Monday, December 31, 2012

Where's the power?

...the vital missing element in his [Wesley, pre-Aldersgate] theological understanding of salvation during this period was understanding faith as trust. The missing dimension in his own life was a personal, inward experience of God and this could not occur until he saw the dimension of trust and relationship as an integral part of a full-orbed definition of faith. The limiting of faith to assent in effect left him with no other option but to exercise rigorous self-discipline in cultivating his relationship with God, seeking to put into practice what his intellectual discoveries were showing him.—Wesley as a Pastoral Theologian, pages 59-60

<idle musing>
And without that trust, there was no transformation and no power. He was where so many are today: intellectual assent to the gospel, but no embracing of what it means for life on a daily basis.
</idle musing>

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