The Methodists began with a university group, the Holy Club, that included brothers John and Charles Wesley. In the 1700s the Church of England was spiritually slumbering, but the Methodists took the faith seriously and emphasized meeting for prayer, fellowship, and Bible study.
John Wesley defined a Methodist as “one who lives according to the method laid down in the Bible.” The Methodists found the people of England and America eager for a richer, deeper faith, and the Methodist revival was an astounding phenomenon of the 1700s.