The Story of John Wesley, Told to Boys and Girls

Every great movement begins with a child. This is the story of John Wesley before he became the founder of Methodism, before thousands heard him preach, before his name became synonymous with religious revival. Here he is simply Jacky: a boy growing up in a bustling rectory in the village of Epworth, the son of a minister, one of nineteen children in a household where faith was as ordinary as breakfast. Marianne Kirlew brings his childhood alive with scrap of dialogue, verse, and scripture, showing us the boy who survived a house fire set by neighbors and grew into the man who would set the world on fire with his preaching. This is religious history rendered intimate and accessible for young readers, not as moral instruction but as story. It reveals how the seeds of conviction are planted early, in love and loss and the everyday courage of childhood.