Welsh Methodist revival

The Methodist revival in Wales was a movement that influenced Christianity in Wales in the 18th century.

Methodist preachers such as Griffith Jones, William Williams and Howell Harris led by their performances that turn many people to Christ ( " decision for him " ), and thus their return to the church life. This revival ended in the late 1790s after the death of Williams, John Wesley and Daniel Rowland. It led to the founding of the Calvinistic Methodists and also revived the other dissenting churches.

The immediate origins of the revival back to the conversion of Howell Harris in the church of Talgarth in the year 1735., Harris had a sermon by the Rev. Pryce Davies heard about the need for the participation in the Holy Communion. Here, Harris became convinced that he had received grace through the blood of Christ. He began this experience to tell others on, and held at his home in Trefeca meetings for his followers.

Is regarded as a forerunner of the Methodist movement in Wales Griffith Jones (1684-1761), Rector of Llanddowror, Carmarthenshire. Jones said that the schools should be a minimum of instructions in the shortest possible time. Teachers could then go to the next village. The first of these Circulating Welsh Charity Schools was opened in 1737. By this increasingly withdrawing from place to place schools thousands of students in Wales were taught in Bible reading and a whole generation for the ideas of Methodism receptive. Jones himself also preached in the open field, just as it later did the leaders of the Methodists. Howell Harris Jones was looking after his conversion to get spiritual guidance and orientation. Through his sermons was converted Daniel Rowland, an Anglican priest, and began to preach even in the sense of Methodism. Another leader at the beginning of the revival was William Williams. He converted in 1737 under the preaching of Harris in the churchyard of Talgarth.

The " Jumper"

The supporters of the revival of 1762 in Llangeitho are known as " Jumper" ( hops ) according to their habit of jumping for joy. Described in this Martha Philopurs letter to her teacher and pastor Philo Evangelius in his reply. In these letters, and other such phenomena are defended during the revival and compared with the practices of the Quakers and Shakers. However, John Wesley said that such concomitants of revival would bring the real work of God into disrepute.

The movement

Rowland and Harris had already worked 18 months, when she in the church of Defynnog came together in 1737 for the first time. This meeting led to the friendship between the two and can also be viewed as the beginning of the Methodist movement in Wales. Since then, the Methodist leaders met regularly to organize their work and to discuss issues of common interest.

Harris and Williams undertook preaching tours, starting in South Wales. After the sermons they organized the converts in small groups, welch " seiadau " ( communities). By 1750 there were already over 400 such groups in Wales. These groups were under permanent supervision, guidance and instruction, and they were involved in an appropriate network within the Anglican Church. Rowland tried to make Llangeitho a center of the movement. On Sunday Supper thousands of group members came there to receive the sacrament.

Reformed movement

The Methodist revival in Wales differed from the Methodist movement in England in that its theology was Calvinistic, and not Arminian. At the beginning of the leaders of the revival were still working with John Wesley together, but gradually they parted from him and joined with George Whitefield (pronounced " Whitfield " ) and his patroness, the Countess of Huntingdon Selina.

The Welsh Methodists and the Church of England

The Methodist revival in Wales began in the Anglican Church in Wales and initially remained as a grouping in it. But with the spread of the movement built the Methodists gradually their own networks, structures and gathering places ( chapels ) on. This led to secession in 1811 and 1823 and the formal establishment of the Presbyterian Church of Wales.

The Welsh Methodists and Dissenters

The Methodist revival in Wales also had great influence on the other churches of the nonconformists, and the Congregationalists, Baptists. These experienced in this growth and renewal. As a result of the Methodist revival in Wales, the Anglican Church lost its dominant position there. Christianity in Wales since the middle of the 19th century mainly determined by the non-conformists, so the supporters of free churches, such as Baptists, Congregationalists, Presbyterians and Methodists.

Swell

• Gwyn Davies: A light in the land: Christianity in Wales 200-2000. 2002, Bridgend, Bryntirion Press. ISBN 1-85049-181 -X