More than 100 years after the fire, Henry Perlee Parker painted “The Rescue of John Wesley from the Epworth Rectory Fire” (1840).

Image courtesy of WikiGallery.org.

And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire …. – Jude 1:23

When John Wesley was a very young child, the rectory at Epworth where he lived with his family, caught fire. John was trapped on the second floor and the parishioners and neighbors had to build a human ladder to rescue him. For the rest of her life, Susanna Wesley knew he was a special child with a special call, and referred to him as a brand plucked from the burning.

We are on a fearful rescue mission in the midst of a raging fire.. We are commanded by God to snatch people out of that fire. God does not want them in the fire and God has sent you to bring them out alive.

Read this admonition in context.

It is sandwiched in a directive about how we are to deal with people in kindness, mercy, and love. It encourages us to be holy and to let our prayers be Spirit filled, to grow, and to be expectant of the Lord’s return. It reminds us that the Lord is able to keep us from falling. And in the midst of it all is this simple plea to rescue people who are being drawn deeper and deeper into the destructive fires of eternal separation from God.

Snatch them.

It is not a passive activity. It is not something that we do casually or without passion. We snatch them because we can see their fate and we love them in Christ. We utilize whatever godly. loving, and respectful means are at our disposal and we employ all of our energy.

If you saw a child in a burning car, analysis would be quick and action would be primary. You would be calling for help even as you initiated efforts to do whatever it took to save that child. You might not even feel the burns on your own hands until later.

There would be one primary objective on your mind: get the kid out alive!

Why not have such passion for announcing the Kingdom of mercy, forgiveness, and compassion to people? Aren’t people dying? Are they not being treated unjustly? Aren't they living with systemic oppression? Aren't they lonely, depressed, addicted, incarcerated, and sad? Are there not those headed on a path of ruin?

We have the means to bring them out entrusted to us – a message of grace and love, yet we sit by as spectators, observers, and critics. The paramedics do not scold the injured driver on his poor driving. The fire fighter does not wait to put out the fire until she has ascertained who was negligent.The life guard does not deliver a safety lecture before rescuing a drowning child.

Neither does a herald of the kingdom of God approach the good news of repentance as some sort of punitive word. It is a message of hope and opportunity to those who ware looking for  an escape from their despair.

It is Advent, the entrance into time and space of something dramatic, new, fresh, and redeeming. It foretells a day of ultimate reconciliation, judgment, salvation, and truth. What could be a better time to enlist as members of a rescue team equipped with life itself .

Back to John Wesley, Blogger and preacher, Dr. James Nored writes:

For "fifty years John Wesley rode 250,000 miles on the roads of England, Scotland and Ireland. He gave over 42,000 sermons, always preaching twice each day, and often three or four times daily, for fifty years. His tireless work changed British society and made evangelistic Christianity a life-giving force throughout the English-speaking world . . . . "

"At the age of 86 he was still preaching to huge gatherings of people two and three times a day, seven days a week."  – James Nored

You might just rescue a Wesley, but whoever it is, it will be a child of God.