Sandy Dengler - Susanna Wesley: Servant of God

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Dengler, Sandy

Susanna Wesley.

Summary: Follows the life of the Englishwoman whose intellectual curiosity led her to study theology, who married a minister who hoped to bring revival to the Anglican Church, and who lived to embrace the Methodism founded by her son John Wesley.

1. Wesley, Susanna Annesley, 1670-1742Juvenile literature. 2. MethodistsEnglandBiographyJuvenile literature. 3. AnglicansEnglandBiographyJuvenile literature. 4. Wesley, John 1703-1791FamilyJuvenile literature. 5. Wesley, Charles 1707-1788FamilyJuvenile literature. [1. Wesley, Susanna Annesley, 1670-1742. 2. Methodist] I. Title.

BX8495.W55D46 1987 287.0924 [B] [92] 87-5666

ISBN-10: 0-8024-8414-X

ISBN-13: 978-0-8024-8414-7

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W hen bitter gusts out of the north hammer London, the tightest window cannot keep the penetrating cold at bay. Most of the year, thick and murky overcasts seal out the sun and seal in the acrid smoke of a hundred thousand chimneys. Silent, clammy fog can, for days on end, hide the front door from the cobbled street hard before it. Then suddenly, when you least expect it, the sun slips out to burn the chill away.

If you pass the Bear Garden during an entertainment, when dogs are baiting bears and bulls, you can watch dust and the steamy breath of all those screaming people rise above the round arena in the smoky torchlight. Then its over. The bulls and the bears and some of the dogs are dead; and the hot, sweaty patrons, laughing and shouting and drinking, come pouring out into the cold, rain-slick streets.

Weather happens inside, too. The vast, echoing sanctuary of St. Giles chills the marrow of your bones any day of the year. The walk-in hearth in Spital Fields manse, so richly warm, welcomes you with a crackling wood fire, or possibly the soft and gentle glow of burning peat. Hot and cold, sun and wind, fire and rain, and you never quite know which will come down upon you next.

Today was sun. It filtered through the tree leaves to weave dancing lace in the grass. It made more vivid the crisp green of the sweetbriers along the back fence and made still softer the quiet pink of their fragrant flowers. It sang for the joy of another English summer.

Out back in the courtyard, the upstairs maid had hung out the rug from the master bedroom. With loud and mighty whops she rhythmically slapped it with the broom. A little cloud of dust lifted away from each swat. The houseman was finally replacing those three broken sticks in the arching rose arbor. The two tame cats had cornered something small and squeaky in the pile of kindling outside the kitchen door. The chore girl turned her back on the cat-rodent brouhaha to polish the big brass dinner bell hanging by the back stoop. And over all poured that delicious yellow sunlight.

Sukey, for pity sake! Throw that musty old book aside and come out in the sun. The weathers much too fine to hide from!

Susanna didnt throw it aside; she laid it down carefully. She leaned out her upstairs casement window. There stood Elizabeth in the busy courtyard below, her lovely face tipped up into the brightness, arms akimbo. Should Susanna be properly deferential toward her older sister, or should Susanna be as usual? As usual, of course.

She had to pause and think a moment. Deus deorum Dominus locutus est: et vocavit terram, a solis ortu usque ad occasum.

Whaaat?

Psalm fifty, verse one. You see? You can study and improve your mind, or you can bask in the sun like a lizard. I choose study. Bask as you wish.

Youre much too saucy for your own good, little snippet. You think you know it all, but youre only thirteen, remember.

Better thirteen than on the brink of marriage. Enjoy your sunshine, Elizabeth. Too soon youll be confined to the house scrubbing floors and birthing babies. Susanna pulled her head back inside and let the not-so-polite language from below drift by unheeded. And Elizabeth the daughter of a rector, too! Smugly she settled back onto her bolster beside the window. She picked up the musty old book again.

Musty? Old? Good! Both words bespoke venerability, the wisdom of age. Susanna yearned for the wisdom of age. Blessed she was indeed to have a brilliant father with a huge library and smart sisters willing to help her learn.

Oh, true, the rest of London called the Annesley sisters pretty, as if pretty were the best thing a girl could be. They called Susanna, the youngest, the prettiest of all and constantly complimented her silky dark hair, her deep blue eyes. Why didnt the people who visited the manse here ever notice that Susanna like her sisters could read Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, could cipher as well as any man, could discuss theology with any seminarian? Those were accomplishments worthy of pride, not an accident of birth, such as physical beauty.

Like a sirens soft fluting, warm summer air pushed aside the musty aroma of books to beckon and tease. The book melted into her lap. Perhaps Elizabeth had a point. Why waste all this fine weather? Susanna laid her study gently aside and walked downstairs. The long hallway ticked quietly in rhythm with her heels.

Sukey? Have you a minute?

For you, Papa, many minutes, Susanna paused in the doorway of her fathers study. She knew what the topic was going to be, and she wished it werent. She crossed the cozy room and settled at her fathers feet. His knees and his huge padded armchair like a throne towered above her.

He sat back and laced his thick fingers together in that way of his. I was over in the City yesterday. St. Pauls is coming, but quite slowly. Some say itll be many years more a-building, and I believe them.

I wish I could have seen it before the fire. They say you could spy its steeple from fifty miles away, if the land lay right. Susanna squirmed. St. Pauls Cathedral wasnt the subject of this chat. And the fire must have been interesting. Sammy and Benny tell me stories about it, but I never know quite when to believe them, they tease so much. I was born three years too late.

Ah. Now my littlest daughter is questioning Gods sovereign timing.

Very well then, Papa. Not questioning it. Regretting it.

And what else do you regret about Gods sovereignty?

Thats not fair, Papa. I dont argue against His sovereignty, but I do have wishes. I wish girls could attend academies and seminaries as boys do. I wish people took me more seriously. I wish I wish Elizabeth werent marrying John Dunton. I see him as boastful and full of self; not altogether a man to Gods liking.