Celebration worship
I want to talk today about our assurance in Christ. Today is Aldersgate Day, a Sunday that commemorates the day in 1738 when the founder of the Methodist movement, John Wesley, felt his heart strangely warmed and experienced true assurance of his salvation in Christ.
Wesley’s story began with a calling. He was preaching in London, and starting small groups with his brother Charles and friend George Whitfield all over Britain, when, in the mid 1730’s, he traveled to what was then the British colony of Georgia to preach to the colonists and convert the natives to the Christian faith. This journey proved to be one of the worst experiences in Wesley’s career. The colonists were not as enthused about Methodism as the Christians in Britain. The colonists considered Wesley too extreme in his faith, and the Indians weren’t willing to engage with someone who wasn’t willing to build a relationship with them. He was distraught and questioning himself. One day he lamented his failure saying “I came to preach to the colonists and convert the Indians, but Lord Jesus, who will preach to and convert me?!” So he left America and returned to Britain, downtrodden and full of doubt. His journal of that time records that in a two year period in London at least 10 churches told him not come back! He was considered “too Methodical, a Bible Moth!” That brings us to his night of Assurance on Aldersgate Street. On a dark and cold night, John was invited to a gathering of believers at a home on Aldersgate Street in London. John didn’t want to go. He thought his presence would be a burden on the gathering, but reluctantly, and with a defeated attitude, he put on his coat and went to the meeting. The evening began with prayers, worship, and a reading. The reading was a commentary from Martin Luther on today’s text in Romans 1 that explored the importance of faith in Christ. John writes in his journal that at about 8:45 that evening, as he heard the reading from Luther’s Preface to the Epistle to the Romans, and while the speaker “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.” This was a great moment for John Wesley and the Methodist movement. I hope you understand that the same assurance is available to each of us in Christ.
To be assured in Christ is to no longer be defined by our past: “The Spirit you received does not make you slaves so you can fall back into fear; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him, we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferingsin order that we may also share in his glory.”-Romans 8:15-17. Remember, Christian teaching in the Bible is often directed at an audience that needs the teaching. Here, Paul wrote to the Roman church because the church was running into tension and suffering in both the Gentile Christian and Jewish Christian communities. These communities had received the Spirit of Jesus and were trying to live as disciples, but bad things kept happening. Both sides — Jews and Gentiles — were guilty of saying ugly, terrible things to one another. They were focused on their squabbles instead of focusing on the big , important picture of lifting up the name of Jesus in a city that was hostile to His name. Both Jewish and Gentile followers of Jesus had forgotten who they were in Christ and the inheritance that was theirs because of Jesus. Paul writes to remind the Roman church that conflict and suffering are going to happen, but conflict and suffering do not take away the assurance we have in Christ.
So let’s think again about John Wesley. Even after his Aldersgate experience, John had days when he didn’t feel like a faithful disciple. But his assurance in Christ kept him steady, and he taught others to see the Christian life the same way. “Blessed are they who follow on to know the Lord, and refuse all other comfort, for they will be comforted by the consolations of His Spirit. This assurance turns away from doubt, and destroys fear.”1He writes in another sermon on Romans 8:1, with a strong hint of autobiography, that when “believers are in Christ ‘there is no condemnation’ on account of their past sins. God condemns them not for any of these; they are as though they had never been; they are ‘cast as a stone into the depth of the sea’, and he remembers them no more.”2That is the Good News of our assurance in Christ: because of our assurance in Christ, our bad moments and experiences of failure no longer define us, Christ does!
Do you want to hear more good news? Assurance in Christ can help us through even the very darkest and most fearful of days. John Wesley felt down about his ministry. The Roman church was squabbling. That’s not good, but what if you fear for your very life? In 1944, United States Army Chaplin George Barber was one of four chaplains at Omaha Beach in Normandy, France on D-Day. He served with the Army’s 1at Infantry Division. Most of us know that American troops landing on Omaha beach on D-Day encountered unbelievably fierce resistance from German guns set in bunkers on the cliffs overlooking the beach. American soldiers faced the seemingly impossible task of scaling those cliffs and overcoming the German army there. If you’re unfamiliar with this historic battle, I encourage you to watch the movie Saving Private Ryan, starring Tom Hanks, but I warn you that the scenes of Americans storming the beach are brutal. Chaplain Barber reported on the situation to the Christian Standard newspaper. I rarely quote word for word from an article, but part of the story is worth repeating as it was written. “On the Lord’s Day, June 4, 1944, we had the privilege to speak to around one thousand men in services on eight invasion ships. One ship was at my disposal for three days. Thus many had the gospel of Christ preached to them on the eve of the greatest invasion in history. We crossed the channel with many other ships. It was “D-Day.” In thirty minutes we would all go for that three-mile ride in a rough sea to the “Atlantic wall.” I stood on the bridge of the ship, and with an electric loud-speaker, I called to the whole boat and announced that we would have a prayer. While the great ships around us were shelling the shore every man on our ship bowed his head and we led the ship in prayer to God, who alone had our destiny in His hands. Over the side, we went. We saw landing craft blown to bits before our eyes, but our LCVPs [the acronym for Landing Craft for Vehicles and Personnel], landed safely. We went up about one hundred yards from the water to some foxholes. There we spent the night—“D night”—with planes overhead, German artillery shelling us, and mines blowing up by the hundreds all around. We were afraid if a man said he wasn’t afraid, he was lying. But, we had faith we would make it. That night was spent in prayer and in giving words of encouragement to men all around our foxhole. Thus we landed. Since landing on “D Day” we have held at least four services every Sunday, and many times five or six. Congregations have varied from six men to 525. Most services were held outside under a tree, but some few have been in theater buildings, town halls, schoolhouses, tents, and sheds. Wherever we were, though, was holy ground, for God was there and the gospel was preached.” Friends, that is what assurance in Christ can do. War happens, sickness and death happen, friends and family get mad at each other, relationships are destroyed, jobs are lost, and the list goes on … but our assurance in Christ Jesus can and will help us through it. Our assurance in Christ is the fulfillment of the promise of Psalm 27:5 that “He will keep me safe in His dwelling.”
What is your story? Are you frustrated? Have you taken your eye off what is important? Are you scared? Don’t let frustration get you down. I want to encourage you to focus not just what is important in your life, but who. Our assurance has a name, and his name is Jesus Christ.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Amen.