The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2
XII. Wesley, Following Bengel, Sets Consummation for 1836
JOHN WESLEY (1703-1791), distinguished founder of Methodism, was born in Lincolnshire. Educated at Charterhouse school, London, and Christ Church, Oxford, he was distinguished for his attainments, especially in logic. His father advised him to make religion the business of his life, and his mother, who understood Greek and Latin, approved of the plan. He was profoundly impressed by reading the works of writers who inculcated “the religion of the heart.” He was ordained a deacon in 1725. After receiving his M.A. in 1726, he became his father’s curate in 1727, and lived and officiated mainly at Wroot. In 1728 he was ordained a priest of the Established Church. PFF2 692.2
Returning to Oxford, he found his brother Charles, and they, together with two undergraduates, associated themselves in a society for “religious improvement.” They were nicknamed “methodists,” and sometimes “Bible Moths,” “the holy club,” and “Bible Bigots.” Later Hervey, Whitefield, and others became members of the society. In 1735 the Wesleys accepted an invitation to Georgia to preach to the Indians and the colonists, and sailed in October. On the voyage to America John Wesley met twenty-six German Moravians whose simplicity and piety made a favorable impression upon him ere they arrived in Savannah early in 1736. Returning to England in 1738, Wesley wrote, “I, who went to America to convert others, was never myself converted to God. 88 PFF2 692.3
In 1738 Wesley met, and was greatly influenced and really converted by, the Moravian Peter Bohlcr. He decided to visit Herrnhut because of his connection with and liking for the Moravians, and so traveled to north Germany. It was on this trip that he became acquainted at Marienborn with Count Zinzendorf. Upon his return to England he followed the example of Whitefield, and preached in the open fields at Bristol and else where, as well as in churches and chapels everywhere. Though sometimes interrupted by mobs, and in several instances barely escaping death, he carried on his preaching, and persecution only confirmed his convictions. He traveled much on horseback, and preached several sermons daily. In fact, in fifty years he scarcely missed a day. 89 As his work grew, both in America and Europe, he was known as a great preacher in both hemispheres. PFF2 693.1
Wesley believed in the main doctrines of the Church of England, but departed later somewhat from her ritual and discipline. He separated from the Moravians in 1740, and soon afterward broke with Whitefield over “free grace” and pre destination. His prose writings fill thirty-two volumes. Few religious leaders through the centuries have been instrumental in effecting more good. Thus began the great Methodist movement that has since grown to such gigantic proportions. PFF2 693.2
1. FOLLOWS BENGEL IN LOOKING TO 1836
In his Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament, Wesley holds that the book of Revelation extends from the Old Jerusalem to the New Jerusalem, and the seven trumpets to the end of the world—the sixth being Mohammedanism. Soon after he began to write, he became acquainted with the great work of Bengel, and believed that the translation and use of many of his notes would be more effective than his own. 90 He even followed Bengel’s curious and complicated chronology. Thus on Revelation 10:6, he says, “The Non chronos [not a whole “time”] here mentioned” seems to reach from 800 to 1936; the “Turkish Flood” (Revelation 12:12, 16), which runs “higher and higher,” “reaches the Woman in her place; and will, till near the End of the half time [1836], itself be swallowed up, perhaps by means of Russia, which is risen in the room of the Eastern Empire. 91 PFF2 693.3
2. PAPAL BEAST TO BE OVERTHROWN IN 1836
The first beast of Revelation 13 is the “Romish papacy. 92 connected with the city of Rome. The second beast (verse 11) is to come out of the earth—out of Asia. “But he is not yet come: tho’ he cannot be far off. For he is to appear at the End of the forty-two Months of the first Beast. 93 The woman Babylon is the papal city, like wise “Antichrist, the man of sin. 94 This brief exaltation will end in 1836, with the Beast “finally overthrown. 95 PFF2 694.1
3. A PREMILLENNIALIST AT FIRST
Throughout the early part of his career Wesley was a premillennialist, in the sense that he looked upon the new earth state as the millennium. In fact it is called such in the hymns for which he took joint theological responsibility with his brother Charles. 96 For example, in a 1748 edition of their hymnal called Hymns for Our Lord’s Resurrection, hymn 22 contains the following lines: PFF2 694.2
“Then the whole earth again shall rest, And see its paradise restored. PFF2 694.3
“O wouldst Thou bring the final scene, PFF2 694.4
Accomplish the redeeming plan, Thy great millennial reign begin.” PFF2 694.5
Wesley’s notes on the book of Revelation constituted a mile stone in his thinking in regard to the time of the millennium. In the introductory comments he said that he had never really understood this book until he read the works of Bengel, and that his own commentary followed Bengel’s closely. (A comparison of the two works will show this in respect to the millennium.) Wesley thenceforth advocated Bengel’s double millennium, and expected the first, on this earth, to begin in 1836. PFF2 694.6
4. TWO MILLENNIUMS FOLLOW TIMES OF BEAST.
These periods, he says, “do not precede, or parallel, but wholly follow the Times of the Beast.” Moreover, the first of “these thousand Years bring a new, full, and lasting Immunity from all outward and inward Evils (the Authors of which are now removed) and an Affluence of all Blessings. But such a Time ... is still to come.” 97 PFF2 694.7
However, the reign of these souls with Christ during the second thousand years is not on earth but in heaven. PFF2 694.8