Thank you. Thank you very much.
It is a joy to be here and to see so many people here.
I think when we had the first symposium, what did Arnold say we had?
15 or twelve?
I don't remember anyhow. It was fun.
It's always been fun, and it's always been a learning experience.
And so thank you very much for this opportunity, Trinity.
It really is a joy and honor to be here
today to join in this celebration, be part of Tyndale Seminary ongoing exploration of
the significance of John Wesley and the Wesleyan Witness.
And I want to especially say how pleased I am to recognize
with you the strategic contribution of Bishop and Mrs.
Donald M.
Bastion initiating the Wesley Studies Chair at Tyndale and also the ongoing
growing contribution of Professor James Pedler in the Ministry of Wesley Studies
and the Wesleyan Witness through Tyndale University and beyond.
And I want to commend especially the
continuing support of the Wesley Chair by the Wesleyan denominations.
So the Wesleyan witness.
There's so much more yet to say and apply, or perhaps to incarnate, as a better word.
So now, from Wesley in the 18th century to
Francis of Assisi in the 13th, I have visited Assisi three times.
Two with my adventurous wife, Jan, and one
with our equally adventurous daughter, Geraldine and her husband, Sean.
We were there last I don't know, time
flies a while back and had a wonderful time there for a little over a week.
Assisi is a lovely, fascinating, hilly place, still with a medieval feel,
though there is a modern city in the valley below.
Climbing or riding into the old city is like going back in time.
I don't remember when I first got
interested in Francis of Assisi, but for the past, really about 20 years since our
first visit to a C 1003, I've been pondering the life and the witness of St.
Francis.
And I found the more I studied Francis, the more John Wesley came to mind.
Two such very different characters.
1234 I began to add up the parallels, and that's what led to today's talk.
And I got awake in the night thinking
about this, and I thought, oh, I shouldn't have done what I'm doing.
Here what I should do.
I should just stand up and tell stories about Francis and John Wesley.
It would be probably more entertaining and
maybe get the point across, but that's really not so much the way my mind works.
But Francis and John Wesley were also very different temperamentally, although both
were, in a sense, poets, wesley temperament was more that of the
rational scholar Francis, more that of a mystic.
In terms of personality, I imagine Francis
seems more like Charles Wesley, and John Wesley more like Francis contemporary St.
Dominic, who founded founded Dominicans
approximately the same time that the Franciscans were founded.
Interestingly, Francis lived 200 years
before the invention of the printing press.
Wesley lived 300 years after.
Yet this doesn't seem to have much affected the impact of the two movements.
Comparatively speaking.
Franciscans actually had many hundreds of
books, it's just that they were all hand copied.
They were mostly liturgical books.
What similarities between Francis and
Wesley might have some relevance for us today?
I suggest a dozen, a dozen ways Francis and Wesley's Lives and Ministries rhymed.
I think these similarities offer clues that we can all apply in our own lives, at
least I see that with regard to myself and insights that can help lighten the path
for churches seeking deeper, broader witness.
So I want to trace these parallels briefly and then draw some implications, things
that have appeared particularly relevant to me.
I think the differences between Francis
and Wesley make the similarities all the more interesting, all the more stunning.
So I'm going to begin with the parallels that seem to me to be most basic and with
some illustrations, and then move on to some others as well.
So, first of all, both Francis and Wesley were transformed by Jesus call and
dedicated their lives to serving and proclaiming the Gospel.
They both have interesting stories about how they came to experience Jesus Christ.
If any of you have seen the film Brother, Son and Sister Moon,
even though it's as much about the 1970s as it is about the 1200s, still
the sense of the conversion of Francis that's depicted in that film is in many
ways true to life, transformed by the Gospel.
And the primary motive here was love.
Love for God and for all people, whoever or wherever they may be.
Wesley's constant theme was the love of God and faith working through love.
Galatian five six in Christians lives.
Wesley echoed Francis when he said that
the necessary fruit of experiencing God's love in Christ is the love of our
neighbor, of every soul which God has made.
Such love is no mere passive emotion.
It means being zealous of good works, the hungering and thirsting to do good in
every possible kind to all people without distinction.
And this was precisely the spirit of Francis.
His life was lived love, beginning when God put love for Lepers in his heart.
The first thing Francis wrote in his final
testament, when he was giving his kind of last will of his call to his brothers, the
first thing he wrote in his testament was this he says, the Lord gave me Brother
Francis thus to begin doing penance in this way.
For when I was in sin, it seemed too bitter for me to see Lepers.
And the Lord himself led me among them, and I showed mercy to them.
And when I left them, what had seemed
bitter to me was turned into sweetness of soul and body.
And this soon led to the dramatic scene of
Francis renouncing his old life, including his clothing, radically following Jesus.
We don't have any stories of John Wesley
taking off all his clothes in front of the bishop, but we do of Francis.
I guess Francis is more radical, at least in that regard.
Francis first biographer, Brother Thomas
of Solano, himself a Franciscan, wrote that Francis quote could not hear the love
of God, the words the love of God, without a change in himself.
As he soon as he heard the love of God, he
was excited, moved and on fire, as if these words
from the outside were a pick strumming the strings of his heart on the inside.
So that, first of all, transformed by Jesus by the love of Christ.
Secondly, both Francis and Wesley viewed the Bible as authoritative and sought
faithfully to live out its precepts and promises.
One of the surprises to me in studying
Francis was how well he knew the Scriptures.
Though a scholar, Wesley, of course, was famously a man of one book, the Bible.
Francis fed on Scripture and sought its guidance in forming his new community.
He loved to hear the Bible read, especially the Gospels.
What Jesus taught.
This we should do.
Francis believed.
He sought to pattern his life according to God's word as he understood it.
And one of the positive surprises studying Francis is how
deeply he and his community immersed themselves in Scripture.
So that I found significant.
Third, both Francis and John Wesley felt
especially called to the poor to be with them, minister to and among them.
This was the story of Francis life,
though, like Wesley, Francis passion was to reach all people.
Both Francis and Wesley manifested what Latin American theologians and Pope
Francis have called a preferential option for the poor.
Fulfilling this call was the main reason both Francis and Wesley traveled so much.
In the spring of 1739, Wesley was asked to
preach outdoors to a crowd of coal miners, a radical thing he thought at the time.
Then he thought, well, actually, Jesus did that, didn't he?
So Wesley preached to the miners and to himself.
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because
he has anointed me to preach, to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
And this echoes Francis own life.
The Spirit of the Lord was upon him to preach good news to the poor.
Because of this call, both Francis and both Francis of Assisi and Wesley wanted
to speak simply and plainly to the common people.
Thomas of Solano writes that Francis quote preached to the simple in simple, concrete
terms, since he knew that virtue is more necessary than words.
But when he was among spiritual people
with greater abilities, he gave birth to life giving and profound words.
With few words, he would suggest what was inexpressible and weaving movement.
With fiery gestures, he carried away all his hearers toward the things of heaven.
Speaking of Francis, Wesley's preaching was seldom fiery, we
suppose, but it was both plain and passionate.
Wesley was always concerned to give a
plain account of the Gospel, whether he was talking about Jesus, the Methodist
bands and class meetings, or Christian perfection.
Fourth, Wesley and Francis both saw the necessity of small covenant community.
This was mentioned earlier this morning by Dr.
Shepard.
Both created structures not only the
importance of community, but both created structures to let it happen so seekers
could grow wide and deep to build communities of committed discipleship.
Francis wrote his rule based mainly on
Jesus'own words, what Jesus told his disciples they should do.
Wesley, of course, had his general rules summarized in three points.
First, do no harm, avoiding evil in every
kind, especially that which is most generally practiced among us.
Second, do good, being in every way merciful after your power as you have
opportunity, doing good of every possible sort and as far as possible to all people.
Third, attend upon all the ordinances of
God, including public worship, the Lord's Supper, family and private prayers,
searching the Scriptures, and fasting or abstinence.
Wesley created much more elaborate and prescriptive structures than Francis did.
The band, the class meeting, the society and others.
These are big differences from Francis.
Yet the key dynamic was the same deep, intimate, energized face to face
communities of people committed to Jesus and to one another.
Wesley's early Methodist communities
involved both men and women, both single and married.
In Francis case, of course, they were communities of men only, while his friend
Claire formed parallel communities of women.
In reality, the Franciscan Tertiaries, the Franciscan Third Orders, which were men
and women leading their normal lives, were much more like the Methodists, I think.
Much more like the early Methodist, involving both single and married men and
women who carried on their normal lives in society.
Both Francis and Wesley sought to live
perfect lives of holy discipleship, the way Jesus taught and showed.
In Francis day, this was called evangelical.
Evangelical perfection, evangelical poverty, apostolic poverty.
These were common terms and similar terms with a very radical stress on poverty.
In Wesley's time.
Common terms for this ideal of the Christian life were, of course,
Christian perfection, entire, sanctification, holiness, similar terms.
In both cases, the goal was the same
following Jesus the way Jesus taught, empowered by the Holy Spirit.
Number six both Francis and Wesley were firmly committed to a life of good works.
Francis watched over his brothers leading
and encouraged them in self giving service.
This was an essential Methodist commitment as well.
Wesley said the true love of God was shown
in the hungering and thirsting to do good and every possible kind unto all people,
the rejoicing to spend and be spent for them, for every child of man, not looking
for any recompense in this world, but only in the resurrection of the just.
Also.
Number seven both Francis and Wesley were churchmen.
Both were committed to the church and especially the Eucharist.
The Lord's Supper is God's self giving for
us in Jesus Christ based on his atoning death on the cross.
Theologically, Francis and Wesley's
conception of Holy Communion was somewhat different.
Of course. Again, Dr.
Shepherd commented on this this morning.
Wesley would not have subscribed to the
doctrine of transubstantiation, which was just being defined in Francis day.
Yet both men saw the Eucharist as a
mystery of grace, more than just a remembrance, an actual means by which God
conveys grace to us through Jesus Christ by the Spirit.
Both Francis and Wesley, therefore partook of the Lord's Supper as often as possible.
As an old man, Wesley published a sermon
on the Duty of Constant Communion with this text.
Do this in remembrance of me.
The Eucharist was a constant emphasis and practice of Francis as well.
With both Francis and Wesley, their sacramentalism reinforced rather than
detracting from intimate, informal Christian fellowship.
Both men saw that community and communion go together, part of the interweaving
ecology of grace within the one church of Jesus Christ.
And then, relatedly number eight both
Francis and Wesley loved and lived the liturgy.
Francis and his brothers faithfully followed the canonical hours
even as best they could when they were traveling similarly with Wesley.
Wesley always carried his book of common
prayer with him, had used it daily his Sunday preaching, his Sunday sermons.
His preaching generally was based on electionary, and both Francis and Wesley
understood the church's liturgy as a means of grace.
Yet their worship was equally often spontaneous, not solely liturgical.
And number nine both Wesley and Francis loved and reveled in God's created order.
Here it is an especially pointed and timely likeness, conjoining the two.
Wesley loved to visit gardens, to walk out
of doors and marveled in the beauty of creation.
Both Francis and Wesley cared about animals.
They saw themselves as stewards of the created order.
One of Wesley's great sermons is the New
Creation Sermon 64 with the text behold, I make all things new.
Like Francis in his cantacle of the
creatures, wesley saw the beauty and intricacy of creation as a cause for
praise and for the hope of final healing and restoration.
Francis lived and sung the same message, though he wrote no books.
Renowned Franciscan scholars like Roger
Bacon and John Dunn, SCOTUS lady later at Oxford, Paris and Bologna and elsewhere in
the generation after Francis did investigate the wisdom of God in creation,
laying the groundwork of modern science as pointed.
Out by two recent books.
For example, the Reopening of the Western Mind by Charles Freeman, just published
and The Light Ages the Surprising Story of Medieval Science by Seb Fok.
Many of the major
scholars at Oxford and Paris and elsewhere were Franciscans, and others were
Dominicans, of course, like Ignatius no, who am Iquinas.
Yes, of course.
Francis explicit vision was to repair,
rebuild and awaken the church, as Jesus called him to do.
Soon, the Roman Church from the Pope on
down broadly recognized this, though certainly Francis, like Wesley, had his
critics and detractors throughout all Christian history.
Perhaps no movements have renewed themselves more frequently and more
genuinely than Franciscans and Methodists like Francis, Wesley saw the crying need
for renewal and reform in the Church and beyond.
Wesley's late sermon, The General Spread of the Gospel, sets forth an inspiring
vision of the world transformed as prophesied in Isaiah eleven nine the earth
shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
Wesley said, It is as easy to God to convert a world as one individual soul.
It is as easy to God to convert the world as one individual soul.
He foresaw that God would in time fulfill, as he said, quote all his promises, until
he hath put an end to sin and misery and infirmity and death, and reestablish
universal holiness and happiness, and cause all the inhabitants of earth to sing
together hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reynath.
And then number eleven.
The lives of Francis and Wesley were marked by joy, by song, by music.
Both were poets and loved to sing.
Francis saw his brothers as God's
troubadours, singing God's praises across Europe and beyond.
Wesley, as an Oxford student, loved to sing and later composed some hymns.
He translated German hymns and edited,
published, and helped promote his brother Charles many myriad hymns.
Wesley wrote rules for singing.
Wesley had rules for everything.
Wesley wrote Rules for Singing for the
Methodists, and also an essay on Thoughts on the Power of Music.
Wesley said Methodists do not like some,
sing in a low drawing, in a slow drawling manner.
We sing swift, both because it saves time
and because it tends to awaken and enliven the soul.
Francis taught his brothers to sing his
cantacle of the creatures as a means of evangelism, that whenever you go preach
and then sing, sing the canacle of the creatures.
Francis, as well as Wesley, loved music,
loved to sing, and saw music as a form of both worship and witness.
And then finally, number twelve.
Both Francis and Wesley had a world vision.
Francis foresaw all peoples, races, tribes
and tongues, all nations and all peoples everywhere on earth who are or who will be
eventually knowing God and walking in his ways.
Francis told his early followers, my dear
brothers, let us consider our calling, because God has mercifully called us not
only for our own good, but also for the salvation of many.
Therefore let us go through the world encouraging and teaching men and women by
word and example, to repent of their sins and to remember the Lord's commandments
which they have forgotten for such a long time.
Wesley, when criticized for not confining
his ministry to one parish, famously said, the world is my parish.
The Franciscan historian Kajitan Esser wrote of the Franciscans, the monastery of
the Friars Minor, if we may thus phrase it, is the wide world.
Wesley himself sent a preacher named Francis Francis asbury to evangelize North
America, which he did with remarkable and enduring fruitfulness.
In the century following Wesley,
Methodists, like Franciscans, were famed for their evangelistic, church planting,
educational and philanthropic work around the world.
While a number of other Wesley Francis parallels could be noted, both Francis and
Wesley showed special sensitivity to women and to the women's concerns and struggles.
Wesley, though he published widely, refused to accumulate wealth.
He wrote of the danger of riches,
reminding us of Francis, who forbad his brothers even to touch money.
Both men stressed simplicity and ignored
social convention when it would have compromised their witness.
Both Francis and Wesley preached widely to
crowds out of doors, not restricting themselves to church buildings.
Both were deeply disappointed when some of their followers proved unfaithful.
The point of this comparison is not really the past, however, it's the future.
And that's the point of the book that I'll
be publishing with Orbis Press, focusing not so much on Francis, but on the
Franciscan movement and what it has to teach us today.
The lives of these two Francis and of Assisi and John of Epworth rhyme with the
marks of other renewal movements down through history.
As we would expect, given their passion to
walk in God's ways as we appear into coming years,
we can expect God again to move in similar ways to these patterns from the past.
And so, as I've pondered this, I've thought about lessons.
Lessons for myself.
I'm low to prescribe things for others,
but these are the things that have particularly impressed me.
And I would draw a number of practical
lessons from Brother Francis and Brother John.
Together.
They comprise pastoral wisdom, wisdom applicable both to our own personal
discipleship and to leading and guiding congregations of believers.
And so I'm going to express several things
now, kind of bullet points of things that particularly impress me with regard to
Francis and Wesley and their lives and what they discovered.
First, discover community.
Common to all renewal movements, really.
In the Francis story, we see how a group of young men banded together, were
energized to life, excitement, vision and good works.
That is the dynamic of community.
Claire and her sisters discovered the same, as did John and Charles Wesley at
Oxford, then the Methodist movement all across England.
Community generates energy.
It takes someone like Francis or Wesley, however, to sanctify that energy and turn
it in positive directions, both for the inward and outward journey.
Discover community.
Secondly live god's word.
Live god's words.
Wesley's sermons are, to a surprising
degree, a compilation of biblical quotations and paraphrases.
Wesley joins them together by drawing practical lessons and applications.
This was true also of Francis.
Francis words and Acts breathed the accents of Scripture.
He lived his life as a response to Jesus.
He sang psalms of praise.
He understood the truth.
Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two edged sword.
Piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow, it is able to
judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
The point is not so much to believe or to
agree, but rather to do, to perform, to live God's words.
Jesus, after all, said, why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I tell you?
The way to life is to live God's word.
Third thing that impresses me is this love all creatures.
Love all God's creatures.
All living things are sacred because life comes from God.
And God has quote an everlasting covenant with all earth's scriptures.
According to Genesis 914 through 16, the glory of God is seen in all life
forms, even if it is distorted or hidden or in some ways corrupted.
Contemporary evangelicals have not stressed this, but Francis did.
The same affection is found in John Wesley.
Though it has been neglected, it is only now, in fact, being recovered.
Francis loved all creatures.
He marveled at them when he saw them suffering or enslaved.
He wanted to free them.
So did Wesley.
He began to stress this theologically during his last decades especially.
We become more fully whole and alive, more part of life with a capital L.
When we love all creatures, partner with
them, learn from them, protect their homes and habitats.
Both Francis and Wesley teach us this.
Number four learn to be lesser.
Learn to be lesser.
In the Francis story, we find the strange
appeal and the strange elevation of choosing to be less choosing to be lesser.
The call to lesserness is a call to servanthood.
Lesserness is a call to courtesy.
In Francis day, it was the courtly age of
chivalry, and the word courteous comes from court.
And so courtesy was a much sought virtue.
To be mature, virtuous, chivalrous was to be courteous.
The way of lesserness is the way of courtesy, of graciousness.
It is a call to live graciously with all courteous withal and to live for the poor,
so we can be more truly human and be a blessing, not a curse.
Looking at Wesley through this lens helps us appreciate him more deeply.
And number five find joy in suffering.
Joy in suffering.
It's an amazing truth, proved over again,
over and over again, in human experience and especially in Jesus own life.
Jesus, for the sake of the joy that was
set before him, endured the cross, disregarding its shame.
Hebrews Twelve Two this is a deep spiritual and also psychological truth.
Joy defeats pain.
Joy can overwhelm pain, turning suffering into surprising joyousness.
This is true even physiologically.
Joy releases substances within the body that block pain.
How else explain Francis?
He suffered dreadfully for long periods.
I have a chapter in my book on Francis diseases, francis Health Issues.
Yet he rose above this.
How else explained the paradox of Francis, who would be cheerful, even joyful, even
joyous and light hearted, even as he suffered in his eyes and his stomach.
Suffering was surrounded and overwhelmed
and captured by joy, grace, love, self giving.
Physically speaking, John Wesley was much healthier than Francis.
Wesley maintained a wise emphasis on good health with many practical lessons.
Francis, I think, failed at this point.
Much of the reason, however, traces two differences in culture of the time and in
the ideal of Christian spirituality of the time.
Still, suffering brings benefits for the faithful, as Wesley himself stressed.
Wesley said, suffering, rather than preventing or lessening our happiness,
greatly contribute thereto and indeed constitute no small part of it.
Love itself leads to suffering.
Wesley notes that the love of our neighbor will give rise to sympathizing sorrow.
It leads us to visit the fatherless and
the widow in their affliction affliction, to be tenderly concerned for the distress
and to mix our pitying tears with those who weep so often.
This is true. Those who suffer deeply, love deeply.
Pain may perhaps be endured, but it can be transcended.
Joy, well placed, is stronger than pain.
Francis shows we can learn to live above and beyond pain and distractions through
prayer and mental and spiritual disciplines.
Number six cherish church connections.
Cherish church connections.
Surrounded by pain or shrinking meaning,
we tend to neglect the very links that nurture us,
like an arm or a truth not exercised connections with other truth seekers and
truth walkers wither and die if not stretched and strengthened.
Much of the genius of Francis life lies here.
He reconnected nominal believers with the church.
Where the church was corrupt or decayed, francis and his brothers offered living
connections connecting cells and sinus that brought life to people in need.
Wesley's genius was similar.
He brought people to church or back to
church through a living encounter with Jesus.
Not only the head, but equally important, the body, the church.
Both Francis and Wesley worked to remember the dismembered.
Francis and Wesley instructors.
Franciscan and Wesley instructors were
quite different from each other, but both serve this function.
Here again, the closest parallel is between Methodist societies, I think, and
Franciscan third orders cherish church connections.
Number seven go deep in prayer.
The Importance of Prayer prayer begins with reaching out to God.
It's not a matter of right words or even pure thoughts or motives.
Prayer arises out of desperation or out of gratitude.
We pray because being all alone is not enough.
Francis, Claire and Wesley and their movements lived lives of prayer.
All accounts of Francis and of Claire and their brothers and sisters stress the
vitality of prayer, sometimes in exaggerated ways.
Accounts tell of Francis brothers being caught up in ecstasy, lifted from the
ground, conversing with Christ, losing all count of time.
This was true of some, not of others.
For we are not all the same.
But we all need prayer, just as we all
breathe and we all breathe, and as we need regular rest.
A significant parallel between Francis and
wesley lies here, the centrality of prayer.
Both men combined formalized liturgical
prayers with informal, spontaneous praying.
Spontaneous or extemporar, prayer was a
significant new learning for the young John Wesley.
With Francis, it seemed to come naturally, almost inescapably, as he walked hills and
valleys and watched birds and other creatures.
Both men lived the rhythm of spontaneous
prayer and liturgical or other written prayers.
With both, this happened in three mutually reinforcing ways private prayer,
small group prayer, and prayers together in the great congregation.
Prayer is the breath, the oxygen and
nitrogen that supply life as we walk in God's word.
Another things I Know number eight love the liturgy.
Not my tradition, but something I've been learning.
Love the liturgy, actually not my tradition.
It depends on how far back I go.
Because if I go back to Wesley, it is right.
As we walk the path of truth, we see footprints, we find well trodden paths.
For the path of truth is an ancient way.
Travelers before us have left markers and
signposts, prayers, testimony, songs, lives added together.
These are called the church's liturgy.
Liturgy in various forms is the record of
the church's journey through time and culture, often codified in forms of prayer
and song and readings that offer profound words to help us pray and praise and grow.
I can and must pray in my own words, but
the thing I love about liturgy is that often it says better than I can what I
really meant, what I really mean or really need.
Plus, it's not just me or you.
Liturgy is by definition of the people.
That is, it is the public property of God's people, so to speak.
This gives us a both and not either or walk with God in the world.
Our own efforts and cries and prayers
blend with those of the communion of saints, the vast numbers of folks through
history, in many lands, who have walked and proved this way.
Liturgy helps us pray with a broader lens,
a wider view to remember in prayer important things we tend to forget.
Another thing number nine find and live your gift.
As a self centered youth, Francis showed the gift of hospitality.
Often he was the center of his group, the life of the party.
But it was all for his own sake, until he met Jesus and hugged a leper.
Transformed by Jesus and given mission, francis discovered gifts of leadership, of
teaching and preaching, of discipling, of humor and song.
He discovered the gift of inspiring others.
This was his charism, his grace gift.
Within the Franciscan communities, other brothers then found their gifts.
Some could garden and some could sing.
Some could preach and some could dream.
Some could go deep or rise high in theology and philosophy and in the
emerging sciences, leaving legacies that still nurture us.
In the mathist movement, wesley encouraged disciples to find their special
ministries, and through doing all the good they could to serve.
Others. The apostle Paul wrote that each of us has
been given grace according to the measure of Christ's gifts.
Gifts are given so that each of us can
serve others and be blessed and enriched in doing so.
As we walk in God's ways, we should expect
both to receive and to give, not only grow in grace, but help others grow in ways
that each one can, each in our unique ways.
And number ten trust God's future.
Trust God's future.
We look ahead to future days, days and
events and people still unknown to us and entrust all into God's hands.
This is what the church calls eschatology the matter of last and ultimate things
wrapped in mystery, yet not needlessly ominous to us.
For we trust God's power and character, justice and lovingkindness.
Joshua in the Old Testament told the
Israelites just before he died, not one thing has failed.
Of all the good things that the Lord your God promised concerning you, all have come
to pass for you, not one of them has failed.
We can trust God and his covenant
promises, so that so long as we remain covenant faithful.
Francis believed this and lived and proved it to and through his final earthly hours.
Both Francis and Wesley lived in times of
high apocalyptic speculation, yet avoided getting caught up in it.
I think this is a wonderful lesson really, considering the times we're in today.
They lived in times of apocalyptic
speculation, yet avoided getting caught up in it.
Though this was not true of some of their
followers, their lives were Jesus focused, not end times focused.
Number eleven forgive joyfully.
Francis saw no point in bearing grudges or withholding pardon.
He made plain the way he wanted his brothers to live.
While he could, he held them accountable.
But he joyfully.
Forgave when anyone in or out of his order
turned from evil and walked in the way of peace and justice.
For Francis, to forgive was not a burden, it was a joy.
A brother or wanderer had been restored.
He had the joy of the Father welcoming back the prodigal.
For in the end, Francis trusted his savior and Lord Jesus Christ.
We see the same spirit in John Wesley.
His brother Charles often thought John was too lenient.
Too forgiving.
When we joyfully forgive, we renew joy and freedom in ourselves.
We become the liberated, not the victim,
nor the oppressed one carrying the weight of others crimes and failures.
Number twelve shun extremes shun extremes we may live in an age of extremes.
We may be pushed and pulled out of the
perfect path into far off ways that lead astray.
If we daily nourish our roots and reflect on God's promises.
We find the path of perfection, the path both Francis and Wesley sought.
For the path of the righteous is like the
light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.
Proverbs 418 here admittedly, Francis
advice was better than his life, francis sometimes went to extremes, stressing
poverty and embracing suffering, especially with regard to himself.
Even here, though, Francis warned the brothers against extremes of ceticism,
against inflicting unnecessary pain on their bodies.
Here, I think actually that Wesley is more
wholesome and biblically sound than Francis.
Both Francis and Wesley did shun extremes in doctrine and liturgy, embracing rather
established church tradition and then a couple more.
Sing joyously.
Number 13 sing joyously.
Francis was a joyous troubadour.
Wesley also loved to sing, as his journals showed.
Francis loved songs and singing often went singing on his wave and went suffering.
Francis knew the songs of his age.
Songs based on the romance of the rose
rendered the fox the knights of the roundtable.
Francis was poet and singer and dramatist.
Chesterton said of Francis as he saw all things dramatically so himself.
He himself was always dramatic.
He was a poet whose whole life was a poem.
Francis saw the beauty of God and the bounty of creation.
He lived the life of joy, celebrated
creatures small and great, especially the sun above and the larks that fly.
He also noticed fish and fireflies, flowers and flowing streams, and the
creatures noticed him, saw him as one of their own.
Perhaps birds would stop singing if he
asked them and would sometimes flock around him and sent a settle on him,
even when knocked down in a snow drift, francis rose up singing.
Thomas of Solano says exhilarated with
great joy he began in a loud voice to make the woods resound with praises to the
Creator of all, often going on his way, often singing in French.
Francis was a living metaphor all the more
because he was flesh and blood and could lead as well as make music.
And then finally, which I suppose is first, although I have it here, number 14
follow Jesus steadfastly it was all for Jesus sake,
his life and resurrection and especially his sufferings for us.
This is what moved Francis.
He would weep long and bitterly over the
sufferings of Christ, yet like a lark, he would rise up in song
for the new life he received through Jesus.
Wesley may not have been as exuberant or
impulsive as Francis, yet he had the same spirit.
In his journal, Wesley often simply has the word sang.
He was singing.
This is a lesson for all of us.
The way to life is to walk in Jesus way, so learn from him.
This joyful certainty never faded, for
Francis and his brothers caught the contagion following Jesus steadfastly.
This, of course, is really number one.
It is the clue and key and power of the
other things we learn from Francis and Wesley.
So finally, in conclusion, I think comparing Francis of Assisi with John
Wesley offers practical wisdom for all Christians today.
For pastors, it offers insights about
building community, nurturing practical daily discipleship,
extending witness that can grow generation to generation,
pastoral wisdom rather than quick fixes or computer based products from commercial
marketplaces or how to advice how to advice for church growth.
For small groups, bands and discipleship
cells the lives of Wesley and Francis offer inspiration and devotional resources
to help serious Christians grow deeper day to day.
For each of us, I think looking at Francis and Wesley side by side offers hope,
inspiration, courage and long range rather than short term perspective.
As we seek seriously to walk in the steps
of Jesus, the parallels we discover between Francis and John Wesley can
perhaps fortify us to find new courage and energy as we walk in the world in our day.
Thank you very much.