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Cokesbury

Methodism in the American Forest

  • By Russell E. Richey
  • By Russell E. Richey
$88.00
$65.99
Product Description
Winner of the 2015 Saddleback Selection Award from the Historical Society of The United Methodist Church

During the nineteenth century, camp meetings became a signature program of American Methodists and an extraordinary engine for their remarkable evangelistic outreach. Methodism in the American Forest explores the ways in which Methodist preachers interacted with and utilized the American woodland,
and the role camp meetings played in the denomination's spread across the country.

Half a century before they made themselves such a home in the woods, the people and preachers learned the hard way that only a fool would adhere to John Wesley's mandate for preaching in fields of the New World. Under the blazing American sun, Methodist preachers sought and found a better outdoor
sanctuary for large gatherings: under the shade of great oaks, a natural cathedral where they held forth with fervid sermons. The American forests, argues Russell E. Richey, served the preachers in several important ways. Like a kind of Gethesemane, the remote, garden-like solitude provided them
with a place to seek counsel from the Holy Spirit. They also saw the forest as a desolate wilderness, and a means for them to connect with Israel's years after the Exodus and Jesus's forty days in the desert after his baptism by John.

The dauntless preachers slashed their way through, following America's expanding settlement, and gradually sacralizing American woodlands as cathedral, confessional, and spiritual challenge-as shady grove, as garden, and as wilderness. The threefold forest experience became a Methodist standard. The
meeting of Methodism's basic governing body, the quarterly conference, brought together leadership of all levels. The event stretched to two days in length and soon great crowds were drawn by the preaching and eventually the sacraments that were on offer. Camp meetings, if not a Methodist invention,
became the movement's signature, a development that Richey tracks throughout the years that Methodism matured, to become a central denomination in America's religious landscape.

Winner of the 2015 Saddleback Selection Award from the Historical Society of The United Methodist Church

During the nineteenth century, camp meetings became a signature program of American Methodists and an extraordinary engine for their remarkable evangelistic outreach. Methodism in the American Forest explores the ways in which Methodist preachers interacted with and utilized the American woodland,
and the role camp meetings played in the denomination's spread across the country.

Half a century before they made themselves such a home in the woods, the people and preachers learned the hard way that only a fool would adhere to John Wesley's mandate for preaching in fields of the New World. Under the blazing American sun, Methodist preachers sought and found a better outdoor
sanctuary for large gatherings: under the shade of great oaks, a natural cathedral where they held forth with fervid sermons. The American forests, argues Russell E. Richey, served the preachers in several important ways. Like a kind of Gethesemane, the remote, garden-like solitude provided them
with a place to seek counsel from the Holy Spirit. They also saw the forest as a desolate wilderness, and a means for them to connect with Israel's years after the Exodus and Jesus's forty days in the desert after his baptism by John.

The dauntless preachers slashed their way through, following America's expanding settlement, and gradually sacralizing American woodlands as cathedral, confessional, and spiritual challenge-as shady grove, as garden, and as wilderness. The threefold forest experience became a Methodist standard. The
meeting of Methodism's basic governing body, the quarterly conference, brought together leadership of all levels. The event stretched to two days in length and soon great crowds were drawn by the preaching and eventually the sacraments that were on offer. Camp meetings, if not a Methodist invention,
became the movement's signature, a development that Richey tracks throughout the years that Methodism matured, to become a central denomination in America's religious landscape.

  •   Hardcover ($88.00)
  •   eBook ($65.99)
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  • Additional Details
  • Additional Details
    Product Specs
    • SKU: 9780199359622
    • Manufacturer: Oxford University Press
    • ISBN 13: 9780199359622
    • Publication Date: 04/03/2015
    • Format: Hardcover
    • Author: Russell E. Richey
    • Width: 6.10 inches
    • Height: 1.00 inches
    • Length: 9.30 inches
    • Weight: 0.06 pounds
    • SKU: 9780190266561
    • ISBN 13: 9780190266561
    • Publication Date: 04/03/2015
    • Format: Electronic Media
    • Author: Russell E. Richey
    • Width: 1.00 inches
    • Height: 1.00 inches
    • Length: 1.00 inches
    • Weight: 0.06 pounds
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    This item is not available for return. At Cokesbury, we offer various expedited shipping methods for an additional charge during checkout. However, products with long lead times and those shipped from a Cokesbury Connect Partner are not eligible for expedited shipping. If you select expedited shipping at checkout and your order includes items that cannot be expedited, you will receive a notice explaining that not all items are eligible.