John Wesley, like Augustine, spent a great deal of time trying to obey God and failing to do so. When they finally found victory they gave testimony to a new life. Here is Wesley’s testimony:
“In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death. I began to pray with all my might for those who had in a more especial manner despitefully used me and persecuted me. I then testified openly to all there what I now first felt in my heart. But it was not long before the enemy suggested that this cannot be faith; for “where is thy joy”? Then was I taught that peace and victory over sin are essential to faith in the Captain of our salvation; but that, as to the transports of joy that usually attend the beginning of it, especially in those who have mourned deeply, God sometimes gives, sometimes withholds them, according to the counsels of his own will. After my return home, I was much buffeted with temptations; but cried out, and they fled away. They returned again and again. I as often lifted up my eyes, and he sent me help from his holy place. And herein I found the difference between this and my former state chiefly consisted. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace; but then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered: now I was always conqueror.”
Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you! You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you. In my unloveliness I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you. Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you they would have not been at all. You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness. You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness. You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace.
Augustine
“As the wars of religion (surrounding the Reformation) subsided and the bloody persecutions came to an end, a remarkable but often overlooked similarity in devotion emerged. The Catholic Church and the Protestant churches, which were now growing in number, had drawn as far from each other as possible and continued to denounce each other. Yet both sides began to embrace forms of piety and devotion that became increasingly similar. From the seventeenth century onward, devotion to Christ would develop in the various divided groups strikingly similar lines. Bitter acrimony gradually gave way to silence, and the different trends in the Protestant world shaped themselves into new identities, often in conflict, as between Anglicans and Puritans in England or between Baptists and Lutherans in Germany. Despite division, persecutions, and animosity, a remarkably but largely unrecognized common ground appeared—a renewed devotion to Christ in His divinity and humanity. Is it possible that this historically inexplicable between warring churches had its roots in a reality beyond them all and present within those who sincerely sought to be disciples of the same Christ? Is it possible that Christ’s grace was calling all who sincerely invoked His name, that the same dynamism of grace shaped the spiritual lives of those who sought Him and drew close to Him in the different churches? Is it possible that this great dynamism and mystery of Christianity with all its wounds and scars is the universal presence of the Holy Spirit? And does this Spirit not invite to a mysterious center all who believe and trust in Him with all their desire?
