A Key Tool In Reconstructing Your Faith
When I was attending a Methodist Seminary an incredibly useful concept was introduced to me that played an instrumental role in reshaping and reconstructing my faith and belief system. You see, I went to a Fundamentalist Evangelical Bible College that provided an indoctrination instead of an education. I was taught what to think not how to think. However, when I was introduced to the Wesley Quadrilateral, it forever informed the way I approached my belief systems, ethics, and faith. John Wesley, the Founder of Methodism suggests that in order to come to a well-thought-out conviction, belief, or ethic we must draw from tradition, Scripture, reason, and experience.
For most of us, our social conditioning and religious upbringing likely taught us to favor one of these areas more than the other and to often discredit and not consider others.
If you were Catholic you likely were taught to favor tradition, history, and the precedent of following a practice or belief for hundreds of years.
If you are part of a Historic Mainline Church (UMC, UCC, Lutherans, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, etc.) you likely were taught to favor reason, science, and logic.
If you were Pentecostal-Charismatic you were likely taught to favor experience. With a heavy emphasis on the baptism of the Holy Spirit, altar calls, retreats, conferences, speaking in tongues, etc. This group also likely trusted heavily in the Scriptural lense of the quadrilateral.
If you were Evangelical/Non-Denominational you likely were taught to favor Scripture with the motto of “if the bible says it, that settles it” and disregarding all other elements of this quadrilateral.
Part of the beauty of being a part of an interdenominational church like Forefront is that we have all of these different veins of the faith represented in our church. This allows us to draw from and let our views and convictions to be wholistically informed by the beauty of each lens that the different traditions bring us. So as you start to reassemble your belief system after deconstructing it, or as you start to question and examine long-held beliefs I encourage you to to ask yourself if you’ve considered all of these lenses for understanding.
For example, when I was examining my views on what the Bible means to me, I consulted historic and traditional views, of how the Bible came into being and how it has been viewed by our Judeo and Christian ancestors throughout history. Then I looked at Scripture itself to see what sort of trends, verses, genres, and observations this book presents. Then I used my reasoning skills to conclude if the Bible was intended to be a book written by God about humans or a book by humans about God. Then I took into account my and others’ experiences to discern if the narrative of the Bible seemed consistently compatible with lived experiences. Which in the end led me to conclude that much of the Bible is descriptive and less prescriptive. By consulting all four elements of the quad I reached a conclusion that the Bible is a gift to us, of the reflections, midrashing, and wonderings of over 35 different authors over thousands of years and miles trying to make sense of their lived experiences by using reason to create traditions that were passed down orally and in written form, as they and we progressively develop our understanding of God. What a gift to be given a book that contains the musings of generations working to construct our ever-evolving faith.
So let’s dive in and do the work, you won’t regret it. How have your traditions, experiences, reasoning, and understanding of Scripture all informed your views, your worldview, and your convictions? Have you drawn from all of these areas of the Wesley Quadrilateral to inform your thought? If not, where might the Spirit be inviting you spend more time in order to better inform how you think and what you believe?
Josh Lee
Community Pastor (he/him)
Rev. Josh Lee is Forefront's Community Pastor. His experiences have exposed him to a wide spectrum of thought, that compelled him to create greater unity among diversity. He has served as an Associate Pastor in the Assemblies of God & United Methodist Church, Youth Director in the American Baptist Church, Senior Pastor at an Independent Christian Church, and most recently as Co-Pastor at an Inter-denominational Church. Throughout his career and education, he has lived at the intersectionality of both the Christian and LGBTQIA+ community, instilling him with empathy to love God and people without exception.
Josh earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Pastoral Studies from Moody Bible Institute and his Master of Divinity from Garrett Theological Seminary and is ordained in the United Church of Christ.
At Forefront, Josh preaches regularly, while also helping newcomers assimilate, providing pastoral care and opportunity for growth, and connection by working with our deacons in the areas of Connection and Justice and Kidstuf.