An inspiring New Year's admonition from John Wesley
Once again, a new calendar year has commenced. It is a time for reflection, remembrance, regret, and resolution.
Just this past week in my daily devotion I came across the following statement widely attributed to John Wesley (1703-1791), the founder of Methodism:
“Do all the good you can,
by all the means you can,
in all the ways you can,
in all the places you can,
at all the times you can,
to all the people you can,
as long as ever you can.”Get Our Latest News for FREE
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It is hard to think of a more appropriate or admirable statement of life goals going into a new year. It certainly helps to explain Methodism’s admirable centuries-long tradition of social activism and charitable work.
I plan on keeping this statement by John Wesley on my desk this year to remind me that as a Christian, I must be about my Heavenly Father’s business. This will serve as a reminder for semi-Reformed Baptists like myself (On the TULIP scale I am about a 3¼ pointer: About ¾ of Total Depravity; About ¾ of Unconditional Election; None of Limited Atonement; ¾ of Irresistible Grace and 100% of Perseverance of the Saints).
As a Baptist, I do believe in “once saved, always saved,” or as the great Victorian British Baptist preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon called it, the “Perseverance of the Savior”—that Jesus has promised to never let us go once He has become our Savior.
I fear too often that leads too many of us to rest on our “Blessed Assurance” and become lax in being the “salt” and “light” (Matt. 5) Jesus commanded each of us, as His disciples, to be.
Also, while I have always found Wesley’s Methodist theology to be “light” on anthropology (understanding the full impact of man’s fallen state, thus overestimating man’s capacity for spiritual understanding apart from God’s prevenient, initiatory, spiritual quickening), ironically, however, my favorite hymn was written by Charles Wesley, John’s younger brother. The hymn “And Can It Be?” is a powerful and moving anthem:
And can it be that I should gain
An interest in the Savior’s blood?
Died He for me, who caused His pain?
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
That Thou, my God, should die for me?‘Tis mystery all! th’ Immortal dies!
Who can explore His strange design?
In vain the firstborn seraph tries
To sound the depths of love divine!
‘Tis mercy all! Let earth adore,
Let angel minds inquire no moreHe left His Father’s throne above,
So free, so infinite His grace;
Emptied Himself of all but love,
And bled for Adam’s helpless race;
‘Tis mercy all; immense and free;
For, O my God, it found out me.Long my imprisoned spirit lay
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;
Thine age diffused a quick’ning ray,
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.No condemnation now I dread,
Jesus, and all in Him, is mine!
Alive in Him, my living Head,
And clothed in righteousness divine,
Bold I approach th’ eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ
my own.Refrain:
Amazing love! how can it be
That thou, my God, should die for me.”
I keep the words of this great hymn in the Bible I use for my daily devotions. It never fails to inspire me and fill me with overwhelming gratitude to my Heavenly Father and Jesus my Savior.
We would all do well to heed John Wesley’s admonition to do all the good we can, not because we are trying to earn favor with God, but because we want to please Him with our obedience and we want to draw others to Him as Savior as a result of our exemplifying His redeeming love.
Let us all go forth into the New Year determined to follow John Wesley’s admonition, knowing that in the end, Christ is Victor and every knee shall bow to Jesus as Lord!
Dr. Richard Land, BA (Princeton, magna cum laude); D.Phil. (Oxford); Th.M (New Orleans Seminary). Dr. Land served as President of Southern Evangelical Seminary from July 2013 until July 2021. Upon his retirement, he was honored as President Emeritus and he continues to serve as an Adjunct Professor of Theology & Ethics. Dr. Land previously served as President of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (1988-2013) where he was also honored as President Emeritus upon his retirement. Dr. Land has also served as an Executive Editor and columnist for The Christian Post since 2011.
Dr. Land explores many timely and critical topics in his daily radio feature, “Bringing Every Thought Captive,” and in his weekly column for CP.
