constituencies. Faculty, for their part, should maintain love as their goal whenever they apply their academic expertise to various questions and issues. Professors, student services, and spiritual services should all help students learn to question in a way that builds, and does not undermine, faith. Third, PLNU should also maintain hospitality to the employment of and input from Christians of other faith traditions. Such employees should not be viewed as outsiders, but as joint followers of Christ. PLNU must also recognize the diverse faith commitments (or lack thereof) within our student population, and make room for those who doubt or disagree.
Summary As a premier Wesleyan institution, Point Loma Nazarene University strives to increase love for God and all neighbors. This love requires us to communally search Scripture in light of tradition, reason and experience, such that we can “know the will of God.” Our striving to learn of God’s will must be rooted in God’s grace. First, the doctrine of prevenient grace reminds us that all of God’s creation is graced, which implies that all academic disciplines are blessed by God, and that God is pleased to use academic inquiry to grow us in love. Second, the means of grace provide us with concrete ways to grow in love through acts of piety and works of mercy. Our striving to grow in love leads to Christian perfection, where “love takes up the whole heart.” We thus pursue knowledge not for its own sake, but because it can teach us to love more fully and more intelligently. Yet, even as we pursue truth, we must humbly recognize our frail fallibility. We only know “in part,” and disagreements about academic theories, church doctrines, and faith practices appear inevitable. In spite of these differences, we must maintain a “catholic spirit,” a love for each other, as we “provoke” each other “to love and to good works.”
Appendix: List of Recommendations I. Prevenient Grace. I.a Nurture openness to listening to those outside our academic community and our faith commitments, as evidenced by invitations to visit and speak on our campus. I.b Encourage active learning outside the campus confines through field trips and class visits, e.g., to other religious communities, ethnic celebrations, etc. I.c Actively expect that God will be in each classroom, working in the hearts and minds of students and professors. I.d Continue encouragement of extracurricular activities that point to God’s activity in all aspects of our lives. II. Means of Grace II.a Maintain opportunities to participate in chapel and small groups that will increase Christian community and accountability. II.b Increase opportunities to read Scripture as a community with an aim towards belief in Christ. II.c Increase identity with the poor and disadvantaged of our local and global communities. II.d Increase ethnic and socioeconomic diversity on campus, resulting in relationships across societal boundaries of race, class, ability, and gender. III. Christian Perfection III.a Pursue knowledge and understanding with the goal of greater and deeper love for God, all neighbors, and all of God’s creation. III.b Celebrate the holistic nature of the calling to Christian perfection, as the work of God through Jesus Christ to redeem and restore human capacities and energies to full obedience to Love Divine. III.c Embrace the collective responsibility to model a communal quest for Christian perfection. IV. Catholicity IV.a Speak openly and explicitly about its Wesleyan heritage in chapel, classes, student life, and spiritual life. IV.b Explore, question and critique Christian beliefs and practices, particularly as found in the Wesleyan tradition, in a way that invigorates the tradition. IV.c Maintain a hospitality to the employment of and input from Christians of other faith traditions, and create room for students with diverse faith commitments. John Wesley, “Preface to Hymns and Sacred Poems” (5) While Wesley never explicitly formulated a “Wesleyan quadrilateral,” he frequently discussed these four elements (Scripture, tradition, reason, experience) in various combinations. John Wesley, “The Scripture Way of Salvation” (I.1) John Wesley, “On Conscience” (I.5—10) John Wesley, “The Scripture Way of Salvation” (I.2) John Wesley, A Survey of the Wisdom of God in Creation, Vol. II (New York: The Methodist Episcopal Church, 1823), 449. John Wesley, “Original Sin” (II.2) John Wesley, “Original Sin” (II.2) John Wesley, “Means of Grace” (II.1) John Wesley, “On Visiting the Sick” (1) John Wesley, “The Way to the Kingdom” (5) Maddox, R.L. Responsible Grace: John Wesley’s Practical Theology. (Nashville, TN: Kingswood Books; 1994) p. 192. John Wesley, “Means of Grace” (III.1). John Wesley, “Sermon on the Mount.IV” (5). John Wesley, “A Plain Account of the People Called Methodists” (I.9). John Wesley, “Means of Grace” (III.7) John Wesley, “Means of Grace” (III.7) John Wesley, “Preface to Explanatory Notes Upon the Old Testament” (18) John Wesley, “On Visiting the Sick” (I.3) John Wesley, “The Scripture Way of Salvation” (II.11) John Wesley, “The Scripture Way of Salvation” (I.9) John Wesley, “The Scripture Way of Salvation” (III.14) John Wesley, A Plain Account of Christian Perfection John Wesley, “The General Deliverance” (III.2) John Wesley, “The General Deliverance” (III.10) John Wesley, A Plain Account of Christian Perfection (Section 25, question 33). John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.3); Wesley is here citing I Corinthians 13:12. John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.14—I.17) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.10) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (III.1) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (III.2) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (III.3) John Wesley, “The Imperfection of Human Knowledge” (IV) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (III.1) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.4) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.14) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.17) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.17) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.4) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.5) John Wesley, “Catholic Spirit” (I.6)
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7.7 DATE \@ "M/d/yyyy" 11/10/2008