How early American Methodists (never really) worshipped: Wesley's Sunday Service

When the Wesleyan revival spread to America in the 18th century, the colonists there did not yet have Methodist churches of their own. Methodists in Great Britain, where the movement started, attended small group meetings (known as classes) for spiritual renewal and accountability, but they still attended services in their own Anglican parishes on Sunday mornings. John Wesley founded the para-church Methodist movement by recruiting these Anglicans, as well as Presbyterians and Baptists and others, into his classes that met during the week -- he did not originally set up Methodism as a separate denomination with its own ecclesial structures. Going to class meetings was something one did in addition to worshipping on Sunday morning.

In the colonies, however, there were not so many Sunday morning options for Methodists. The American Revolution made it clear that the Church of England would struggle, mostly unsuccessfully, to retain a foothold in the colonies. Even though Wesley was an Anglican, his Methodists in the colonies had just fought a war to gain independence from the king, so they were not thrilled about worshiping in the monarch's church. Furthermore, there simply were not enough Anglican priests in America to shepherd the explosive growth of the Methodist revival. Imagine, there were only 600 Methodists in America in 1771, but that number grew to more than 200,000 in 1816! So, in order to provide leadership to this growing movement, Wesley (grudgingly) agreed to let the American Methodists form their own denomination and ordain their own pastors.

In addition to setting apart Methodist "superintendents" to lead the new church, he also created a manual that spelled out the nuts and bolts for how the American Methodists should worship. Ever the pragmatist, Wesley called this guide The Sunday Service of Methodists in North America. It was basically a revision of the 1662 edition of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, with a few things left out. For better or worse, the Americans did not really take to Wesley's plan. Even if his instructions were not fully embraced in America, reading the Sunday Service can teach us quite a bit about Wesley's vision for worship in this new denomination.

Sacraments. In the three-page preface of the Sunday Service, Wesley laid out his (rapidly evolving) theology of ordination, justifying his decision to send Thomas Coke as a superintendent to America. Coke was charged with ordaining Francis Asbury so the two of them could jointly oversee the work there, eventually taking on the title of Bishop, ordaining other preachers in turn.

The setting apart of Francis Asbury for superintending work

Why was ordination so important to Wesley's view of the church's worship? Because without ordained elders, the Methodists could not practice the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Even while Methodist meetings thrived under the leadership of non-ordained laity, Wesley did not believe that these lay preachers should preside over the sacraments. Simply put: Wesley held that there must be ordained pastors in order to have a church. Since the Anglican Church in America (or, what remained of it) was unwilling to ordain Methodist preachers into its own church, Wesley felt that he had no choice but to set apart his own pastors, thereby creating a new denomination.

Lectionary of Scripture Readings. Wesley's Sunday Service assumed that Methodist churches would continue the Anglican practice of reading a standard set of scripture passages that lined up with the seasons of the church year. In accord with the Book of Common Prayer (BCP), he expected there to be at least four readings each Sunday: Old Testament, New Testament epistle, Gospel, and one or more Psalms. There is little evidence that this lectionary was ever widely adopted by Methodists in America, as later worship guides indicate that the choice of scriptures was left up to the whim of the preachers. The adoption and use of the Revised Common Lectionary within United Methodism in the past couple of decades is a recovery of Wesley's original intention for guided corporate scripture reading.

Common Prayer. It is clear that prayer was a central part of Wesley's vision for corporate worship. As a good Anglican, he drew from the deeply theological and scriptural prayers of his church tradition. Wesley believed in a passionate faith, with one's heart and affections inflamed by the Holy Spirit. Thomas Cranmer's prayers in the BCP are indeed beautiful and emotional, but in America these written forms lost out to extemporaneous prayers of emotionally-charged preachers. This was part of a larger move in American spirituality in which worshipers became an audience and worship leaders became performers. The Sunday Service may have been too dull and rote for America, but at least it provided words that the laity could pray. Unfortunately, the camp-meeting and revival services that bloomed in the 19th century did not give the laity any words to pray on their own like the prayer books did. This lack of lay participation in corporate prayers is still a problem in most Protestant churches.

Singing. One of Wesley's most important innovations to Anglican worship was his emphasis on congregational singing of hymns. Elsewhere he wrote that the people should sing "lustily and with a good courage." Apparently hearty hymn-singing was not widespread in Church of England services in the 18th century. John and his brother Charles wrote a multitude of hymns for the Methodists, some of which are included in the Sunday Service. The Methodists were known as singing people, and this aspect of worship was taken up by the Americans.

Wesley knew that the political landscape would not allow for the American Methodists to remain in the Church of England. But he had no idea how much the American culture had changed -- how even the forms of worship would be rejected for new styles. In the end, the Sunday Service was probably too structured for the American frontier. It was very text-heavy, requiring worshipers to have books. This was not only impractical from a logistical standpoint, but it was unlikely that many of the early Methodists could read well enough to use this resource. So if Wesley's plan was ahead of its time, I think now is the moment to bring back some of these historically-grounded and participatory styles of worship. Just as the world-wide church is finding it's way back to the sacramental practices of the early church, so too should Methodists reclaim some of the spiritually potent services proposed by its founder.


For a more scholarly and in-depth treatment of Wesley's instructions for Methodist worship, check out Todd Stepp's Paper: "Authentic Christian Worship: Discovering Wesleyan Criteria." For more on how American Methodists actually worshipped, read Lester Ruth's book A Little Heaven Below.