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I love studying the old Methodists, not only because they appear to have lived holy lives, sanctified and set apart unto God, but also because I have attended 2 different Methodist churches: one a UMC, and the other one The Wesleyan Way also under UMC but quite different. The UMC was a lady pastor, while the Wesleyan Way was a man.
I must say the lady even 25 years ago said some things that just couldn't sit right in my spirit, like "Mother/father God" and how she dismissed adultery and fornication as being serious sins, and thus permitted them without any church discipline.
The male pastor was much more scriptural, but when one man during prayer requests and praise reports thanked God for the overturning of Roe v Wade, he would not receive it, and then revealed his pro choice stand, much to the dismay of many in attendance. I came across this while doing some research on William Bramwell, who said, "How is it that the soul being of such value, and God so great, eternity so near, and yet we are so little moved?"
"Modern Methodism bears little resemblance to the Methodism that sprang from the Evangelical Revival of the 18th century, as those whose lives had been transformed by the Christian gospel were formed into societies.
The revival had waned well before John Wesley’s death in 1791 but from the early 1790s, and for a period of fifty years, a second evangelical awakening took place. Spontaneous revivals broke out all over the British Isles in varying degrees of divine power – usually limited to certain towns or denominations but at times sweeping the nation.
Most of these revivals have been forgotten, and yet a tenth of the population of our land was gathered into the Nonconformist churches in this period. So we ought to know about them, and the 250th anniversary of the birth of William Bramwell is a good time to begin.
Prayer and preaching
By his fervent preaching in the Wesleyan Connexion, Bramwell was responsible under God for the conversion to Christ of thousands of ungodly people."
Fire from heaven: William Bramwell and his ministry
This from John Wesley,
"This it is to be a perfect man, to be ‘sanctified throughout;’ even ‘to have a heart so all-flaming with the love of God,’ (to use Archbishop Usher’s words,) ‘as continually to offer up every thought, word, and work, as a spiritual sacrifice, acceptable to God through Christ.’ In every thought of our hearts, in every word of our tongues, in every work of our hands, to ‘show forth his praise, who bath called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.’ O that both we, and all who seek the Lord Jesus in sincerity, may thus ‘be made perfect in one!’”
From, A PLAIN ACCOUNT OF CHRISTIAN PERFECTION, AS BELIEVED AND TAUGHT BY THE REVEREND MR. JOHN WESLEY, FROM THE YEAR 1725, TO THE YEAR 1777. John Wesley
I totally identify with this fire they speak of, and seek it. I know the LORD dwells in fire, and our God is a consuming fire. I know without the fire of the Holy Spirit, preaching is quite dead, and those who hear it go away with little or no conviction of sin, nor admonishments to change their lives to conform to the life of the Blessed Redeemer who hath purchased them with His own blood. I've walked away from such preaching myself, head down and shaking it from side to side, almost thinking I should have stood up and shouted in the Spirit for the real fire to fall! But let everything be done decently and in order, and do not disrupt the service, but rather pray for those whose fire has been extinguished, that the fire be rekindled!
Edward M. Bounds in his book Purpose in Prayer said,
"Prayer and a holy life are one. They mutually act and react. Neither can survive alone. The absence of the one is the absence of the other. The monk depraved prayer, substituted superstition for praying, mummeries and routine for a holy life. We are in danger of substituting churchly work and a ceaseless round of showy activities for prayer and holy living. A holy life does not live in the closet, but it cannot live without the closet. If, by any chance, a prayer chamber should be established without a holy life, it would be a chamber without the presence of God in it."
Would to God I not stumble into the morass of filth I once wallowed in, and be kept by His power! I thank Him for His sanctifying Spirit! Things that once would draw my attention so much so I'd "lock on target" and fixate on, or even pursue, now turns me off, and even grosses me out at times. Scantily clad women gross me out. Get dressed and repent! The smell of liquor used to draw me in and I'd pine away for a slug of the swill. Now it makes me sick as if I smelled a deadly poison! Rock n Roll, heavy metal, I used to sing along and groove to the beat, and desire more of my favorite songs. Now it's a cacophonic noise that accosts my ears and makes me uncomfortable to be around. I get away from it if I can, or I'll try to drown it out by listening to praise music. And why do some gas stations have to have a speaker in their restroom blaring this trash? I know, because Satan's the prince of the power of the air, so I just answered my own question.
None of those THINGS have changed, but I have, and the Christ dwelling within transformed me by the renewing of my mind by the washing of the water of the Word, and setting me apart from the unclean and impure to sanctification and holiness, without which no one shall see the LORD (Hebrews 12:14) Truly, "he that feareth God shall come forth of them all." (Ecclesiastes 7:18)
I would long for a time when the wickedest of sinners can see the glow on my face, and observe from my life without me saying a word that I'd been with Jesus, that I am with Jesus! I desire that when I speak words they pierce like a sword and burn like a white hot flame of Almighty God's jealousy for our souls: The "most vehement flame" of Song of Solomon 8:6, which is in Hebrew "ShelhevetYah" The flame of Yahweh. I desire the word be like a hammer and a fire as Jeremiah said; both a sin slaying weapon, and a life renewing water and sanctifying food. Others can have their mediocre religion, and churchianity, but I must seek His all, and believe His Word when He says to forsake all and follow Him, and to deny myself and take up my cross, and to preach the gospel, for woe unto me if I preach not the gospel! As we do these things we will close on that perfection of Christ He calls us to, as it is written in Matthew 5, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
Let us be edified with this snippet from George Whitefield's sermon, The Potter and the Clay,
"Will you not see reason to pray for yourselves also? Yes, doubtless, for yourselves also. For you, and you only know, how much there is yet lacking in your faith, and how far you are from being partakers in that degree, which you desire to be, of the whole mind that was in Christ Jesus. You know what a body of sin and death you carry about with you, and that you must necessarily expect many turns of God's providence and grace, before you will be wholly delivered form it. But thanks be to God, we are in safe hands. He that has been the author, will also be the finisher of our faith. Yet a little while, and we like him shall say “It is finished;” we shall bow down our heads an give up the ghost. Till then, (for to thee, O Lord, will we now direct our prayer) help us, O Almighty Father, in patience to possess our souls."
I'll conclude with what William Bramwell said here:
"Pray, O pray, my brother! never, never quit your hold of the fullness of God; for time is nearly over, and if this fullness be lost it will be lost forever. I am astonished that we do not pray more, yea, that we do not live every moment as on the brink of the eternal world, and in the blessed expectation of that glorious country."
Amen!
I must say the lady even 25 years ago said some things that just couldn't sit right in my spirit, like "Mother/father God" and how she dismissed adultery and fornication as being serious sins, and thus permitted them without any church discipline.
The male pastor was much more scriptural, but when one man during prayer requests and praise reports thanked God for the overturning of Roe v Wade, he would not receive it, and then revealed his pro choice stand, much to the dismay of many in attendance. I came across this while doing some research on William Bramwell, who said, "How is it that the soul being of such value, and God so great, eternity so near, and yet we are so little moved?"
"Modern Methodism bears little resemblance to the Methodism that sprang from the Evangelical Revival of the 18th century, as those whose lives had been transformed by the Christian gospel were formed into societies.
The revival had waned well before John Wesley’s death in 1791 but from the early 1790s, and for a period of fifty years, a second evangelical awakening took place. Spontaneous revivals broke out all over the British Isles in varying degrees of divine power – usually limited to certain towns or denominations but at times sweeping the nation.
Most of these revivals have been forgotten, and yet a tenth of the population of our land was gathered into the Nonconformist churches in this period. So we ought to know about them, and the 250th anniversary of the birth of William Bramwell is a good time to begin.
Prayer and preaching
By his fervent preaching in the Wesleyan Connexion, Bramwell was responsible under God for the conversion to Christ of thousands of ungodly people."
Fire from heaven: William Bramwell and his ministry
This from John Wesley,
"This it is to be a perfect man, to be ‘sanctified throughout;’ even ‘to have a heart so all-flaming with the love of God,’ (to use Archbishop Usher’s words,) ‘as continually to offer up every thought, word, and work, as a spiritual sacrifice, acceptable to God through Christ.’ In every thought of our hearts, in every word of our tongues, in every work of our hands, to ‘show forth his praise, who bath called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.’ O that both we, and all who seek the Lord Jesus in sincerity, may thus ‘be made perfect in one!’”
From, A PLAIN ACCOUNT OF CHRISTIAN PERFECTION, AS BELIEVED AND TAUGHT BY THE REVEREND MR. JOHN WESLEY, FROM THE YEAR 1725, TO THE YEAR 1777. John Wesley
I totally identify with this fire they speak of, and seek it. I know the LORD dwells in fire, and our God is a consuming fire. I know without the fire of the Holy Spirit, preaching is quite dead, and those who hear it go away with little or no conviction of sin, nor admonishments to change their lives to conform to the life of the Blessed Redeemer who hath purchased them with His own blood. I've walked away from such preaching myself, head down and shaking it from side to side, almost thinking I should have stood up and shouted in the Spirit for the real fire to fall! But let everything be done decently and in order, and do not disrupt the service, but rather pray for those whose fire has been extinguished, that the fire be rekindled!
Edward M. Bounds in his book Purpose in Prayer said,
"Prayer and a holy life are one. They mutually act and react. Neither can survive alone. The absence of the one is the absence of the other. The monk depraved prayer, substituted superstition for praying, mummeries and routine for a holy life. We are in danger of substituting churchly work and a ceaseless round of showy activities for prayer and holy living. A holy life does not live in the closet, but it cannot live without the closet. If, by any chance, a prayer chamber should be established without a holy life, it would be a chamber without the presence of God in it."
Would to God I not stumble into the morass of filth I once wallowed in, and be kept by His power! I thank Him for His sanctifying Spirit! Things that once would draw my attention so much so I'd "lock on target" and fixate on, or even pursue, now turns me off, and even grosses me out at times. Scantily clad women gross me out. Get dressed and repent! The smell of liquor used to draw me in and I'd pine away for a slug of the swill. Now it makes me sick as if I smelled a deadly poison! Rock n Roll, heavy metal, I used to sing along and groove to the beat, and desire more of my favorite songs. Now it's a cacophonic noise that accosts my ears and makes me uncomfortable to be around. I get away from it if I can, or I'll try to drown it out by listening to praise music. And why do some gas stations have to have a speaker in their restroom blaring this trash? I know, because Satan's the prince of the power of the air, so I just answered my own question.
None of those THINGS have changed, but I have, and the Christ dwelling within transformed me by the renewing of my mind by the washing of the water of the Word, and setting me apart from the unclean and impure to sanctification and holiness, without which no one shall see the LORD (Hebrews 12:14) Truly, "he that feareth God shall come forth of them all." (Ecclesiastes 7:18)
I would long for a time when the wickedest of sinners can see the glow on my face, and observe from my life without me saying a word that I'd been with Jesus, that I am with Jesus! I desire that when I speak words they pierce like a sword and burn like a white hot flame of Almighty God's jealousy for our souls: The "most vehement flame" of Song of Solomon 8:6, which is in Hebrew "ShelhevetYah" The flame of Yahweh. I desire the word be like a hammer and a fire as Jeremiah said; both a sin slaying weapon, and a life renewing water and sanctifying food. Others can have their mediocre religion, and churchianity, but I must seek His all, and believe His Word when He says to forsake all and follow Him, and to deny myself and take up my cross, and to preach the gospel, for woe unto me if I preach not the gospel! As we do these things we will close on that perfection of Christ He calls us to, as it is written in Matthew 5, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."
Let us be edified with this snippet from George Whitefield's sermon, The Potter and the Clay,
"Will you not see reason to pray for yourselves also? Yes, doubtless, for yourselves also. For you, and you only know, how much there is yet lacking in your faith, and how far you are from being partakers in that degree, which you desire to be, of the whole mind that was in Christ Jesus. You know what a body of sin and death you carry about with you, and that you must necessarily expect many turns of God's providence and grace, before you will be wholly delivered form it. But thanks be to God, we are in safe hands. He that has been the author, will also be the finisher of our faith. Yet a little while, and we like him shall say “It is finished;” we shall bow down our heads an give up the ghost. Till then, (for to thee, O Lord, will we now direct our prayer) help us, O Almighty Father, in patience to possess our souls."
I'll conclude with what William Bramwell said here:
"Pray, O pray, my brother! never, never quit your hold of the fullness of God; for time is nearly over, and if this fullness be lost it will be lost forever. I am astonished that we do not pray more, yea, that we do not live every moment as on the brink of the eternal world, and in the blessed expectation of that glorious country."
Amen!
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