John Wesley's Marriage - A Warning from Church History

[thbslawson]

Came across this article on John and Mollie Wesley's terrible marriage via Tim Challies' blog.

From Cajun to Asian: Sacrificing Your Marriage on the Altar of your Job: Examining John Wesley’s Train Wreck of a Marriage

I don't want this to turn into a "bash the non-reformed brother" thread. I agree with George Whitfield's assessment of the man. I'm sure we all agree with the lesson here, but I know I need to be reminded of it regularly. It is easy for the busyness of public ministry to creep in and overtake our private family ministry.

 

[arapahoepark]

Thank you for sharing! Definitely something I needed to read.
I also read the other one posted today about Edwards.

 

[jandrusk]

Sad but true. Are vocations can easily become idols even in the realm of ministry. We need to take this warning seriously. Thanks for posting this.

 

[FenderPriest]

When I went to Wesley's House in London, they showed us the secret cabinets he had in the house where he would hide his correspondences (especially pastoral letters with other women) so that his wife wouldn't find them and send them to the local paper to publish. Sad state of affairs...

 

[he beholds]

That was interesting but why was it naive of Wesley to allow his wife open his mail? I think that is prudent.

 

[SolaScriptura]

That was interesting but why was it naive of Wesley to allow his wife open his mail? I think that is prudent.

Prudent to let someone open your mail who will first read your mail, then hide it from you, and then erase and re-write the contents of the letters and then send them to publishers in order to slander (or is it libel?) you?

See, you write from the perspective of a good, normal, rational, sane person. However, Wesley's wife was a crazy person.

 

[FenderPriest]

That was interesting but why was it naive of Wesley to allow his wife open his mail? I think that is prudent.

Prudent to let someone open your mail who will first read your mail, then hide it from you, and then erase and re-write the contents of the letters and then send them to publishers in order to slander (or is it libel?) you?

See, you write from the perspective of a good, normal, rational, sane person. However, Wesley's wife was a crazy person.

Indeed.

 

[yeutter]

It was only recently that I discovered what a troubled man Wesley was. A book review of Stephen Tomkins, John Wesley, A Biography can be found at John Wesley Review Article

 

[OPC'n]

That was interesting but why was it naive of Wesley to allow his wife open his mail? I think that is prudent.

Why would it be prudent for any wife or husband to open each others mail? I don't agree with that at all.

 

[AThornquist]

Wesley, Carey, Tozer, etc... Great things are sometimes done by men who have seriously messed up family lives.

 

[Supersillymanable]

Wasn't one of the reasons Wesley had such a train wreck marriage, was that he thought celibacy was the higher state still? I remember J. I. Packer contrasting him with Edwards and making that statement...

 

[BobVigneault]

I hope BBC One or ITV do a night time soap about this, similar to Downton Abbey. It would be the Church history junkie's dream show.

 

[J. Dean]

A very good read. Thank you for posting this. And no, I wouldn't interpret this as "Wesleyan bashing" at all. But the blogger does have a point: namely, that Wesley's theology in part had a contribution to the ruin of his marriage.

Those of you who never went to a Wesleyan church should pull aside some of your ex-Wesleyan brethren and talk to us about our experiences. There are reasons we are no longer with Wesleyanism.

 

[earl40]

I hope BBC One or ITV do a night time soap about this, similar to Downton Abbey. It would be the Church history junkie's dream show.

Now that is classic.

 

[gordo]

That was interesting but why was it naive of Wesley to allow his wife open his mail? I think that is prudent.

Why would it be prudent for any wife or husband to open each others mail? I don't agree with that at all.

Me either. While I would agree that there is no reason why a husband and wife shouldn't be able to read each others mail, meaning there is nothing to hide from each other. But for this to be a practice in a marriage seems a bit dysfunctional, without proper cause (ie past infidelity). Then again, the point is moot. Who sends letters now a days!?

 

[ValiantforTruth]

Wesley, Carey, Tozer, etc... Great things are sometimes done by men who have seriously messed up family lives.

I agree, this reminds me how stunned I was when I read about how William Carey treated his family when I read Vishal & Ruth Mangalwadi's book on how William Carey transformed India. He started a bunch of schools including, I believe, a University, and oversaw the translation of the Bible into something like 40 languages, became the international authority on Indian botany and geology, etc., etc., etc. But when he left England for India, with no intention of ever returning, he was preparing to leave his wife and seven children in England utterly destitute. Only at the very last second was his wife persuaded to join him as she was vehemently opposed to going to India, and she basically went insane there shortly afterward, and we can only imagine how insane people were treated at that period in history. I said at the time, if he was going to desert his family, he should have been excommunicated from Christ's church. But this was just another example of how the main lesson I learn from church history is how mightily God can use the most wretched sinners.

 

[earl40]

Wesley, Carey, Tozer, etc... Great things are sometimes done by men who have seriously messed up family lives.

I agree, this reminds me how stunned I was when I read about how William Carey treated his family when I read Vishal & Ruth Mangalwadi's book on how William Carey transformed India. He started a bunch of schools including, I believe, a University, and oversaw the translation of the Bible into something like 40 languages, became the international authority on Indian botany and geology, etc., etc., etc. But when he left England for India, with no intention of ever returning, he was preparing to leave his wife and seven children in England utterly destitute. Only at the very last second was his wife persuaded to join him as she was vehemently opposed to going to India, and she basically went insane there shortly afterward, and we can only imagine how insane people were treated at that period in history. I said at the time, if he was going to desert his family, he should have been excommunicated from Christ's church. But this was just another example of how the main lesson I learn from church history is how mightily God can use the most wretched sinners.

Should we call men like this them "worse than unbelivers"?

 

[MW]

The post linked in the OP states the following:

In virtually every sense, Wesley sacrificed his marriage on the altar of ministry success. He thought his work as a preacher was far more important than his marriage. It is no understatement to say that the way he treated his marriage was his biggest moral failure.

At no point has the poster attempted to show, (1) what would have been expected of Wesley as a husband in the 18th century, nor (2) whether or not marital expectations in the 18th century were any more or less biblical than they are now. The criticism and moral lesson drawn from it are, at best, sentimental notions.

 

[py3ak]

John Berridge remarked that Charles was quite spoiled for the itinerant ministry by his marriage, and felt that John Wesley and George Whitefield would have been spoiled had not the Lord given them shrews. Berridge himself decided, on the basis of Jeremiah 16:2, not to pursue matrimony.
Perhaps if people (including Charles himself) had not interfered with his plans to marry a woman he liked, John's marriage would have turned out more like Charles'.

 

[FenderPriest]

John Berridge remarked that Charles was quite spoiled for the itinerant ministry by his marriage, and felt that John Wesley and George Whitefield would have been spoiled had not the Lord given them shrews. Berridge himself decided, on the basis of Jeremiah 16:2, not to pursue matrimony.
Perhaps if people (including Charles himself) had not interfered with his plans to marry a woman he liked, John's marriage would have turned out more like Charles'.

Speaking of the Wesley's relationship, don't know if it's been noted that Charles Wesley's journals were cracked recently: article.

 

[Leslie]

This thread just reeks of Dobsenism, the deification of the family, the 20th century heresy that has been embraced by all of American evangelicalism. Career missionaries who take ministry seriously suffer from this attitude in their colleagues all the time. Many are the new mission field "recruits" whose sole motivation for coming overseas is to get away from the demands of earning an honest living. They take up housing and work permits and English-speaking household help, depriving other missionaries of these resources, because they want to "spend quality time with their families". In one case there are two couples, all four adults highly educated, professional people, coming to a non-hardship location. The destination ministry location is expected to put themselves out for housing etc. etc. for these 4 plus 3 children, but they will put in, at very most, the equivalent of one full-time missionary. In another case a man whose job description was the repair and maintenance of vehicles moved his family to a remote area, where no one with a broken vehicle could possibly get to him. I've known of families where one could find both parents home, playing fun and games or homeschooling with the kids during any and all daylight hours. This was on Kingdom of God money. Churches and individual donors, beware of supporting these people! Enough, maybe too much, said. This is the other side of the coin.

 

[thbslawson]

This thread just reeks of Dobsenism, the deification of the family, the 20th century heresy that has been embraced by all of American evangelicalism. Career missionaries who take ministry seriously suffer from this attitude in their colleagues all the time. Many are the new mission field "recruits" whose sole motivation for coming overseas is to get away from the demands of earning an honest living. They take up housing and work permits and English-speaking household help, depriving other missionaries of these resources, because they want to "spend quality time with their families". In one case there are two couples, all four adults highly educated, professional people, coming to a non-hardship location. The destination ministry location is expected to put themselves out for housing etc. etc. for these 4 plus 3 children, but they will put in, at very most, the equivalent of one full-time missionary. In another case a man whose job description was the repair and maintenance of vehicles moved his family to a remote area, where no one with a broken vehicle could possibly get to him. I've known of families where one could find both parents home, playing fun and games or homeschooling with the kids during any and all daylight hours. This was on Kingdom of God money. Churches and individual donors, beware of supporting these people! Enough, maybe too much, said. This is the other side of the coin.

Friend, you go to far. You're not presenting "the other side of the coin" but a totally different "coin" altogether, one of laziness and poor missiology. For every situation you mention above, I could show you virtual widows and orphans because supposed men of God have forgotten that their first mission fields are at home. Scripture backs this up; 1 Tim 3 is in the Bible for a reason, so be careful what you're calling "heresy". I for one applaud a return to a more Biblical pattern for families in the church, especially fathers that has occurred over the past few decades. If more men would properly attend to their wives and children then perhaps we'd have better ministers and missionaries. I for one do not want a man teaching me who has not first taught his own children. This is part of his calling as an elder. The real heresy is failure to see this.