Defenders and/or Heirs: A Historian’s Reflection on the 60th Anniversary Meeting of the Wesleyan Theological Society

Charles Wesley, John Wesley, and Francis Asbury, portrayed in stained glass at the Memorial Chapel, Lake Junaluska, NC. (Source: WikiCommons)

When the Wesleyan Theological Society (WTS) met in 1975 to reflect and celebrate on the occasion of its 10th anniversary, Mildred Wynkoop, the first woman to serve as the President of our society, noted in her Presidential address (“John Wesley: Mentor or Guru?”) with a hint of surprise just how valuable and consequential the work of the WTS was proving. “We are engaged in a big thing,” she wrote, “How big we may not yet realize…. Wesleyan Theological Society theologians need to write, WRITE, WRITE—not just tracts and devotional literature—but solid theology, worth reading—not just rewriting the old words but breaking out into fresh, vibrant, anointed, biblical, deeply meaningful theology—and to pay the price for the scholarship needed to do this.” After six decades of the work of the WTS, Wynkoop’s words have proved quite prescient and provide insight into the life and history of an academic society that is continuing to experience interesting days filled with vital and important work. 

The Wesleyan Theological Society recently met (March 14-15, 2025) to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of the society and do what academics do: give papers, argue with friends and frenemies over minute points of doctrine and detail, complain about the lack of vision in tight-pocketed administrators and institutions, and experience the joy of spending time in Christian fellowship with that thin slice of humanity that enjoys doing all three. The meeting, hosted by the Wesley House of Studies, Truett Seminary, on the campus of the very beautiful and very green Baylor University, drew over 230 scholars from across the pan-Methodist family. Methodists of various kinds—Nazarenes, United Methodists, Wesleyans, Global Methodists, Free Methodists, Salvationists, and a few determinedly non-affiliated methodists (all small m)—and holiness scholars, pastors, and students sat together in lecture halls of academic happiness to consider again and in various and sundry ways the Gospel of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer and Sanctifier. The fitting theme, “Partakers in the Divine Nature,” was chosen for the meeting by President Justus Hunter, and the keynote address was delivered by Khaled Anatolios, University of Notre Dame. 

Just like the early days of the society, groups within the society presented original and derivative research in the areas of theology, Bible, and history. The growth of the society’s interests over the last six decades was evident in sessions where women’s studies, liturgics, pop culture, and preaching were considered. A special lecture on ecumenical efforts in the Wesleyan/Holiness world, sponsored by the Wesleyan Holiness Connection, was given by Donald Thorsen, whose service to the society and the broader ecumenical movement has been recognized with the J. Irwin Miller Award for Excellence in Ecumenical Leadership by the National Council of Churches. Our partner societies, the Wesleyan Dogmatics Society, the Wesleyan Historical Society, and the Nazarene Historical Society all held meetings the day before, and this year the Graduate Student Theological Seminar, a joint meeting sponsored by the Wesleyan and Free Methodist Churches, held their annual gathering alongside the WTS. Nazarene Theological Seminary, A Foundation for Theological Education and its John Wesley Fellows, and the Manchester Wesley Research Centre all held receptions during the meeting. Baker Academic Press, Wipf and Stock, and Baylor University Press sold books and United Theological Seminary and The Nazarene Foundation had tables and were welcome friends. 

The hallways of the Truett Seminary building with its many welcoming seating areas and room for comfortable conversations proved to be the gathering place for the renewal of friendships and extending the conversations generated by the many academic papers. The meeting showed the vitality of the Wesleyan witness and the many ways that scholars and church leaders and thinkers can do the important business of solid scholarly reflection, considering together why and how we do our work. These are good days for a Wesleyan/Holiness academic society, and the days just in front of us look promising. As the Promotional Secretary of the society, I would be remiss if I did not ask you to check us out our website, WTSociety.org, and to join our efforts by becoming a member. We may be engaged in something big—how big, we may not yet realize.

As a historian, it is my job to work with two things—time and dead people—and ensure that no matter our interests as Wesleyan/ Arminian /Holiness/ M(m)ethodist folk (take your pick), and no matter how well we may be doing (or not), that we exercise the gift of a great history that has come to us in Jesus Christ. The WTS was born in a back-hallway meeting of the National Holiness Association (NHA) six decades ago at the downtown Statler-Hilton Hotel (of blessed memory) after four years of organizational efforts headed by the just-past president of the NHA, Ken Geiger. Geiger was a General Superintendent in the Missionary Church and knew the value and too-often overlooked importance of academic studies in the Wesleyan/Holiness Movement. Sensing that the NHA was reaching yet another crisis point in its almost century of existence over important issues like Biblical inerrancy and whether or not real Christians could own a television set and drink coffee, he marshalled the academics to help provide a rational and reasonable defense against the coming tide of liberalism. During Geiger’s presidency (1960-64), a series of roughly 17 meetings (give or take, using the language of sacred excess that theologians and bishops are all too familiar with), all with the theme “Distinctives in Arminian-Wesleyan Theology,” were held at Christian colleges and retreat centers across the country. The result of those meetings was three books, Insights into Holiness, the aptly titled Further Insights into Holiness, and The Word and the Doctrine, all published by Beacon Hill Press, and the creation of the Wesleyan Theological Society. (For an accounting of all this see Wesleyan Theological Society: The Fiftieth Anniversary Celebration Volume, eds. Barry Callen and Steven T. Hoskins, Emeth Press, 2015.) Leo Cox was chosen as the founding President and presided at its first official meeting in November 1965 at Spring Arbor College. Cox’s initial address to the society, “Sin in Believers,” was indicative of the many solidly theological and occasionally acrimonious debates during the early years when the society tackled the issues of fundamentalism, inerrancy, Spirit baptism, and just how Wesleyan a Wesleyan must be, arguing as friends and frenemies with admirable gusto and vigor.

Those debates paved the way for today’s society. During the last six decades the WTS has done admirable theological work, much of it chronicled in the pages of the Wesleyan Theological Journal (WTJ) under the careful eyes of editors like Barry Callen and Jason Vickers, with a bit of style, a dash of bluster, and a lot of excellent theological reflection. We added new areas of interest to the big three of theology, Bible, and history. We have been through end-times circuses, thorny arguments about creation care and other social issues, quite a few debates about new and old theological ideas, new and old denominational salvage projects, and even some meetings with the Society of Pentecostal Studies about just how Pentecostal Pentecostal can be. We have shed both a formal membership application and requiring a faith statement (that had included belief in pre-tribulation rapture fundamentalism). We have made it through two virtual meetings during the COVID-19 crisis, both held in makeshift studios on the campus of Northwest Nazarene University and attended by scholars as far and wide as Russia, Sweden, and England. We have now, along with World Gospel Mission—the NHA-created missionary society (1910)—outlived the NHA (of blessed memory) which gave birth to the WTS and ceased to exist as we entered the 21st century, and yet we remain a witness to its heritage and the original idea of defending the Wesleyan witness and work in the world. 

Somewhere in the middle of the last six decades, a subtle yet pronounced shift occurred in the society. In the 1990s we rewrote our constitution and our mission statement and decided that our theological exchanges occurred as Wesleyan/Holiness theologians and dropped the reference to Jacobus Arminius and the need to provide papers for the NHA meetings. We listed, along with the publication of the WTJ, the encouragement of young theologians and pastors. Though the changes may seem small at first glance, they paved the way for a new trajectory of the society’s work to emerge. We became more “heirs to a theological tradition” and less “defenders of a theological tradition,” in the words of the great Howard Snyder. Much of our work since that third decade has created a small cottage industry of M(m)ethodist studies that is reflected in many, if not most, of the papers presented in our meetings. That shift has been spearheaded by scholars like Randy Maddox, Ken Collins, and Rob Wall, whose WTS papers turned into books in the next year or so after their presentation at our meetings, and they have spurred the movement and the reframing of our identity. So much for the testimony to our past. It remains alive and well.

As to time, well you may not be aware of this, but the last few years have been difficult ones in the pan-M(m)ethodist family. One need not recount that here, but occasionally there is trouble in churches. Our days have proven no different. As my Irish ancestors said, “May you always live in interesting times.” And so we do. The WTS 60th Anniversary was an event where we discussed and argued over our heritage, our shared theological commitments, and our differences—and we did so as friends. This is not easy to do in such days, and we owe much to our dead, whose civility and willingness to do the hard work of Wesleyan theology and pay the price for doing so remains an inspiration that we must hearken to as we pass through these times together. When Perkins Divinity School found out that one of their own, Priscilla Pope-Levison, was this year’s WTS Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, they posted a nice story honoring her on their blog, and in it she noted the unique role that WTS plays in uniting Wesleyan scholars across denominational lines. She said: “It’s the one organization where the entire Wesleyan family participates across denominations—including the Salvation Army, the Church of the Nazarene, Church of God (Anderson, Indiana), the United Methodist Church, and the Global Methodist Church,” she said. “It fosters friendships and academic collaboration among scholars who otherwise might not be connected. I’m extremely honored to receive this recognition from such a distinguished and inclusive group.” 

The 60th Anniversary of the WTS is a reminder that we have a great and interesting history. We are both defenders and heirs of a great tradition. And we do live in interesting times. As we take account of our past and turn our face toward the sun of the coming days, may God continue to bless us and the WTS. May we continue to do the necessary and difficult work of theological reflection with the vigor and gusto of our ancestors, with a bit of style, a dash of bluster, and the kind of solid theological reflection that would honor our ancestors. We are onto something big; how big, we may not yet realize.   

Steven Hoskins is professor of church history at Trevecca Nazarene University in Nashville, TN.