Proud To Be A Methodist!

I always look forward to receiving The Methodist Recorder, which I pick up from my local newsagent.  I could take out a subscription and have it delivered; but I like to support local businesses in my area and its always pleasent to chat with the girl behind the counter who used to be a member of the children's drama group at church.

There's always a lot of interesting stuff in The Methodist Recorder and I'm surprised that more Methodists don't read it.   As well as the news there are interesting debates on the letters page, wonderful sermons and articles, notes for preachers, reviews and other interesting content.  This weeks was particulary good as the centre four pages were devoted to a new campaign by the Methodist Recorder called Proud To Be Methodist.  This campaign really appeals to me because I the past two or three years I have come to the conclusion that I am indeed proud to be a Methodist.

Let me explain.  I have been brought up in the Methodist Church, attending a Methodist Sunday School and then going on to attend Poulton Methodist Church.  apart from a brief sojourn in the Church of England when I was at university (both a really lively evangellical church and an Anglo-Catholic church) I have always attended a Methodist church and yet I never really identified myself as a Methodist.  If asked I would have probably said that I was a Christian who just happened to attend a Methodist church.

I would now say that I am mostly definately a Christian, but also that I am a Methodist Christian and proud of my roots in the Methodist Church which I believe was raised by God to spread scriptural holiness.  I started to understand just how Methodist I was when I started to study the Local Preachers' Faith & Worship course.  This has continued through my time as a Student Minister at a joint Methodist and Anglican training college where the experience of sharing lectures, worship, prayer and fellowship with Anglican students has enabled me to discover that whilst we agree on the fundamentals of the Christian faith there are also areas of difference that make us distinctively Methodist or Anglican.  I realised that my faith and Christian understandings had a distinctly Methodist flavour and I am proud of that flavour and of the understandings it can bring not only to Methodism but also to the world-wide Body of Christ.

I am now proud, in the best sense of that word, to call myself a Methodist, without in any way seeing myself as superior to the adherents of any other Christian denomination.  I am proud to belong to a church that believes in the power of preaching, that believes that all people need to be saved and can be saved, that has a history of concern for the poor and downtrodden and a church that is connexional and is governed by a Conference rather than by Bishops or a local congregation.  I am proud to be part of a Christian denomination that has an open communion table, that emphasises the assurance of salvation and scriptural holiness.  I have, for many years, used the Methodist quadrilateral of reflecting using scripture, tradition, reason and experience and believe that this brings a good balance to applying our faith to contemporary issues and Christian practice.  I know that these things are understood and valued within the wider worldwide church but also recognise them as Methodist in origin and emphasis.

Perhaps, most of all, I am proud to be a Methodist because it is the church that has nurtured my Christian faith and the church I believe God has called me to serve as a Presbyter.

Pride is often seen as one of the seven deadly sins and it is said that 'pride goeth before a fall'; but I don't think that it is in any way wrong to say that I am proud of the denomination that has given me a spiritual home for nearly 44 years and which I believe God still wants to use to help to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ.

I am proud to be Methodist because Methodism is, at its best, a missional and discipleship movement contributing towards Jesus final command to 'go and make disciples of all nations.'  To be part of such a movement is an honour and privilege.