One of the things I have noticed in life is that our reactions to the seasons and the weather are often determined by the season of life in which we find ourselves. As a kid, I used to dread fall because it meant school was back in session. Now that I am no longer in school, fall is one of my favorite times of year. For children summer means days off from school and hanging out with friends, and a winter storm means fun in the snow (Yes, I realize I am writing this in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, but we have had two measurable snows here in my daughter’s lifetime!) and of course, more days off from school! For adults on the other hand, summer can mean increased utility bills, uncomfortable working conditions, and extra expense as we try to find ways to keep our children who are out of school entertained. A winter storm can mean increased utility bills, uncomfortable working conditions, and/or the possibility of missed wages from not being able to make it to work. As our seasons of life change, our perspective changes and with the changing of our perspective, also our understanding of the world in which we live and hopefully, our relationship with God. Now everybody’s journey is different and has its own path, but someone walking with Christ who has grown up in the Church may have an experience such as what is described below.
As a child, it is enough to know that God loves you and that Jesus is God’s ultimate expression of that love. Many of us can fondly remember singing at the top of our lungs in front of the congregation, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so!” For those of us that grew up in the Church, our parents and our local church community were two of the first expressions of God’s love that we ever experienced. We did not question our faith. We simply accepted what we were told and rested in God’s love and grace.
As we get older and enter the season of adolescence, we start to figure out who we are separate from our parents. Often times during this age we begin questioning, testing, and challenging our faith in God. In some church traditions including the UMC, youth go through a process called confirmation that will hopefully give them the tools to explore their faith and come to an understanding of God and God’s love and grace for them that is deeper and more nuanced than the faith they had as a child.
In a blink of an eye, we find ourselves in the season of adulthood (which can be broken into many seasons in itself but for the brevity of this article, we will keep as a single season.) There is no guarantee that we will reach this season with our faith in tact. Life happens. Loss happens. Prayers we perceive as unanswered happen. Stuff happens in the world that we have a hard time reconciling with a good and loving God. For some, these events are things that cause their faith to strengthen. For others, they find their faith shattered. For many of us, we have gone through both. Faith, after all, is a journey. Until we have achieved Christian perfection, we are still traveling and on our journeys, our faith is going to encounter restful waters as well as dark valleys (Psalm 23).
The founder of the Methodist movement, John Wesley, knew what it was like to go through seasons of certitude and seasons of doubt. He was certain he could make a difference in the kingdom of God in the New World and traveled to Savannah, Georgia to proclaim the gospel. He left the colonies feeling like a failure and severely questioning his faith. It was not until he attended a Bible study on Romans and heard Martin Luther’s preface being read that John Wesley felt certain in his faith again. From this heartwarming experience, John’s faith continued to grow and the fruits of his faith showed in the exponential growth of the Methodist movement.
The United Methodist Church expects each of us to have different seasons in our faith journey. As such, the denomination has given us tools of discernment to use to help us along the way. While John never used this term, these tools are commonly known within our faith tradition as the Wesleyan Quadrilateral. “What is the Wesleyan Quadrilateral?,” some of you may be asking. Well, I am glad you asked. It is a group of four tools we are called to use when considering a theological question and how it relates to our own lives. Those four tools are scripture, tradition, experience and reason, with scripture being primary.
As United Methodists, we believe that scripture contains all things necessary for salvation and is the primary tool we use. We believe that scripture communicates God’s love and grace through the Old and New Testaments and that Jesus Christ is the ultimate expression of God’s love. That being said, we do not believe that scripture is the inerrant word of God. We believe scripture to be the inspired word of God recognizing that while the Holy Spirit helped in forming our scriptures, our humanness is also reflected in their authorship. With that humanness comes errors, contradictions, culture norms from thousands of years ago that were never meant to be eternal truths, and stuff we simply do not understand. That’s where the other three tools of the quadrilateral come into play.
Tradition refers to what has been the historical Church teaching on a matter. Tradition grounds us and gives us a starting point in our discernment process with scripture. With tradition we also have to consider if the Church had been interpreting scripture correctly over the years or if there is a new light of revelation that reveals a corrective course that needs to be taken. We also look to see how things have already evolved from the book of Acts through time until today to help discern the path forward. While we take tradition seriously and use it to guide us, we also recognize that traditions sometime have to evolve in order for the Church to be able to communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ within the context it finds itself.
Which brings us to experience. Our experiences, both corporate and individual, are to help us with our discernment of what scripture and tradition are telling us. How have our experiences affirmed our understanding of scripture and tradition? What of our experiences calls us to question them? How are we to reconcile when we find conflicts in what we read, what tradition tells us, and what our own experience has been? That is where reason comes into play.
As Christians, Jesus never asked us to check our brains at the door as he called us to follow him. He was constantly challenging both his disciples and the Pharisees to think about what they were saying and what they were doing. If their words and actions were not rooted in loving God or loving neighbor, then they needed to rethink what they were saying and doing.
That is the timeless truth of our scriptures and what tradition, experience, and reason are to help us discern. We are to love God and love neighbor. If we do those things, then the rest will sort itself out. That does not mean that we will not go through seasons of questioning and doubt. I would be surprised and disappointed if you did not, and I am here to help in any way I can no matter what season you find yourself experiencing today. My door is always open to you.
I do want us all to remember, regardless of where we find ourselves in our faith journeys, we can rest assured that God is indeed our shepherd guiding us and pursuing us all of our days (Psalm 23)!
Grace & Peace,
Pastor Bryan
