¶ … American Evangelical Story" Douglas a. Sweeney. I a paragraph summary chapter.
"The American Evangelical Story: A History of the Movement" - review
Douglas Sweeney's book "The American Evangelical Story: A History of the Movement" provides an elaborate description of the evangelical movement in the U.S. And how it started. The first chapter is intended to have readers gain a more complex understanding of the concept of evangelicalism in the U.S. Sweeney attempts to enable readers to realize that it would be difficult and almost impossible to consider a simple definition while relating to the movement. He actually acknowledges the fact that his experience somewhat limits him in providing the perfect explanation of evangelical traditions in the U.S. "Evangelicals comprise a movement that is rooted in classical Christian orthodoxy, shaped by a largely Protestant understanding of the gospel, and distinguished by other such movements by an eighteenth-century twist." (Sweeney 2005, p. 24)
The first chapter in the book further addresses the complexity of the topic under discussion by acknowledging that it would be impossible for it to provide a final definition on the subject. Sweeney also uses this chapter to emphasize the fact that the other chapters in the text are going to focus on the matter even more and that they are going to introduce readers into a world filled with information on the American evangelical movement. Throughout the chapter, the writer relates to the strong connection between the movement and Protestant concepts. "Second, evangelicals are descendants of the Protestant Reformation with a commitment to the orthodoxy (i.e., right doctrine and right worship) expressed in the Ancient Christian creeds and promoted further by Reformers such as Luther, Zwingli,...
Wesley comes and underlines this fact by connecting the humanly actions, registered by the good deeds and the honest and austere way of life, with the state of perfect. Thus, the Christian becomes perfect when he has attained the complete love for God. This is due, in his belief, to the absolution of sins and thus returns to the original state at birth. This final aspect is significant particularly because
For those who have achieved or been granted certain comforts, I would impress upon the congregation, such fortune has been accompanied by God's desire to see that this good fortune is shared. I would use my role in the Church to find ways to engage with poorer communities outside of our own, to create and empower an internal volunteer corps through which congregants can reach these communities and to establish
67). Of all of the events that chronicled in the book, the fire stands out as the most poignant force that helped to shape John Wesley's life. After this, Wesley developed the idea that god had saved him because he had a purpose for his life. Thinking all was lost, Wesley's father knelt in prayer when John was rescued just before the building collapsed (Collins, p. 14). Samuel Wesley prayed
It is never something we are meant to earn; it is a gift from God. Faith is necessary as a condition of justification by faith, and salvation is for the penalty and the plague of sin (Maddox 144). Maddox writes that argues that Wesley's view of salvation is best expressed as a via salutis, a way to salvation" rather than a more reformed or scholastic expression of ordo salutis, a
John Wesley's understanding of the via salutis, identifying each component. Does John Wesley successfully maintain his emphasis both on God's goodness and on humanity's responsibility throughout this entire process? The term "via salutis" translates into the "path of salvation." In the view of John Wesley, the path of salvation consisted of two distinct components, that of justification and sanctification (Wesley, 1980, p.271). Justification was an act of God's forgiveness and
70). The emphasis that Wesley placed on Christians having a conscience set a standard and a tone for what Methodists would do many decades later in the United States. Some may argue that prominent Methodists taking positions on social issues (like terrible workers' conditions in factories; the slaughter of Native Americans; etc.) was out of the purview of a Christian organization, nonetheless "human morality" was on the line for
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