Digging Out the Embedded Church - The Maranatha Community

Wesleys‟ societies. But Whitefield had only four more years to live, so the really strongly
united front which all hoped for never came about.
The Countess‟s attempt to bring peace between the Wesleys and the Inghamites 85 also came
to nothing. She sent George Whitefield to Newcastle upon Tyne to try to negotiate with them
with a view to their union, but although Charles was amenable to discussion, John Wesley
refused to attend even though Ingham attended Wesley‟s Conference. 86
Although it was contrary to the instinct of her spirit, the Countess did get caught up in the
latter part of her life in the Calvinist/Arminian controversy that divided the Evangelical
Revival leaders, and, consequently, their congregations. So keen were the feelings on the
questions of predestination and free will (and, to make matters worse, on the „Wesleyan‟
doctrine, as it was perceived to be, of entire sanctification), that when Wesley‟s Conference
of workers in 1770 minuted disapproval of what they considered to be the antinomian
tendency of Calvinism, Selina found that she could not invite Wesley to the second
anniversary of the founding of Trefeca College. Similar doctrinal differences caused the
resignation of the saintly John W Fletcher, Vicar of Madeley, a close associate of Wesley,
as President of the college. The rift was never healed and, in certain circles, exists to this
day.
It must be recorded, sadly, that the pioneer of the Evangelical Awakening in Wales, Griffith
Jones of Llanddwror, became disaffected with the fervour of „revivalists‟ such as Rowland
and Harris. As a loyal Anglican, Jones looked askance at the irregular style of their preaching
in its organisation (itinerant evangelism, crossing parish boundaries willy-nilly), its use of
laymen (Harris never did become ordained), and its appeal to emotions and experiences. 87
In view of all this, Charles Wesleys‟ poem, written in the latter years of the Revival, comes to
be seen as wistful rather than hopeful. The first two lines run: „Come on my Whitefield (since
the strife is past) and friends at first are friends again at last‟, but there were few organic or
visible evidences of the strife being over.
The leaders came to honour and respect each other and Wesley gave a most warm
commendation of Whitefield and his work when he gave the Memorial address for Whitefield
at his own City Church in London in November 1770. It seems he preached this same tribute
85 Inghamites. Benjamin Ingham was a member of the Holy Club at Oxford University with the
Wesleys and went with them to Georgia as an ordained Church of England clergyman to do
missionary work among the settlers of the new Colony. Like the Wesleys, Ingham was impressed by
the spirituality and faith of the Moravians who were on board the ship in which they sailed to
America. On his return to England Ingham preached widely, concentrating on the north of England.
Opposition to his preaching by Church authorities led him to preach out of doors and on farms and in
cottages and inns in the spirit of Whitefield and the Wesleys and Howel Harris in Wales. By 1742 50
„Inghamite‟ Religious Societies had been founded and Ingham handed them over to be supervised by
the Moravian leadership. He married a sister of the Countess of Huntingdon, Lady Margaret Hastings.
86 Stevens, Abel, The History of the Religious Movement of the 18 th Century called Methodism, ed
Willey, William, in 3 Vols, Vol 1, George Watson, London, 1865, pp 318-319. Stevens points out that
Wesley‟s decision not to attend was based on sound judgement as he probably sensed the inherent
instability of what Stevens call Ingham‟s „mongrel association‟. By 1759 this association was
beginning to disintegrate.
87 Evans, Eifion, Daniel Rowland and the Great Evangelical Awakening in Wales, The Banner of
Truth Trust, 1985, p 140.
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