John Wesley and Reading the Bible

12 Monday Jun 2017

Posted by Andrew C. Thompson in Bible, John Wesley, Wesleyan Theology, Wesleyan Tradition

Here’s a passage where John Wesley explains how he goes about reading the Bible:

Is there a doubt concerning the meaning of what I read? Does anything appear dark or intricate? I lift up my heart to the Father of Lights. “Lord, is it not thy Word, if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God? Thou givest liberally and upbraideth not. Thou has said, ‘If any be willing to do thy will, he shall know.’ I am willing to do. Let me know thy will.” I then search after and consider parallel passages of Scripture, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. I meditate thereon, with all the attention and earnestness of which my mind is capable. If any doubt still remain, I consult those who are experienced in the things of God: And then, the writings whereby being dead, they yet speak. And what I thus learn, that I teach.”

This paragraph comes from the preface to Wesley’s Sermons on Several Occasions, published in 1746. Wesley’s reflections here offer us some insight into how he believed we should read the Holy Scriptures. You might call them Wesley’s principles of biblical interpretation. I’ll list four of them, connected to four statements he makes in the quoted paragraph:

1) I lift up my heart to the Father of Lights. — First and foremost, the reading of Scripture should be undertaken in such a way that it is clothed in prayer. Wesley’s belief in the power of prayer comes through just about everywhere in his writing. “God does nothing but in answer to prayer,” Wesley says in the Plain Account of Christian Perfection. “Every new victory which a soul gains is the effect of a new prayer” (Q.38.5). What this means is that we should not approach reading the Bible as something we are doing simply to learn the content, or as an academic exercise. Instead, we should approach the Scriptures through prayer. We should ask God the Holy Spirit to illuminate our hearts and minds that we might receive God’s word within us.

2) Is there a doubt concerning the meaning of what I read? — Another baseline principle of Wesley’s is that the Bible should be taken at face value unless doing so would make no sense. As Wesley puts it, “[I]t is a stated rule in interpreting Scripture never to depart from the plain, literal sense, unless it implies an absurdity” (“Of the Church,” ¶I.12). We can easily come up with examples of such absurdities—Jesus’ “I am” statements in the Gospel of John, for example. (When Jesus says, “I am the gate,” as he does in John 10:9, he has not literally transformed himself into a gate; he is referring rather to the way of salvation.)

Following Wesley’s counsel on reading the Bible at face value has some wonderful benefits. For one, it helps us to realize that we do not study the Scriptures in order to master them, but rather so that they might master us. It isn’t up to us to tame or domesticate God’s word. Rather, when we come to the Bible we are come in order to receive and be transformed by it.

On the other hand, the “unless it implies an absurdity” clause in this principle of Wesley’s biblical interpretation also keeps us from reading the Bible too woodenly. Going back to that opening sentence from the preface to Sermons on Several Occasions, we will inevitably encounter things in the Bible where we have doubt as to the meaning of what we’ve read. At those times the text must be read spiritually rather than literally. And when we get to those places it is important to have other interpretive principles upon which to rely.

3) I then search after and consider parallel passages of Scripture, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. — The principle this statement points toward is that the best interpreter of Scripture is Scripture. If you want to understand some isolated passage or story in the Bible, then compare it with the whole witness of Scripture as represented in other parts of the Bible that shed light on it.

There are two ways that Wesley tends to express this principle. The first is through his phrase, “the whole scope and tenor of Scripture.” An example: in the sermon “Free Grace,” Wesley argues that the Calvinist doctrine of predestination “is grounded on such an interpretation of some texts…as flatly contradicts all the other texts, and indeed the whole scope and tenor of Scripture” (¶20). What he is pointing out here is that an isolated text (such as Romans 8:29) cannot be read in such a way to overturn the vast number of texts that affirm the steadfast love of God. Individual passages in the Bible must be read with respect to both the scope (meaning the breadth from Genesis to Revelation) and the tenor (meaning the enduring tone throughout) of the whole.

Portrait of John Wesley, by William Hamilton (1787)

The second way that this principle comes through in Wesley’s writing is with his many references to the “analogy of faith” or “rule of faith.” This phrase is drawn from Romans 12:6 (“let us prophesy according to the analogy of faith,” in Wesley’s translation). In the Christian tradition, it is typically taken to mean the whole, unified message of the Bible. The early church often saw the analogy of faith as the content of the creed—the Bible’s witness about God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Since the time of the Reformation, Protestant thinkers have often connected the analogy of faith with the biblical teaching about salvation. This is how Wesley understood it, as we can see from his commentary on Romans 12:6 itself: “St. Peter expresses it, as the oracles of God: according to the general tenor of them; according to that grand scheme of doctrine which is delivered therein, touching original sin, justification by faith, and present, inward salvation. There is a wonderful analogy between all these; and a close and intimate connection between the chief heads of that faith which was once delivered to the saints. Every article therefore, concerning which there is any question, should be determined by this one rule: every doubtful scripture interpreted, according to the grand truths which run through the whole.”

Thus, Wesley advocates a principle of biblical interpretation whereby shorter passages of Scripture always be read in light of the analogy of faith of the scope and tenor of Scripture—that is, according to the “grand truths which run through the whole.”

4) I consult those who are experienced in the things of God: And then, the writings whereby being dead, they yet speak. — Wesley often said that Methodism was nothing other than “the religion of the Bible, the religion of the primitive church, the religion of the Church of England” (e.g., “On Laying the Foundation of the New Chapel,” ¶II.1). That formulation offers us a succinct way of pointing out something that Wesley took for granted: if you want to live faithfully; if you want to read the Bible accurately; and if you want to renew the church, you look backward to those times when the church was at her best. When it came to the faithfulness of the church herself, for Wesley this meant the church before the age of Constantine the Great. He both appealed to the life of the church in this age as well as to the writings of the early church fathers. Thus, when we need help understanding the Bible, we will do well to consult the fathers of the early church whose writings will bring clarity to the writing of Scripture itself.

So by working through that paragraph from the preface to Sermons on Several Occasions, we arrive at these principles of biblical interpretation:

Approach reading the Bible through heartfelt prayer.
Read the Bible with an eye to its literal, plain sense meaning unless such a reading implies an absurdity.
The best interpreter of Scripture is Scripture, so read each individual passage in light of the whole scope and tenor of the Bible.
Use the witness of the early church fathers as an abiding guide to Bible study.

Those were Wesley’s guiding principles to the reading of the Bible, and they can be helpful principles for us to adopt today as well.

John Wesley and the Power of Christian Doctrine

27 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by Andrew C. Thompson in Arkansas Conference, Doctrine & Theology, John Wesley, Justification, Salvation, Sanctification/Holiness, United Methodist Church, Wesleyan Theology

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John Wesley was passionate about doctrine. In fact, his love of doctrine is one of the more underappreciated (and sometimes even unknown) parts of his leadership of the Methodist movement.

Wesley was such a believer in the importance of doctrine that it was—ironically—one of the things that caused him to get in trouble with his own Church of England. We see an example of that in a sermon from 1789 called “Prophets and Priests.” In answering critics who claimed that his actions amounted to separation from the church, Wesley responded: “I hold all the doctrines of the Church of England. I love her Liturgy. I approve her plan of discipline, and only wish it could be put in execution.”

His appreciation for the way that the church’s doctrine and discipline were laid out on paper led Wesley to want to see them truly put into action. In fact, he believed that’s what the Methodist movement was attempting to do. When people would criticize him for planning Methodist services in the city of Dublin at the same time as regular church services, one of the reasons Wesley gave for why he did such a thing was to ensure that the people would have a chance to hear “that sound doctrine which is able to save their souls.”

Nowadays there are all kinds of misconceptions about the nature of the message that Wesley preached and wrote about. Sometimes he is depicted as an excitable evangelist that just wanted to get people pumped up about their faith. Other times you’ll hear people make comments like, “I just really appreciate Wesley’s message about grace.”

Both of these points of view miss the fact that there was actually a lot of concrete content to what Wesley was trying to get across. It wasn’t just about being energetic for Jesus (though that is certainly a good thing!). And it wasn’t just a generalized message about grace or love. Wesley’s understanding of the Christian gospel had fundamental doctrinal content—and he believed that content was of paramount importance for people to hear.

When pressed to summarize the Christian doctrine he thought most central to the Bible, Wesley typically spoke in terms of a three-part scheme: the doctrine of sin and the need for repentance; the doctrine of justification by faith and new birth; and the doctrine of sanctification or holiness. He imagines these three doctrinal heads as the porch, door and house of religion in a famous example from the Principles of a Methodist Farther Explained in 1746.

Wesley writes, “Our main doctrines… are three, that of repentance, of faith, and of holiness. The first of these we account, as it were, the porch of religion; the next, the door; the third is religion itself.”

Wesley’s intense commitment to core Christian doctrine can be explained by the fact that he really believed people’s salvation was at stake in what was being preached by Methodist preachers. The pulpit was not a place to go off into flights of theological fancy, nor was it the proper arena for the preacher to test out his own pet theories about the Bible. It was a place solely meant for the preaching of the meat-and-potatoes gospel of Jesus Christ.

One of the last retrospective essays Wesley wrote about the Methodist movement was a short 1786 piece called “Thoughts upon Methodism.” It is there that he shared his thoughts about the prospects for the Methodist movement in the years to come. And since Wesley was not a man to mince words, he stated exactly what he thought the dangers were to the revival that he had led, by that point, for over 45 years.

He writes, “I am not afraid that the people called Methodists should ever cease to exist either in Europe or America. But I am afraid lest they should only exist as a dead sect, having the form of religion without the power. And this undoubtedly will be the case unless they hold fast both the doctrine, spirit, and discipline with which they first set out.”

Our present age is one in which all three of those points Wesley makes are being tested in the extreme—doctrine, spirit and discipline. The Methodist movement may go one of any number of directions in the years to come. If it is to go in a Wesleyan direction, the Methodists themselves must surely take heed of Wesley’s advice and embrace the biblical doctrine that Wesley himself embraced in the movement’s first flourishing.

This essay also appeared in the Arkansas United Methodist newspaper’s April 7, 2017 edition. You can read it in the online version of the AUM newspaper here.

New Room Conference brings new life

19 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by Andrew C. Thompson in Seedbed, United Methodist Church, Wesleyan Theology

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The Methodist revival began in earnest in the spring of 1739. Along with London, the city of Bristol was one of the early centers for revival activity. That activity was so significant that it soon became clear that land needed to be purchased and a building erected to house Methodist activities.

What would come to be known as the New Room in Bristol was the first structure built by John Wesley and his fledgling movement. He describes its beginnings in his Journal on May 9, 1739:

“We took possession of a piece of ground, near St. James’s churchyard, in the Horsefair, where it was designed to build a room large enough to contain both the societies of Nicholas and Baldwin Street and such of their acquaintance as might desire to be present with them at such times as the Scripture was expounded. And on Saturday the 12th the first stone was laid, with the voice of praise and thanksgiving.”

We can interpret the name of the new building—the “New Room”—in a couple of different ways from the standpoint of history. The most obvious is that it was literally a new thing, a building newly erected to house preaching gatherings and meetings of the Bristol bands.

The other way to interpret the New Room’s name is that it provided new room for Christian believers to practice the means of grace. It offered a space within the lives of mostly hardscrabble people to gather together that they might hear the word of God preached and share conversation and prayer about their faith journeys.

If you fast forward 275 years, then you’ll discover that there is yet a third way that New Room can be interpreted: as the name adopted by the fastest growing conference of Wesleyan Christians in the world.

Two years ago, Seedbed Publishing began hosting a three-day gathering called the New Room Conference as a way to bring together Wesleyans with a deep passion for revival, worship, prayer and mission. Seedbed’s own motto is “Sowing for a Great Awakening.” The Christian publisher knows that it can’t bring about revival under its own power, but it does believe it can plant the seeds that will provide for revival’s beginnings when God chooses to grant the growth. screen-shot-2016-10-19-at-5-39-19-pm

The New Room Conference takes place each September in Franklin, Tennessee. As an attendee at each of the first three conferences, I can attest to its electric growth. The initial New Room in 2014 attracted a little over 300 people. In 2015, that more than doubled to almost 800 people. At the New Room Conference held just a few days ago, there were more than 1,500 people present. In just two short years, New Room has witnessed a 500 percent increase in attendance.

Why is this significant? For a couple of reasons.

The turmoil that the United Methodist Church is currently undergoing is no secret to anyone. The failure of bishops, pastors, and congregations to abide within our common covenant is threatening to rip the church apart at the seams. One spillover effect of all of this tension is that our official conferencing—in Annual Conferences, Jurisdictional Conferences and General Conference—tends to discourage more than encourage.

In short, we’ve seen very little of what Wesley meant by “Christian conferencing” in our official gatherings over the past few years. When Christian conferencing is a means of grace, it emphasizes testimony, prayer, conversations about faith and the sharing of a common witness.

What we lack in our official gatherings the New Room Conference has in spades. The preaching, teaching, prayer and worship I witnessed a few days ago in Franklin was one of the most enlivening and encouraging experiences I’ve had in 15 years of ministry.

We are at a turning point in the life of our connection. What we desperately need is new room—to rediscover our Wesleyan evangelical roots and recommit ourselves to the deeply Methodist mission with which we first set out.

No single conference is going to do all of the work needed to gain a course correction in our common life. But the New Room is certainly a start.

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This essay also appeared in the Arkansas United Methodist newspaper’s October 7, 2016 edition. You can read it in the online version of the AUM newspaper at this link.

Wesleyan Accent: Our Sort-of Free Will

19 Friday Aug 2016

Posted by Andrew C. Thompson in John Wesley, Salvation, Wesleyan Accent, Wesleyan Theology

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I wake up on a Saturday morning. It’s a beautiful day. The sun is out and flowers are in bloom. Should I go to the zoo and watch the animals, or would I rather work in my garden? Am I even free to decide?

Most people would say, “Yes, of course you are free to decide.” And I am. In fact, I’ve got more freedom than the freedom of choosing between the zoo and the garden. I could choose to do something else entirely. I could even choose to lie in bed all day with the curtains drawn—as wasteful as that might seem.

But what if the choice is on a different level entirely? How about if the choice is whether or not to love God? To believe in Jesus Christ?

Do we have the ability to choose our salvation?

That is a much trickier question. Click here to continue reading…

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Wesleyan Accent provides free and subscription resources for Christian spiritual formation, catechesis, and discipleship in the Wesleyan way. By clearly articulating the Wesleyan understanding of Christian faith, Wesleyan Accent seeks to strengthen discipleship, empower mission and evangelism, cultivate ministry gifts of young leaders, and nurture the professional and service life of young theologians.

Andrew C. Thompson joined the writing team of Wesleyan Accent upon its launch in the Fall of 2013. For the full catalog of his articles on the Wesleyan Accent site, click here.

Wesleyan Accent: The Word and The Spirit

10 Wednesday Aug 2016

Posted by Andrew C. Thompson in Church History, Ecclesiology, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, John Wesley, Wesleyan Accent, Wesleyan Theology

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“Whate’er his Spirit speaks in me, must with the written Word agree.” –Charles Wesley

Many of the more contentious arguments in the church today are over social issues. That has certainly been the case for the United Methodist Church — the church I call home. Nowhere have the UMC’s internal debates over such issues been on clearer display than during its recent General Conference in Portland, Oregon.

The General Conference is the representative body of the 13+ million-member UMC. It meets once every four years. General Conference equips the general church for ministry by ordering its life and funding its ministries. It is also the body within the church that has the authority to write or alter canon law, which for Methodists is held in our Book of Discipline. So at least theoretically, the General Conference can vote to change everything from the church’s doctrinal understanding of the Trinity to how a local congregation handles estate bequests (though in the case of core Christian doctrine the bar on any substantive change is much higher and more complicated than a simple majority vote). Click here to continue reading…

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Wesleyan Accent provides free and subscription resources for Christian spiritual formation, catechesis, and discipleship in the Wesleyan way. By clearly articulating the Wesleyan understanding of Christian faith, WA seeks to strengthen discipleship, empower mission and evangelism, cultivate ministry gifts of young leaders, and nurture the professional and service life of young theologians.

Andrew C. Thompson joined the writing team of WA upon its launch in the Fall of 2013. For the full catalog of his articles on the WA site, click here.

Discipleship and the Means of Grace

15 Thursday Oct 2015

Posted by admin in Means of Grace, Practical Theology, Seedbed, Seven Minute Seminary, Wesleyan Theology, Wesleyan Tradition

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The Seven Minute Seminary video series that is produced by Seedbed is one of the best ways to get familiar with Wesleyan thought related to the Bible, theology, and ministry. It features prominent Wesleyan scholars and pastors speaking on topics related to their areas of specialty. I’ve been lucky to record a few of the video presentations myself.

In the following video, I speak on the Wesleyan understanding of the means of grace. The means of grace are those practices of worship, devotion, and discipleship which lie at the very heart of Wesleyan spirituality. Click below to learn more:

For my other Seven Minute Seminary teaching presentations, go to this link.

The Means of Grace — a new resource!

25 Friday Sep 2015

Posted by admin in Discipleship, Means of Grace, Practical Theology, Seedbed, United Methodist Church, Wesleyan Theology, Wesleyan Tradition

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My new book, The Means of Grace, hit the digital bookshelves a few days ago. As you can imagine, this is exciting for me personally. I wrote this book because of how strongly I believe in the importance of its subject matter. And I think it could be a real benefit to Christians who are looking for a way to bring a disciplined pattern to their discipleship.

I wanted to do a little writeup on The Means of Grace for anyone who might be interested in it for personal use or for small group study. I’ll do that below in Q&A format. If you have any questions after reading it, please feel free to leave them in the comments section below this post!

What is The Means of Grace about?
This is a book about those practices and habits that bring us closer to Jesus Christ by opening us up to the power of his grace. They are drawn, either directly or indirectly, from the Bible. My own understanding of them is deeply shaped by the way that John Wesley taught about them. That comes through in some significant ways in the book. At times the means of grace are called by other names: spiritual disciplines, practices of discipleship, and the like. Those are good terms, but I believe that embracing the term means of grace is important because it reminds us that the source of their power is indeed the grace of God.

Who was it written for?
The Means of Grace is geared toward a broad reading audience. My hope is that churches will find it to be a fruitful book for small group or congregational use. It can also be read profitably on an individual basis.

How is it organized?
The book begins with an introductory chapter that lays out a Wesleyan understanding of grace. Thereafter it is divided into three sections: instituted means of grace, prudential means of grace, and general means of grace. While these terms may sound technical, they are explained easily enough in the text. And the individual means of grace ought to be familiar to people with any familiarity with the Christian faith: prayer, searching the Scriptures, fasting, the Lord’s Supper, etc.

Most of the book’s chapters are arranged in similar fashion. Each of the means of grace is explained as it appears in the biblical witness. The way in which they are framed in Wesleyan spirituality follows. Finally, each of the means of grace is described as it can find a place in daily discipleship. The point is to show how the means of grace are grounded in a biblical and Wesleyan framework, while also showing how practical they are for day-to-day use.

Why did you write it?
I wanted to offer Christians a practical guide for how the means of grace can become the “pattern of the Christian life.” I believe this the way that John Wesley envisaged them, and I think it is the way they can be most effective in our lives today.

Does it have a study guide?
Yes it does. There is a “Discussion Starters” section at the back of the book intended to facilitate small group study.

Are there any other resources to go along with it?
The book is put out by Seedbed Publishing. Later this year, Seedbed will be producing a video series that will accompany the book as another tool for small group and congregational use. I’ll update my readers on this blog when those videos have been published.

Where is it available?
Currently, the books is available directly from Seedbed and from Seedbed’s Amazon marketplace store. The Kindle edition can also be ordered direct from Amazon.

That’s all for now. Let me know if I’ve left anything out that would be helpful to share. And if you check it out, let me know what you think!

The John Wesley Collection

25 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by admin in Discipleship, Doctrine & Theology, John Wesley, Local Church Ministry, Practical Theology, Seedbed, Spiritual Formation, Wesleyan Theology, Wesleyan Tradition

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Here’s a development that holds great promise for readers interested in Wesleyan spirituality and ministry: The John Wesley Collection.

The John Wesley Collection (or “JWC”) is a new venture by Seedbed Publishing. Its purpose is to gather together and publish the writings of John Wesley and other early Methodist figures. These writings are collected into volumes aimed at people hungry for solid theological material related to how we should understand God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, grace, discipleship, salvation, and much more.

As the folks at Seedbed put it themselves: “Seedbed believes these writings are as relevant to our context today as they were in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Consequently, we consider it a sacred calling to join with those who are recapturing John Wesley’s publishing vision for the twenty-first century.”

Several months ago I took over as executive editor of the JWC. I’m truly excited about this project! So far, we have published volumes by Wesley that contain his discourses on the Sermon on the Mount and his Plain Account of Christian Perfection. We’ve also published The Tongue of Fire, a work on the Holy Spirit by a 19th century Irish Methodist missionary and pastor named William Arthur. Most recently, we have come out with a volume of nine sermons by Wesley on the nature of faithful discipleship called From Almost to Altogether: Sermons on Christian Discipleship.

Check out this video on the JWC:

It’s true that there a number of ways people can access much of John Wesley’s writings these days: student editions of Wesley’s sermons intended for seminary use, Wesley texts offered in online formats, and the scholarly Bicentennial Edition of the Works of John Wesley.

Yet none of these formats is really designed for reading and study with an eye to spiritual formation. Seedbed’s hope is that the volumes of the JWC will be used in churches: by pastors, youth ministers, laypeople in small groups, etc.

I recently gave a copy of From Almost to Altogether to every staff member of my church. Within a few days, two of those staff members had asked if I’d be willing to help guide them through a few of the sermons included in it. As you can imagine, my answer was an enthusiastic yes!

The great thing about the JWC is that it is an ongoing project. Seedbed will be producing new volumes of Wesleyan material in it for years to come. And I’ll do my best to keep you updated on it!

The Throne of Love

05 Tuesday May 2015

Posted by admin in Discipleship, John Wesley, Salvation, Sanctification/Holiness, Wesleyan Theology

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In my course, “The Means of Grace in Wesleyan Theology” this semester, we read John Wesley’s sermon, “On Zeal.” The dominant image in the sermon is an illustration by Wesley that is sometimes called the Throne of Love.

My student Mimi White reviewed the sermon for our class, and she drew an illustration to help our class understand Wesley’s throne of love. It was so fantastic, I took a picture of what she drew so I could share it:

Children, dogs, cats, and butterflies. The love of Jesus is for the whole creation!

Why this image? It’s because Wesley is trying to paint a picture in the sermon of what the holy life looks like in a true Christian believer. Here’s how he describes it:

“In a Christian believer love sits upon the throne which is erected in the inmost soul; namely, love of God and man, which fills the whole heart, and reigns without a rival. In a circle near the throne are all holy tempers; — longsuffering, gentleness, meekness, fidelity, temperance; and if any other were comprised in ‘the mind which was in Christ Jesus.’ In an exterior circle are all the works of mercy, whether to the souls or bodies of men. By these we exercise all holy tempers — by these we continually improve them, so that all these are real means of grace, although this is not commonly adverted to. Next to these are those that are usually termed works of piety — reading and hearing the word, public, family, private prayer, receiving the Lord’s supper, fasting or abstinence. Lastly, that his followers may the more effectually provoke one another to love, holy tempers, and good works, our blessed Lord has united them together in one body, the church, dispersed all over the earth — a little emblem of which, of the church universal, we have in every particular Christian congregation.”

As a bonus, check out John Meunier’s post, Wesley: On Zeal and the local church.

New Room Conference 2015

30 Thursday Apr 2015

Posted by admin in Discipleship, Evangelism & Mission, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Practical Theology, Seedbed, Wesleyan Theology, Worship

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What if such a meeting place could be arranged today, where our collective paths could cross for a few days of hearing some new voices, engaging in some new conversations and seeing some new horizons of possibility for a movement whose time has come to move again?

That’s the question posed by the organizers of the New Room Conference, scheduled for this upcoming September 16-18, 2015, in Franklin, Tennessee.

If you are looking for a gathering that is deeply Wesleyan in tone and practical in aim, then you should really check out the New Room Conference. I attended the first New Room gathering last year, and it was one of the most encouraging, invigorating meetings of Wesleyan pastors and laity that I’ve experienced in a long time.

This year’s New Room gathering promises to be even better. Speakers include Jo Anne Lyon, Kevin Watson, Lisa Yebuah, Stanley John, and more. They’re even going to let yours truly take the stage at some point. There’ll be great music, great worship, and great conversation.

The New Room Conference will be held at Christ Community Church in Franklin, Tennessee. Since the Nashville International Airport is nearby, travel shouldn’t be too much of a problem even for those who live far off.

Seedbed Publishing is the host of the New Room Conference, and they see it as part of their larger mission to assist the Wesleyan movemenet with vital resources in print, online, and conference formats. (Or as they put it, “Resourcing people, communities, and movements to love the whole world with the whole gospel.”) You should check them out, and even more importantly — check out the New Room Conference this fall.