John and Charles Wesley
This chapter examines the theologies of the sacraments of the eighteenth-century brothers John and Charles Wesley, two of the most influential leaders of the eighteenth-century evangelical movement in the Church of England. Based on the synergistic relationship between worship and theology, and combining evangelical experience and sacramental grace, the Wesley brothers asserted that God in Christ initiates the work of grace in believers through Baptism and sustains it through Eucharist. In short, believers receive inward grace through the outward means of the sacraments. In their theological writing and hymns, the grace-focused sacramental theology of the Wesley brothers found creative and vigorous expression that remains influential today, particularly in the Methodist tradition.