Our Calling to Fulfill : Wesleyan Views of the Church in Mission

Drawn from the Twelfth Oxford Institute of Methodist Theological Studies in August, 2007, these essays address the ecclesiological deficit of Methodism in relation to vocation and mission, crucial issues that have suffered from theological and practical confusion in the world Methodist communion these last decades. The authors enter into an uncommonly honest dialogue across the global divides and press urgent questions about how world Methodist and Wesleyan churches can regain a biblically sound view of mission and ecumenism without traits of colonialism. The answer from all continents is that this revitalization must and, in fact, is beginning in the congregation around revived practices of vocation and sanctification. The essays are suffused by a sense of realism about the church in a changing world economy and geopolitics and a contagious encouragement through the gospel and Wesleyan traditions that world Methodism can be revived in genuine connection.

Contents

1. M. Douglas Meeks: A Home for The Homeless: Vocation, Mission, and church in Wesleyan Perspective2. William Willimon: What If Wesley Was Right?

3. Lung-Kwong Lo: Ecclesiology from the Perspective of Scriptures within Wesleyan and Asian Contexts

4. Tim Macquiban: Work On Earth and Rest in Heaven: Toward A Theology Of Vocation in the Writings of Charles Wesley

5. Ivan Abrahams: "To Serve the Present Age, Our Calling to Fulfill:: A Different Church for a Different World 6. Marjorie Suchocki: Christian Perfection: A Methodist Perspective on Ecclesiology

7. Robin W. Lovin: , Human Rights, Vocation, and Human Dignity

7. Paulo Ayres Mattos: “The World Is My Parish. Is It?” Wesleyan Ecclesio-Missiological Considerations from a Contemporary Latin American Perspective

M. DOUGLAS MEEKS is Cal Turner Chancellor Professor of Theology and Wesleyan Studies at The Divinity School, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee.