John Wesley Vows
Attended a Spiritual Formation group prayer gathering yesterday and we looked at a prayer written by John Wesley in 1733. Having spent time in the Methodist church, I have heard and recited pieces of John Wesley prayers and works, but it was interesting to spend time going line by line in a nearly 300 year old prayer.
His first two stanzas from A Collection of Forms of Prayer (1733):
To you, O God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, my Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, I give up myself entirely. May I no longer serve myself, but you, all the days of my life.
I give you my understanding. May it be my only care to know you, your perfections, your works, and your will. Let all things else be as dross unto me, for the excellency of this knowledge, and let me silence all reasoning’s against whatsoever you teach me, who can neither deceive nor be deceived.
Although the language is a bit flowery, we are still walking by reasoning and not by faith today. Everything screams at us from the TV to the internet of speculation and hearsay disguised in the deceptive mask of reasoning.
Yet we know that in our hearts, our gut, our listening to that small voice of faith that if we lean not unto our own understanding we can reach higher. Walking by faith we find our true place here and now and the thing we were born to do.
