Social Holiness?

John Wesley once said something like, “there is no holiness but social holiness, no gospel but social gospel.”

This has been so badly misused by Methodists. We hear the phrases “social holiness” and “social gospel” and assume it means some program of activism. What he meant was that we are not individual Christians. It's the basis of the small-group discipleship the early Methodists emphasized: our holiness is among us, and so is our gospel. We grow in grace as we meet together and hold each other accountable.

I Didn't Go to a Methodist Church Sunday

Many years back, a friend of mine told me that she no longer went to a Methodist Church. She had grown up at First Methodist in Lexington, KY, but she had moved North to pursue her Ph.D. The Methodist churches in the area—she could not figure them out. I don't remember what she said was not jibing. But I think I resonate with what she felt. Jessie's family is from Illinois. Over the past 6 years when we come to visit, we have been to some Methodist churches in the area. I have yet to hear the Gospel in a Methodist church in Central Illinois. Something has gone bad wrong.

As we were thinking about where to go, we knew for starters that we were not going to a Methodist church. That such a decision has been made would have bothered me a few years ago. But now I don't really care what has gone wrong or why. Can't fix it. But I am not going to go to a Methodist church here, waiting to see what happens, or hoping we might get to hear the Gospel.

We decided to worship at a non-denominational church we heard about from a friend of Jessie's we met at the bike shop.

I totally succeeded in turning my pastor-mode off. Normally it feels like I am a 12 o'clock preacher, woulda-done-this, I-don't-believe-I'd'a-done-it-that-way... But I worshipped the Lord with gladness. And even moreso because the Gospel was clearly presented. I thanked the pastor for his sermon.

You can make a living by telling the church it's dying and presenting your plan to revive it. We are dying and it's because we are... too conservative... too liberal... don't have a contemporary service... sing hymns...didn't apologize for the Crusades...

Methodists are dying in this country and will deservedly die out because we don't preach the Gospel. We have a lot of money and a lot of property-- we can probably drive this thing into the ground for another 75 years.

Or we can preach the Gospel.