Every now and then someone suggests a good pastoral or small group question to ask is “How is it with your soul?”
I don’t know where the question started, so I might be stepping in it here, but that strikes me as not a terribly Wesleyan question. It is much too vague. It leaves much too much room for speculation.
Wesley asked questions such as: What known sins have you committed since we met last week? Have you assurance that Jesus Christ died for you? How many sinners are reformed because of your preaching?
Wesley was not one to ask a fuzzy question, so far as I can tell.
Someone once asked how it was possible to review the Methodist classes and determine someone should be kicked out. Wesley’s journal notes suggest he was stunned by the question. What do you mean? Is that hard? You ask the person. You talk to people who know him. If any of them are honest you can easily figure out who is not keeping the rules of the society.
Wesley did not find the human soul nearly so mysterious as we often do.
I’m not saying we should not use the question. I’m just saying I don’t think John Wesley would use it.
I am a part-time local pastor serving 
The doctrine of original sin is surely more humbling to man than the opposite: And I know not what honour we can pay to God, if we think man came out of His hands in the condition wherein he is now.
John, I think the question is derived from the “General Rules.” In the material that discusses what happens in a class meeting, the class leader is supposed to ask each member of his or her class “how their soul prospers.” “How is it with your soul?” is not identical, but there seems to me to significant similarity.
I appreciate your point about Wesley not finding the soul as mysterious as we do. I think one of the reasons we find the soul to be “mysterious” is precisely because people don’t often talk about the state of their souls. Methodism has come perilously close to losing the language for giving voice to what God is doing in their lives. Early Methodist accounts, on the other hand, are filled with attempts to discern and describe how they are experiencing God’s presence in their lives.
Thanks for setting me straight on that, Kevin.
I suppose the real difference is that early Methodists had the experience and language to answer that question in ways that we often do not.