Chapel - Dr. James Pedlar

In this special chapel where Dr. James Pedlar was installed to be the Donald N. and Kathleen G. Bastian Chair of Wesley Studies, Dr. Pedlar examines the life of John Wesley and how John Wesley was a great witness to the triumphs of God’s grace even when God often led John Wesley to do things he did not want to. John Wesley’s story challenges us to embrace the optimism of God’s grace and that nothing is beyond the reach of God’s grace.

Dr. Pedlar is the Donald N. and Kathleen G. Bastian Chair of Wesley Studies and Associate Professor of Theology at Tyndale Seminary. He joined the faculty at Tyndale in 2013 after completing his PhD from St. Michael’s College. He is a Wesleyan theologian whose work focuses on ecclesiology – especially questions involving renewal and reform movements. His first book, Division, Diversity, and Unity, explores the use of the Pauline concept of “charisms” as a way of thinking about the unique gifts that renewal movements bring to the life of the church. Dr. Pedlar convenes Tyndale’s annual Wesley Studies Symposium, an event that fosters Canadian scholarship on the Wesleyan tradition. Dr. Pedlar is a pastor in the Free Methodist Church in Canada and is part of the leadership team at Wesley Chapel in Scarborough, where he focuses primarily on worship ministry.