John Wesley and the Foundations of Methodist Missions: Lessons from History and Global Expansion with Philip Wingeier-Rayo
Show Notes: To Be and Do Podcast
Host: Philip Amerson
Guest: Philip Wingeier-Rayo
In this rich and insightful episode of the To Be and Do podcast, Philip Amerson sits down with noted missions scholar Philip Wingeier-Rayo , who brings his decades of experience as a professor at Wesley Seminary and work with the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry. The episode springs from Philip Wingeier-Rayo ’s new book, "John Wesley and the Origins of Methodist Missions," and takes listeners deep into the historical journey of Methodist missions—exploring how the global movement evolved from John Wesley’s origins to its worldwide presence today.
Here are three key takeaways from the conversation:
1. John Wesley’s Mission Legacy Is More Nuanced Than Many Realize
While John Wesley is credited as a founding missionary figure, Philip Wingeier-Rayo clarifies that Wesley’s role as a missionary was complex, even debated (02:52). During his time in Georgia, Wesley was technically called a missionary by others but did not accept a salary, nor did he self-identify with the title. His disappointing and challenging experience in Georgia shaped his later hesitance about engaging in missionary expansion, which influenced the ethos of early Methodism as initially more focused on renewal within the Anglican Church, rather than outward missionary zeal.
2. The Spread of Methodism Was Often Grassroots and Lay-Led
Contrary to popular belief, the explosive spread of Methodism in its early days wasn’t driven top-down by Wesley or denominational authorities. As Philip Wingeier-Rayo describes, laypeople who had caught the "fire" of Methodist faith carried it across oceans, founding societies and requesting support only after establishing local congregations (09:07). Wesley was hesitant and even declined several times to send clergy to support these fledgling communities, a testament to the organic, spirit-led nature of Methodist expansion.
3. Education and Experiential Faith Are Interwoven in the Methodist DNA
The Methodist tradition, shaped by Wesley’s experiences and Moravian influence, treasures both "knowledge and vital piety." Philip Wingeier-Rayo highlights compelling stories, such as that of Boston King—a formerly enslaved man who became a missionary in Africa due to Methodist educational efforts—to illustrate how the movement integrated heart and mind in spreading faith and social uplift (14:40). This holistic approach remains central to the Methodist ethos worldwide.
Listen in for a truly enlightening conversation about what it means to be and do as part of a global movement shaped by ordinary people, transformative faith, and education.
Philip Wingeier-Rayo serves as Executive Director of Education for the General Board of Higher Education & Ministry of the United Methodist Church. He is also Visiting Professor of Missiology, World Christianity, and Methodist Studies at Wesley, where he teaches courses in mission and evangelism, world Christianity, and Methodist history and doctrine. He served as Dean at Wesley from 2018-2022. Wingeier-Rayo was born in Singapore to missionary parents and grew up in Evanston, Illinois. He earned a double major in Human Relations and Spanish from Earlham College, a M.T.S. from Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, and a M.Th. from Seminario Evangélico de Teología in Cuba before earning a Ph.D. in Theology, Ethics and Culture from Chicago Theological Seminary. His teaching and scholarship is informed by 15 years of missionary service where he served with the General Board of Global Ministries in Nicaragua, Cuba, Mexico and the Rio Grande Valley in south Texas. Wingeier-Rayo has published five books, including Where are the Poor? A Comparison of the Ecclesial Base Communities and Pentecostalism—A Case Study in Cuernavaca, Mexico (Pickwick Publications, 2011) and The Bible Through the Eyes of John Wesley (Upper Room/Discipleship Resources, 2019). His most recent publication is John Wesley and the Origins of Methodist Missions (Abingdon Press, 2025). Wingeier-Rayo and his wife, Diana, reside outside of Washington DC and have three adult children and one son-in-law.
Books:
John Wesley and the Origins of Methodist Missions, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2025.
La Evangelización y la Misión de Dios: Una Teología Bíblica, Nashville, TN: Wesley’s Foundery Books.
2020.
La Biblia a través de los ojos de Juan Wesley: 52 clases de discipulado para pequeños grupos, with
foreword by Justo González, Nashville, TN: Upper Room, 2019.
Where are the Poor? A Comparison of the Ecclesial Base Communities and Pentecostalism—A Case
Study in Cuernavaca, Mexico, Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2011.
Cuban Methodism: The Untold Story of Survival and Revival, Atlanta, GA: Dolphins and Orchids,
2006.
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Greetings everyone, this is Phil Amerson again with the To Be
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and Do podcast. And today, well,
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we have the privilege of having someone I think
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who knows more about United
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Methodist missions but also the global church than almost
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anyone I know. And that's Philip
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Wengai Ryo. Phil, you've got several
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titles. I didn't memorize them all, but I know you
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You teach at Wesley Seminary in Missions, Intercultural Studies,
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and Methodist Studies. You work with the General Board of Higher
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Education and Ministry, especially around all the educational
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institutions. I didn't get the title of that, but wow,
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what do you— do you have any spare time? Thank you
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for those kind words. It's a pleasure to be on your podcast.
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Well, it's great to have you here.
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The first reason I wanted to speak with you is because of your
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book that I— when
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I went through it, I found myself thinking, oh,
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this explains some things that I had never quite fully understood.
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John Wesley and missions and Methodist
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missions. Talk a little bit about this project, and the
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book's just out, right? Yes, the book was just
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released in the second half of 2025
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by Abington Press, and it was
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a big project in the doing.
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Since you were the president at a couple of United Methodist
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seminaries, you know the academic world, and
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professors often go and present their research
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at conferences., and so I did this
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over 2 or 3 years and started to realize a
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pattern. I would research. I wanted to find out what were the origins
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of Methodist missions, and so I would look at John Wesley, but then I
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would realize that he actually started on
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the wings of other people. There were traditions before him:
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the Church of England, the Roman Catholic Church, the Moravians,
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and so he learned from them And then in the timeline,
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I kind of moved forward. Well, what happened after John Wesley? And I started looking
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at Thomas Coke. So after a few of
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these conference papers, I thought, well, hey, there's a theme to
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this. And so I started putting together an outline and proposed it to
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a press, and that's how the book came
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about. Well, that's great. And I
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found myself thinking about Wesley himself had been a
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missionary. But he also was hesitant about
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missions. Talk a bit about that. Yeah, that's a
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great story. And actually, you mentioned that John Wesley was
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a missionary. There's a bit of a debate on
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that. I live in Silver Spring, Maryland, just outside of
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D.C. And as a part of my research, I went to the
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Library of Congress. Wesley, as a member of the
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Church of England, when he was in
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Georgia, he related to a couple of different
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societies. So there was the
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Society for
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the Promotion of Christian Knowledge that largely produced
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literature, and there was the Society for the Propagation of
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the Gospel in other parts of the
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world. And I went to their journals that are held in
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England and also at the Library of Congress in
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Washington. And it's interesting that he is listed as a missionary
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but with no salary. And so
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he eventually— at first he went as a
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volunteer. He wanted to go and evangelize the Native Americans
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in the colony of Georgia. And he was on
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the ship when the board
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met and they decided to call him a
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missionary. But he didn't accept any money for it. He was
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a volunteer. So you could really debate whether
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he was technically a missionary because
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that wasn't the title that he
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used. You know what's interesting, as I heard you talking about
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that, The SPCN, Society for Promotion of
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Christian Knowledge, has a long history, doesn't it, that
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continues? Yes, it's still an active printing press today.
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And there was a missionary in the Church of England by the
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name of Thomas Bray who came to Maryland, and he noticed that
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the Native American children weren't receiving any education.
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The children for the enslaved Africans weren't receiving any
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education. And so he was moved by that. And so he's the one
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that founded this society to produce literature and
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send missionaries to serve Native American and African
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Americans. Amazing. So Wesley, when
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did he find out he was a missionary, or did he? Well, he was
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on the ship when the board met and called
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him a missionary. And so in their journals, he's listed there, and there are
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several missionaries that were sent to places like the
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Bahamas and Barbados, and he's listed
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there as Georgia but with no compensation. I'll be
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darned. So how do you think his experience in
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Georgia influenced his view of missions? Or
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maybe to, maybe to put another hook on that
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question, was he reluctant to compete
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with his his denominational body, the
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Anglican Church? That's a great question. So
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when John Wesley was in Georgia, he was a member of the Church
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of England. He was an ordained priest, and Methodism
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hadn't even started yet. And so, as you and
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your listeners know, he had a frustrating experience in Georgia. You
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know that he had the romantic entanglement with Sophie
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Hopkey, and he was brought up on charges. For not serving
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communion to Sophie Hopke. And so
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he absconded. Instead of facing the charges,
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he left and went back to England. And he doesn't use this term,
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but I think today we would say he was depressed when he got back to
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England and not really knowing what his purpose or his
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calling was. And he befriended a
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Moravian who kind of
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encouraged him and gave him a sense of hope. And that's the point where he
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had his heartwarming experience in 1738
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at Aldersgate Street. So I think
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that he— this negative experience in Georgia really
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tarnished his view of missions. He wasn't able
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to evangelize the Native Americans like he had hoped. He had gone there
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with great illusions. Perhaps
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romantic ideas about mission work, and in the end that
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all came crashing down. And so as an
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Anglican, he didn't really see the need to start a Methodist mission
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society because he thought we were part of the Church of England. He wasn't trying
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to start a new denomination. So I think that's part of the reason
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why he was not gung-ho about
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missions. He just wanted to return the
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church to the beginning, to what it was like to be the primitive
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church, and to seek holiness. He was very
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much into mysticism and the primitive church. And so I
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think he was just trying to renew the Church of England and not thinking, I'm
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going to start a denomination. Yeah, so the primitive
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church— let's put a flag in that and come back to it. But first, I
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want to ask Am I not right that
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he was reluctant to support Coke
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and Asbury in their
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adventures in the Americas? No, you're absolutely
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correct. As a matter of fact, the way that missions
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eventually spread is by ordinary
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everyday laypeople who got on a ship and
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they had become Methodist in
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England or Ireland or Scotland, and they went
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to another part of the world and there was no Methodist society.
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And so they decided to start their own. And so it was really kind of
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spirit-led. And eventually these societies would form and they would write
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Wesley a letter and they would say, you know, we're not
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ordained, we're not equipped to do this work, but we're here. Can you send
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us somebody? To support us. We, you know, we can't baptize, we
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can't perform Holy Communion. And Wesley at first
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was very reluctant. He said no. He said, I can't send you
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missionaries. I don't have enough pastors here in England to meet
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the demand. So yes,
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he declined several invitations to send
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missionaries. So let's look at that notion
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of primitive Christianity and experiential
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faith. How much of that do you think was what
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motivated or was behind the rapid spread
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of Methodism in those early years?
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Well, Phil, that's what I mean at the beginning when I said I
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started with John Wesley and then worked back. So one of
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the main influences on John Wesley was the Moravians.
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He befriended the Moravians on the ship on his way to
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Georgia, and he sojourned with them for about 3
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years. And he was very, very close friends with many
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Moravians. And at one point, he thought he would even join the Moravians and
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leave the Church of England. So one of the streaks
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within Moravianism is Pietism. And
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so there was a Pietist revival going on in
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Europe. And so that, I think, influenced Wesley to have
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this heartwarming experience, kind of a religion of
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the heart instead of more of an
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intellectual belief system. And I think that was at the heart
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of— especially these lay people who traveled around the world, they had caught this
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fire and they wanted to go and spread it wherever they
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went. Yeah, we've In more recent
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years, I know you know this in your work
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in theological education, which has been deep and
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broad, we talk about Methodism as focusing
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on knowledge and vital piety, the two hand
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in hand. And it seems to me that while
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Wesley was moved toward and influenced by and had
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his own altar's gate experience, He also never
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quite gave up on the importance of knowledge and
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education. Absolutely, and that's something that he learned from
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the Moravians as well because they had
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schools and universities where they trained people to
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be missionaries. And so he took
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that curriculum, and when he started the Kingswood
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School, which is Bath, England today, he used much
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of that same curriculum that he learned from the Moravians. I think you're absolutely right.
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He had that balance between heart and mind,
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and that's been an ingredient, part of our DNA that has
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gone all around the world. So one of the stories that
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I tell in the book, talking about education, is the
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story of a man by the name of Boston
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King. He was born near Charleston, South
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Carolina, into slavery. And he was
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illiterate. Eventually, when the American Revolutionary War
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started, the English made an offer to all the
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enslaved Africans and said, if you will come and fight on our side, we
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will guarantee your freedom. So Austin King, he went out on
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a horse from one of his master,
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and he eventually crossed over the enemy's line. And he said, well, there's
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no turning back. 'If I go back, I'm going to get whipped.' So
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he kept going and he decided to join the British forces.
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He didn't see combat. He was more of a spy and
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a messenger. And so he was with the
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British. And then when the British lost the war, he and
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many other enslaved Africans who had accepted this offer
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were worried that they were going to get re-enslaved. And in fact,
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there was signposts, you know, with
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the physical traits of the Africans who had left
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their masters, and they were bounty hunters who were trying to get
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them back. So a Boston king realized that he had
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to go north, and so he found his way to New York
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City, and there the British negotiated the
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ceasefire with George Washington, and the British agreed to
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honor their promise. And so there were about
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3,000 formerly enslaved Africans who were in this book. It
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was called the Book of Negroes, and it had their approximate
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age, their name, their physical traits. And so the
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British found safe passage for these 3,000
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formerly enslaved Africans to go to Nova Scotia,
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England, and Boston King was one of them along with his
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wife Violet King. They found their way to Nova
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Scotia, and there was a Methodist missionary who was from Maryland
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by the name of Freeborn
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Garrettson. Thomas Coke from the conference in Baltimore named him
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a missionary to Canada, or what we call Canada
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today. Freeborn Garrettson met Boston King
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and his wife Violet. Violet, she converted
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to Methodism under the ministry of Freeborn
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Garrettson. And they— uh, Freeborn Gerritson gave Boston King a
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church to serve, a church in Nova Scotia. So
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by this time, the, uh, the English were
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very concerned with the well-being of these
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formerly enslaved Africans, and they were called Black
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Loyalists because they were loyal to the British crown, right? And so
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coming back to the story of Kingswood School,
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uh, Boston King was illiterate. And so he started to
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teach. And so Thomas Coke said, well, if you're going to teach, you
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need a formal education. And so at
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this time, Thomas Coke was trying to start a
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colony in Sierra Leone and send missionaries to Sierra
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Leone. So this was the first Methodist work on the continent of
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Africa, and there were several ships that went from Nova
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Scotia to start the city of
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Freetown. Freetown because it was a utopian colony
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where Blacks and whites would be free. They would all get a plot of land.
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They would all have the right to vote and participate in government.
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So Boston King and his wife Violet were a part of those
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first settlers where Blacks and whites went to start the colony
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of Sierra Leone. Thomas Coke invited
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Boston King to come to Kingswood School in Bath and
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get a formal education. He went there for 2 years,
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studied, and so Boston King, Black
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Methodist preacher, was the first Methodist to preach and teach in
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the continent of Africa, and it was due to this
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worldwide connection of Methodist
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education. Wow, what a story, wonderful story,
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and it causes me to leap in a direction
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that you might understand better than most of our listeners, even
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if they're United Methodists, and that is
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the place and role of the Evangelical United
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Brethren Church. Because I know
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in places like India and in West
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Africa, they had a remarkable kind of mission.
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I found myself often wishing that many of our church
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structures we had borrowed more from the EUB than the old Methodists.
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But can you tell some of that story as well?
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Yes. As a matter of fact, when I launched my book,
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I live about 45 minutes from Otterbein
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United Methodist Church in Baltimore, which is
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the oldest continually in use
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church in the city of Baltimore, which is saying
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something. Philip William Otterbein, the founder of
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the EUB denomination,
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was mainly working with the German-speaking population in the
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American colonies, and he befriended Francis
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Asbury and was present at the Christmas Conference in
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Baltimore in 1784 when the Methodist Episcopal Church was
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founded. And so Methodism and the Evangelical
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United Brethren tradition They worked together
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parallel, although they had slightly different structures and
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theologies. But when language was no longer a
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factor, eventually they were merged together, as you know, at
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the uniting conference in Dallas
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in 1968. So at that time,
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Methodist missions had to figure out what to do because there are all these EUB
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missions around the world. And so the Board of Global
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Ministries became the General Board of Global Ministries, and they work
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with all these mission churches around the world. But I
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agree with your statement because the EUB
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were ahead of the Methodists in allowing these churches to
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become autonomous. Yes. And so around the
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world, we don't have— they don't have these kind of
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these old holdovers of this colonial
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structure. Methodists were a little slow in granting these
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churches autonomous, where the EUB was ahead of the
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game. So in Puerto Rico, for example, you have an
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EUB church and you have a Methodist church because they were
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fully independent at the time in 1968
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of the uniting conference.
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Wow, so rich. Phil, hold up your book again so we can see the
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COVID 'John Wesley and the Origins of
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Methodist Missions.' This is
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our opportunity to hear from Philip Wengai
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Ryo. Phil, thank you for being with us. We're going to talk with you
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again, and maybe we'll explore a little bit of what's going on
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in the world today. That sounds like a great idea. I look forward
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to that next conversation. Great. Thank you, Phil. And this
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is Phil Amerson, another Phil, signing off for the To
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Be and Do podcast. God bless.
