The story of the eighteenth century preacher David Brainerd has been told in dozens of popular biographies, articles, and short essays. Almost without exception, these works are celebratory, even hagiographic in nature, making him into a kind of Protestant saint, a model for generations of missionaries. This book will be the first scholarly biography of Brainerd, drawing on everything from town records and published sermons to hand-written fragments to tell the story not only of Brainerd's life, but of his legend.

The most respected and acclaimed biography of Wesley published in recent times.

In this book, historian Nigel Scotland examines ten powerful revival movements that hugely impacted the social life and culture of large sections of America and the British Isles. Revivals represent a high point of Christian experience, renewing and empowering the life and worship of Christian communities. In consequence they draw large numbers of new people to personal faith in Christ, which in turn brings lasting and positive change to social life and culture. In this book special attention is given to the ways in which vibrant Christian faith challenged racism, fought and overcame slavery, helped to birth trade unions, campaigned for temperance, led to a rapid growth in education, from Sunday schools to universities, provided equal opportunities for women, and renewed family life and relationships.

All too often the religious and cultural experiences of British North Americans have been analysed without reference to the world of the Atlantic empire. Anglicans and the Atlantic World seeks to redress this by demonstrating that transatlantic connections continued to shape the history of the Anglican church in Quebec throughout the nineteenth century. To achieve this Richard Vaudry traces the migration of both English and Irish Protestants and examines the careers of various prominent Quebec Anglicans, including Jacob, Eliza, and George Mountain, Jasper Hume Nicolls, Henry Roe, Jonathan and Edmund Willoughby Sewell, and finally Jeffrey Hale - families with impeccable imperial credentials. By stressing the importance of an imperial, transatlantic culture, Vaudry offers a fresh and innovative look at the history of the Anglican church in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Quebec.

The important questions in ecumenical dialogue centre upon issues of authority and order. This book uses the development of ministry in the early Methodist Church to explore the origins of the Methodist Order and identify the nature of authority exercised by John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church. Showing Methodism as having been founded upon Episcopalian principles, but in a manner reinterpreted by its founder, Adrian Burdon charts the journey made by John Wesley and his people towards the ordination of preachers, which became such a major issue amongst the first Methodist Societies. Implications for understanding the nature and practice of authority and order in modern Methodism are explored, with particular reference to the covenant for unity between English Methodists and the Church of England.

Exploring the intense relationship between Romantic literature and Methodism, Helen Boyles argues that writers from both movements display an ambivalent attitude towards the expression of deep emotional and spiritual experience. Boyles takes up the disparaging characterization of William Wordsworth and other Romantic poets as 'Methodistical,' showing how this criticism was rooted in a suspicion of the 'enthusiasm' with which the Methodist movement was negatively identified. Historically, enthusiasm has generated hostility and embarrassment, a legacy that Boyles suggests provoked concerted efforts by Romantic poets such as Wordsworth and the Methodist leaders John and Charles Wesley to cleanse it of its derogatory associations. While they distanced themselves from enthusiasm's dangerous and hysterical manifestations, writers and religious leaders also identified with the precepts and inspiration of a language and religion of the heart. Boyles's analysis encompasses a range of literary genres from the Methodist sermon and hymn, to literary biography, critical review, lyric and epic poem. Balancing analysis of creative content with a consideration of its critical reception, she offers readers a detailed analysis of Wordsworth's relationship to popular evangelism within a analytical framework that incorporates Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey, and William Hazlitt.

John Wesley by his own words considered himself a "Man of One Book," meaning of course the Scriptures. Yet what does this seemingly declarative statement really mean? What was Wesley's view on the inspiration, authority, and even the infallibility of Scripture? This question is more than a historical curiosity when we recognize the current debate between evangelical groups over their views of the authority of Scripture. Recognizing the debt all Wesleyan movements have to Wesley's teachings and doctrines, this book will attempt to answer some critical questions about Wesley's view and use of the Bible. How did Wesley develop his views? How did he incorporate Scripture into his development of the Methodist movement? What was the position of Scripture in what has become known as the Wesleyan Quadrilateral of reason, experience, tradition, and Scripture? What were his views on inspiration and infallibility and would his principles of interpretation hold up against modern, critical scholarship? Finally, and perhaps most importantly, what influence did Wesley's view and use of the Bible have upon the success of the Wesleyan Revival? Are there lessons we can still learn from Wesley that could impact the world and church of the twenty-first century? This book will attempt to answer these and many other fascinating questions about John Wesley, a "Man of One Book."

In "Thoughts Upon Methodism," John Wesley shared his hopes and fears for the future of his religious movement. The article contains this well-known passage: "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." The Form and Power of Religion unpacks this statement by explaining what Wesley meant by the form and power of religion, identifying what Methodist Doctrine, Spirit, and Discipline were according to Wesley, and discussing how these aspects of Methodism worked together to maintain the vitality of the Revival. The book concludes with an evaluation of Wesley's theory of Methodist Vitality, and discusses its viability as a basis for contemporary Church Vitality programs.

Most Christians are completely unaware that for over 200 years there has existed in England, and at times in Wales, Scotland, Canada, Bermuda, Australia, New Zealand, Russia and the USA, an episcopal Church, similar in many respects to the Church of England, worshipping with a Prayer Book virtually identical to the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, and served by bishops, presbyters and deacons whose orders derive directly from Canterbury, and ecumenically enriched by Old Catholic, Swedish, Moravian and other successions. The Free Church of England as an independent jurisdiction within the Universal Church began in the reign of George III. In 1991 the Church sent a bishop to George Carey's Enthronement as Archbishop of Canterbury. In addition to presenting for the first time a detailed history of the Free Church of England, John Fenwick also explores the distinctive doctrinal emphases of the denomination, its Constitution, its liturgical tradition, its experience of the historic episcopate, and its many connections with other churches (including the Reformed Episcopal Church in the USA). He discusses why the Church has, so far, failed to fulfil the vision of its founders, and what the possible future of the Church might be - including a very significant expansion as many Anglicans and other Christians considering new options discover this historic, episcopal, disestablished Church with its international connections and ecumenical character.