Fred Sanders writes today about John Wesley’s marriage. I don’t recall reading much about Wesley’s marriage (now I know why) and was surprised by this entry.
. . . But Wesley broke all his own rules when he married Molly, and got what he deserved. Early Methodist historians painted Molly as an unstable woman of sour disposition and a flaring temper, and posed questions like, “How did so wise and great a man come to make so unhappy a choice?” She does seem a bit crazed with jealousy, but then again when Molly opened the mail, she found letters from Wesley’s many –female– admirers. And she found in his coat pocket a letter of spiritual advice to a woman which included the words, “The conversing with you, either by speaking or writing, is an unspeakable blessing to me. I cannot think of you without thinking of God. Others often lead me to Him; but it is, as it were, going round about: you bring me straight into His presence.” That’s enough to get some dishes flying around anybody’s house. How did so wise and great a man manage to be so foolish and petty?
Read it all here.
What a sad story for such a great man. Sometimes our own lives are such a mess it is any wonder God can use at all to encourage others.
Maybe Wesley’s tragedy in marriage is what made him pliable for God. God used his misguided decision for His Glory with Wesley just as He does for us.
My husband was just commenting (after reading From Jerusalem to Irian Jya) on how messed up the family lives of so many famous missionaries were. David Livingstone for one.
Wesley was a notorious womanizer who was practically estranged from his wife for the last part of his life (though they never divorced). If I remember right, he also had to leave Georgia in part for women issues–he was tutoring a government offical’s daughter in French, fell for her but never married her, and then refused to serve her communion when she married another without consulting him, her pastor. The government official ran him out of Georgia.