“Madeley, June 20, 1784. The sight of Mr. Greenwood, in his son, has brought some of my Newington scenes to my remembrance, and I beg leave to convey my tribute of thanks by his hands. Thanks! Thanks! What, nothing but words? There is my humbling case. I wish to requite your manifold kindnesses, but I cannot. I must be satisfied to be ever your insolvent debtor. Nature and grace do not love it. Proud nature lies uneasy under great obligations; and thankful grace would be glad to put something in the scale opposite to that which you have filled with so many favours. But what shall I put? I wish I could send you all the Bank of England, and all the Gospel of Christ; but the first is not mine, and the second is already yours.”[[603]]
Wesley’s annual Conference, in 1784, was held at Leeds. He writes, in his Journal:—
“1784, Tuesday, July 27. Our Conference began; at which four of our brethren, after long debate (in which Mr. Fletcher[[604]] took much pains), acknowledged their fault, and all that was past was forgotten. Thursday, July 29, being the public Thanksgiving Day, as there was not room for us in the old church, I read prayers, as well as preached, at our Room. I admired the whole service for the day. The prayers, Scriptures, and every part of it, pointed at one thing: ‘Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.’ Having five clergymen to assist me, we administered the Lord’s Supper, as was supposed, to sixteen or seventeen hundred persons. Sunday, August 1. We were fifteen clergymen at the old church. Tuesday, August 3. Our Conference concluded in much love, to the great disappointment of all.”
Such is Wesley’s brief account of one of the most important Conferences he ever held, and the last which Fletcher had the opportunity of attending. During the year, Dr. Coke had begun the Methodist Foreign Missionary Society; and Wesley had signed and sealed his famous “Deed of Declaration,” constituting, for all time to come, the Legal Conference of the Methodists, and defining the powers and duties of its members. Charles Atmore, who was present, relates,[[605]] that, on the Sunday evening before the Conference opened, the congregation, assembled to hear Wesley, was four times greater than the chapel could contain, and, therefore, Wesley “preached in a field adjoining, on the judgment of the great day.” On Monday morning, Fletcher “preached an excellent sermon from Matt. v. 13–16, ‘Ye are the salt of the earth,’” etc. At night, Wesley took for his text, “Give the king Thy judgments, O God, and Thy righteousness unto the king’s son.” On Tuesday morning, at five o’clock, Henry Moore delivered a sermon founded upon “Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you.” At the conclusion of the service, Wesley “opened the Conference;” and, in the evening of the day, preached from, “Even the very hairs of your head are all numbered,” etc. Next morning, July 28, at five o’clock, the text of Thomas Taylor was, “What then? notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretence, or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice.” At night, Wesley preached from, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” Thursday, July 29, “was a high day indeed.” At five a.m. Thomas Hanby discoursed on “My grace is sufficient for thee,” etc. In the forenoon, Wesley expounded and enforced 1 Cor. xiii. 1–4, “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity,” etc. Then followed the sacramental service, in which Wesley was assisted by Fletcher, Coke, Cornelius Bayley, who had been Fletcher’s curate, Mr. Dillon, an ordained clergyman from Ireland, and the well-known David Simpson, of Macclesfield, the services of the day being concluded with another sermon from Wesley, on the text, “This is the first and great commandment.” At five a.m. on Friday, July 30, Joseph Pilmoor preached from “I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved”[moved”]; and, at night, Fletcher, from, “These all having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.”[[606]] At seven o’clock on Sunday morning, August 1, Fletcher preached again, taking as his text 1 Kings xiii. 26, selected from the first lesson for the day: “It is the man of God, who was disobedient unto the word of the Lord: therefore the Lord hath delivered him unto the lion, which hath torn him, and slain him, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake unto him.” Joseph Benson, who was present, writes:—
“Mr. Fletcher drew such a picture of the degradation and misery of a backsliding minister, and of the corruption and injury he introduced into the Church of Christ, as produced a general and deep sensation, not easily to be forgotten.”
And Henry Moore, another of Fletcher’s auditors, remarks:—
“I was extremely impressed with the whole service: the shadow of the Divine presence was seen among us, and His going forth was in our sanctuary.”
Next morning, Mr. Moore himself had to preach. He writes:—
“I went to the chapel at the hour appointed, and, to my dismay, found the venerable Mr. Fletcher in the pulpit, leaning upon his staff. My first impression was to run away; but a moment’s reflection changed my purpose. I ascended the pulpit and gave out the hymn; while I did so, my knees smote one against the other: I knelt down to pray, and indeed lifted my heart with my voice, that I might be endued with power and wisdom from on high: my soul was calmed, and I took my text, and continued the service, fully set free from fear, and strengthened in my resolution ever to obey the voice of duty.”[[607]]
At five o’clock on the following morning, Wesley, eighty-one years of age, again preached, selecting a text admirably adapted to be a sequel to that chosen by Fletcher on the previous Sunday; and also peculiarly suited to what had taken place in the Conference: “And Jeremiah said unto the house of the Rechabites, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Because ye have obeyed the commandment of Jonadab your father, and kept all his precepts, and done according unto all that he hath commanded you; therefore, thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before me for ever” (Jer. xxxv. 18, 19). The Conference was concluded on Tuesday, August 3; and next morning, at five o’clock, Wesley delivered another sermon, and immediately afterwards took the coach for Wales. His last text, at this remarkable Conference, was, “Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee.”[[608]]