Methodist Church :: essays research papers

The United Methodist ChurchMy home church is United Methodist. I have gone there ever since I was a pip-squeak because that is where my mother went to church. Through researching this paper I found many interesting things about my church. There are many points and issues I agree with and many I disagree with. Writing this really made me think about my denomination closely and if its the right one for me. The United Methodist Church shares a common history and heritage with other Methodist and Wesleyan bodies. The lives and ministries of John Wesley and of his brother, Charles, mark the origin of their common roots. Both John and Charles were Church of England missionaries to the colony of Georgia, arriving in March 1736. It was their only occasion to visit America. Their mission was far from an unqualified success, and both returned to England disillusioned and discouraged, Charles in December 1736, and John in February 1738. Both of the Wesley brothers had transforming sacred exp eriences in May 1738. In the years following, the Wesleys succeeded in leading a lively renewal endeavour in the Church of England. As the Methodist movement grew, it became apparent that their ministry would spread to the American colonies as some Methodists made the exhausting and hazardous Atlantic voyage to the New World. Organized Methodism in America began as a lay movement. Among its earliest leaders were Robert Strawbridge, an immigrant farmer who organized work about 1760 in Maryland and Virginia, Philip Embury and his cousin, Barbara Heck, who began work in New York in 1766, and tribal chief Thomas Webb, whose labors were instrumental in Methodist beginnings in Philadelphia in 1767. The American Revolution had a profound impact on Methodism. John Wesleys Toryism and his literature against the revolutionary cause did not enhance the image of Methodism among many who supported independence. Furthermore, a number of Methodist preachers refused to bear arms to aid the patrio ts. When independence from England had been won, Wesley recognised that changes were necessary in American Methodism. He sent Thomas Coke to America to superintend the work with Asbury. Coke brought with him a prayer book coroneted The Sunday Service of the Methodists in North America, prepared by Wesley and incorporating his revision of the Church of Englands Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion. Two other preachers, Richard Whatcoat and Thomas Vasey, whom Wesley had ordained, accompanied Coke.