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John Wesley's scriptural Christianity

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This book is a must read reference for any Methodist or Holiness pastor whose tradition values what John Wesley has wrote. Thomas C. Oden gives a Biblical framework for what Wesley wrote in a manner that is far easier to deal with than Wesley's journals.

In the introduction of this work, Oden is careful to distinguish his efforts from those of Outler. Oden notes that he is primarily a systematic theologian and that Outler was primarily a historical theologian. Hence, Oden writes, "My method is primarily systematic, Outler's historical." The bottom line for the reader is that you can either pick and read through Wesley's works trying to remember where he addressed certain subjects or you can pick up a copy of this book. Throughout this effort, Oden quotes from and abstracts-in contemporary prose-Wesley's writings subject by subject and then orders it all in a systematic fashion proving the overall consistency, width and depth of the material Wesley covered throughout his lifetime. In addition, Oden heavily references each subject and topic so that you can then read the context from the material he drew from. Of further interest, Oden offers suggested reading should a topic peak the readers interest to the point that they would like to learn more from other Christian thinkers. At the back of the book Oden provides both Scripture and subject indexes. Hands down this is an invaluable reference for topical Wesleyan studies and it is the closest you'll come to a systematic theology written by Wesley himself.

Thomas C. Oden has done a remarkable job in this book. John Wesley wrote sermons, tracts, hymns, notes on the Bible and other books such as the works, journals and letters. However, Wesley did not write a sytematic theology.

Oden contends that Wesley wrote about all of the areas of theology and his sermons were written to cover all aspects of systematic theology. This was apparently the method used by those of his day to write theologically. Wesley wrote for his ministers and people in his church so that they would have his thinking on all aspects of theology.

Oden has gathered Wesley's thought systematically, in a form that Wesley did not do and it is remarkable how excellent this job was done.

This book should be up front and center for all ministers and lay people who want to know what Wesley thought and find the entrances or documentation in Wesley's works to follow up.

Great job.

J. Robert Ewbank, author of "John Wesley, Natural Man, and the 'Isms'"

This is a verey balanced book. Easy to read and able to hold your intrest from begining to end