The Methodist Church is a Protestant Christian denomination in Britain and across the world.
Methodism traces its origins to the revival movement in the Church of England in the 18t century led mainly by John Wesley. He is celebrated today as the most prominent ‘Founder of Methodism’.
Born in 1703, John Wesley in his lifetime was well known as a pioneer and a travelling Anglican clergyman; he is estimated to have travelled 250,000 miles in 50 years to preach the gospel.
‘Methodist’ became a widely used term in the 1700s to describe John, his brother Charles and their followers whose approach to Bible study and religious practices was ‘methodical”.
John Wesley adopted unconventional and controversial practices for those days, such as open-air preaching to reach factory labourers and newly urbanised masses uprooted from their traditional village culture at the start of the Industrial Revolution. His preaching centred upon personal conversion, holiness and that God’s grace was for all, which differed from the rather formal practices of the Church of England. John Wesley had never intended to form a separate church, but as the numbers of new converts grew and were organised into groups and Methodist Societies across Britain and America, they needed ordained preachers. It became clear that theological differences between Methodists and Anglicans couldn’t be reconciled and so the Methodists became a separate church and ordained its own ministers; it was called a Nonconformist church because it did not conform to the rules of the established Church of England. In the 19th century, the Methodist movement experienced many revivals and breakaway sections, with the largest of these being the Primitive Methodists, the Wesleyans and United Methodists. These came together in 1932, forming the Methodist Church as it is today.
The governing body of the church is the annual Methodist Conference; it is headed by the President of Conference, a presbyteral minister, supported by a vice-president who can be a local preacher or deacon. The Methodist Church is organised into 30 districts and each district into circuits, which comprise several churches.
The Methodist Church ordains women and openly LGBT ministers.
John Wesley quote:
Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.
Kingston Circuit
Methodist Churches in the Royal Borough of Kingston
The Methodist Church in Britain
