CHAPTER 5 Vocal Ministry 83 FRIENDS FOR 300 YEARS.
Vocal ministry is an important, but not an essential element in Quaker worship.
- Both theoretically and actually a meeting which worships in complete silence may be as valuable as one in which speaking occurs.
- "It was a heart tendering time, though there was not a word spoken amongst us," writes Richard Jordan in his Journal.
Many such comments could be cited. A silent meeting is generally preferred to one in which speaking does not arise from an inspired source.
But experience shows that meetings in which there is little or no vocal ministry for a length of time decline in membership and power.
- There are usually some members of a meeting who require no vocal aid or guidance in their worship, but there are others who are greatly in need of this help.
- Because the search for Truth and Life is a group search as well as an individual search, even those furthest along the way derive strength and encouragement from others in the meeting.
The author has participated in periods of meditation among the Zen sect of Buddhists in Japan.
These gatherings, which in-eluded many persons arranged in
orderly rows in a meditation hail, were held in complete silence. They seemed
much like Friends meetings, but an important difference was felt. There Was no
communication. Each individual was engaged in a solitary search for truth and
reality. But the meditator might sometimes leave the hall and seek a brief
interview with his roshi or teacher, Who would offer special guidance.
The meditator would then return to his meditation. This teacher supplied, in a
way very different from the Quaker way, the need for ministry.
The minister among Friends differs from the Zen instructor and the Catholic director. He speaks as the immediate mouthpiece of the group of worshipers whose insight into Truth has been brought to utterance by the Holy Spirit, the Presence in the midst.
It is as if the general spiritual potential of the meeting increased until at some particular point it crossed the boundary from silence to speech, as a spark passes from one pole to another when the electric potential is sufficiently high.
The first person singular pronoun is seldom
heard in Quaker ministry, nor does the speaker declare his own experience
except as his experience may illustrate a more general truth. As Charles Lamb
said of one whom he heard ministering in a Quaker meeting, "He seemed not
to speak but to be spoken from."
The theory of the Quaker ministry is simple. As the worshipers sit together in silence to wait upon the Lord, anyone among them may find arising in his consciousness a message which he feels is intended for more than himself alone.
- It is then his obligation to deliver that message and to cease speaking when he has delivered it.
- He must learn to recognize the unique sense of urgency which is evidence of a divine requirement.
- If a thought comes to him with peculiar life and power, he may be justified in assuming that this is a sign from God to speak.
- He may sometimes be mistaken. There is no sure test of divine guidance in this or any other undertaking.
- If, however, through prayer and humble waiting he has become sensitive to the "still, small voice," he will be increasingly enabled to recognize a call when it comes.
- He will learn to recognize and reject the wish to speak which comes from a different source, however disguised, such as an inclination to exhibit his own powers or knowledge or simply a lack of inhibition.
- Usually he knows quite well whether what is on his mind will help the meeting or not.
- Often a suggestion is provided from the true Source which is intended, not for the meeting as a whole, but to be kept by the recipients as Isaac Penington cautions, "for bread at home,"
It may seem to him an evidence of pride that, by his own decision, he should take such a responsibility upon himself. But when he becomes aware that the responsibility is not solely his, but that of the divine Master who has called him, if he is faithful, he will yield to the requirement.
Quaker Journals frequently mention the sense of complete peace which follows obedience to the call.
But there is not always peace. Sometimes the most revered of Friends sit down with a sense of uneasiness and a feeling of having "outrun the guide." This was John Woolman's experience the first time that he spoke in a meeting for worship. It was a long time before he felt able to speak again.
Not
infrequently, mention is made of a sense of dryness and consequent pain felt by
well-known Friends when they found themselves unable to speak to a large
company assembled with the expectation of hearing them. "Sat in suffering
silence" is an occasional entry in the Journal of Job Scott.
Sometimes this lack of ability to speak seems justified. Richard Jordan
records, "I sat through it [the meeting] in silence, I believe to the
great disappointment of many, but I was thankful in being preserved from
gratifying the itching ears."
----
The purpose of vocal ministry in a Quaker meeting is different from the purpose of preaching from a pulpit.
The primary function of pulpit ministry is to teach by expounding the Scriptures and explaining the way of salvation for men.
This the preacher exhorts his hearers
to accept by an act of faith. The old-fashioned plan of salvation which
concerns a future life is often replaced today by a plan of social salvation
for this life.
A teaching ministry is not entirely absent from
meetings of the
Society of Friends, but in general, it is exercised upon occasions especially appointed for the purpose.
When exercised by a Speaker of genuine prophetic power, teaching may find an appropriate place in the solemn waiting upon the Lord.
A more thoroughgoing instruction in religious history, theory and practice is needed in the Society of Friends, as it is elsewhere, but it fits the lecture platform better than the meeting for worship.
George Fox says that the object of Quaker ministry is "to bring people . . . to the end of all preaching. "2
86.
Isaac
Penington says, "The great work of the minister of Christ is to keep the
conscience open to Christ. Ministiy may supply a subject for meditation which
will focus wandering thoughts, but he who ministers must carefully avoid making
his hearers dependent upon him.
In Catholic books giving instruction to
spiritual directors there is frequent admonition that the director must not
take too much on himself or give too explicit guidance. Rather he should seek
to reach the Spirit of God within the person under his care. St. John of the
Cross says:
Let spiritual directors . . . remember
that the Holy Ghost is the principal agent here, and the real guide of souls;
that He never ceases to take care of them and never neglects any means by which
they may profit and draw near to God as quickly as possible and in the best
way. Let them remember that they are not the agents, but instruments only, to
guide souls by the rule of faith and the law of God. . . Their aim should be,
then, not to guide souls by a way of their own suitable to themselves, but to
ascertain if they can, the way by which God Himself is guiding them.4
Such advice is equally applicable to speakers in
a Quaker meeting. The minister is an instrument of that Spirit which is in his
hearers as well as in himself. If he keeps close to the one Center, he can
reach any person along a particular radius.
No rules can be laid down for Quaker ministry. The Spirit leads where it will. In general, the spoken word should be a simple affirmation of truth rather than an argumentative defense of it.
- The method of Jesus was to state a truth which the hearer could recognize as such without debate.
- Just as the artist offers his picture or the poet his poem to be accepted for what it is without reasons, so the speaker should offer his message, trusting that the Light in him will answer the Light in others.
- The life which flows from one person to another moves the will, but if the will is coerced by arguments, it moves, if it moves at all, without full consent.
- An analytic ministry which dissects religious experience may be as destructive of life as is the dissection of a plant or an animal.
- As we know the life in our bodies by direct intuition without analysis, so we recognize the life of God in the soul.
87
Analysis
has its peculiar scientific value, but the Spirit which passes from one person
to another as a flame leaps from one coal to another grasps truth in its
wholeness as a living thing united within itself. Such an experience is like
that which might occur in a society of ornithologists discussing the different
kinds of birds if a real and unusual bird flew into the room.
Ministry in a Friends meeting should be
spontaneous in the sense that no one comes to meeting either expecting to speak
or expecting not to speak. To use a figure of Jeremiah, our religion should
arise from a spring, not be drawn from a reservoir. The spoken message should
well up freshly and genuinely from the life of the meeting. To change the
figure, a seed may have been sown earlier to await the right conditions for
germination. A concern which develops finally into a spoken message may arise
in the mind at any time during routine engagements of daily life or during a
time of private retirement for prayer and worship. It must then be allowed to
mature and be reserved until there is a clear sense that the time has arrived
to give it utterance.
A Friend of the eighteenth century named Mary
England dreamed that when she dipped her pitcher into the spring and drew it
out at once to carry it away, the water ran out, but when she held the pitcher
in the spring long enough the water did not run out. By this she took warning
not to act too quickly upon an urge to speak in meeting.
Since the vocal message is followed by silence, opportunity is given for the hearers to carry it further for themselves. The spoken word in a Friends meeting ought to be suggestive of more that might have been said, rather than being in itself exhaustive. It may even be to some extent shadowy.
Spiritual truth cannot be sharply defined like scientific
truth. It exists on the dim edge of the unexplored region beyond the horizon of
self-conscious thought. The language of the Spirit is symbolic and its suggestions
are not so much facts as signs which point beyond themselves to the unseen
ground of all existence. So inarticulate Sometimes is the voice of the Spirit
that it can be expressed only by a sigh, or even by complete silence.
Speaking in a Quaker meeting may concern any
subject, provided it be in a distinctly religious frame of reference.
88
In mathematics
what is a circle in one frame of reference may be an ellipse in another.
Similarly, what appears one way in a secular setting may assume a very
different form in a religious frame of reference. The difference between the
religious and the secular, like the difference between beauty and ugliness or
good and evil, is, perhaps, impossible to define, but most persons have the
capacity to recognize it. The important question from a religious standpoint is
not "what shall we do" but "what is the will of God for
us."
For religious utterance moral platitudes are not
as effective as a simple call to dwell in the Spirit of the Living Christ. He
who lives in that Spirit will follow naturally the teachings of the Christ of
history. If we sincerely experience the Presence of Christ in the Midst, every
word will be in harmony with his spirit. Similarly, if we are in conversation
with some person honored for his character and achievement, all that is said is
in keeping with his nature. As someone has remarked, "We may beat about
the bush but we do not beat about the Burning Bush."
That type of sermon which inspires fear because
of the consequences of sin is not typical of Quaker preaching. It is the
appreciation of good rather than the dread of evil which leads the soul in the
way of perfection. Yet it was said of Stephen Grellet by William J. Allinson
that his ministry was "solemn, close and alarming" as well as
"persuasive, prophetic and encouraging."5 The first
function of the Light is to reveal sin and evil. None should hesitate to point
out the dark shadow cast by obstructions to the Light. -
A realization of the terrible reality of
wickedness and the consequent feeling of humility and dependence is the first
step toward regeneration. Without it there can be no beginning of the spiritual
journey. But the soul must not remain in the abyss. The object of the meeting
for worship is not exposure to darkness, but exposure to the Light which
overcomes the darkness. Worshipers should accordingly be directed to the goal
and to the Life of God in man's soul which alone will give power to reach it.
It was such a ministry that George Fox exercised when he wrote to Cromwell's
daughter, Lady Claypole, who was "sick and much troubled in mind":
89.
Whatever temptations, distractions,
confusions the light doth make manifest and discover, do not look at these
temptations, confusions, corruptions; but look at the Light which discovers
them. . . . For looking down at sin and corruption and distraction ye are
swallowed up in it but looking at the Light which discovers them, ye will see over
them. [Journal I, 488]
The highest vocal exercise in a meeting for
worship is spoken prayer. The worshiper may discover that the spirit of prayer
in a meeting is coming to utterance through him. He then becomes the mouthpiece
of the group in prayer to God. Not "I" but "we" is the
language of his supplication. Prayers for oneself are generally best offered
in silence. To some persons prayer seems so private and intimate that audible
petition is impossible. Others shrink from it for fear of insincerity or
formalism. Yet nothing so effectively lays a covering over the meeting as the
humble utterance of sincere prayer. Many are grateful for words which they
themselves feel unable to utter.
To educated and uneducated, old and young, men
and women, the call may come to yield to the requirement to speak in a meeting
for worship. Three hundred years of Quaker history has made it clear that the
gift of the ministry is not confined to any particular kind of person. There is
no ordination other than evidence that a divine gift has been bestowed. George
Fox's earliest "opening" taught him that it was not necessary to be
trained at Oxford or Cambridge in order to be a minister. Some of the early
Quaker preachers were highly educated, most of them were not. The same was true
of the apostles and prophets of Biblical times. By no group were the first
Friends more harshly treated than by university scholars at Oxford, Cambridge,
Edinburgh and Aberdeen, who were angered by the low value that Friends placed
on learning as a prerequisite for the ministry. When Friends were taunted that
they could not read the Scriptures in the original languages they replied, as
did Fox,
·. . that the Word of Cod is the
Original . . . and the Word is it which makes a Divine . . . and this is the
Word that makes both men and women divine and brings them into the divine
nature. [Ep. 249, 1667]
90.
That Friends valued education as
fitting men and women for the activities of life is shown by the schools which
they set up and maintained. Though education might be a help in the spiritual
life, it might also prove a hindrance and it is not an essential requirement
for vocal ministry.
From the very
beginning Quaker women shared the vocal ministry with men. To show that women
could receive as genuine a call to this service as men, Friends had only to
point to results. Barclay writes:
Cod hath
effectually in this day converted many souls by the ministry of women and by
them also frequently comforted the souls of his children, which manifest
experience puts the thing beyond all controversy.'
Paul's
instruction that women should keep silent in the church (I Cor. 14:34) was read
in the light of his instruction in the same epistle regarding the headdress of
women when prophesying (I Cor. 11:5, 13). A text often used by Friends to
defend their position on the ministry of women was taken from Peter's quotation
of the prophet Joel delivered at Pentecost, "I will pour out my spirit
upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy" (Acts
2:17).
The
inequality of men and women, Fox says, was a result of the Fall but "in
the restoration by Christ. . . they are helps meet
·. . as they were before the Fall" (Ep.
291).
The
method of laying the responsibility for ministry on the congregation as a whole
rather than on a person or persons specially prepared and delegated for it
obviously involves serious difficulties. The ministry in Quaker meetings has
always been, and will continue to be, a problem. Persons unqualified because of
shallowness of experience or failure to attain the highest motivation take
advantage of the liberty. George Fox warns against preaching in a
"brittle, peevish, hasty, fretful mind" (Ep. 131). Some even fail to
understand the religious character of the meeting and introduce subjects more
appropriate to a forum or lecture platform than to a group that is gathered to
wait upon the Lord. Some, who have undoubtedly received a gift in the past, may
have outlived it and not be aware of their loss.
91
Too
much ministry may lead to overdependence on the spoken word. Joshua Evans
remarks in his Journal:
At our meeting lately we had the
company of four Friends who were ministers. It occurred to my mind that in a
season of drought we looked to the clouds for rain. Sometimes many clouds
produce but little rain, so when divers preachers are in the gallery and the
minds of the people turned towards them and not to the Bishop of souls,
disappointñent often happens.7
In the parable of the sower, some seed did not
grow because it fell on hard ground. The ground may have become hard because so
many were tramping up and down to sow seed.
The attender at a Friends meeting must accustom
himself to hearing much that he feels is unprofitable, at least to himself. His
forbearance in respect to speakers who are struggling, perhaps blindly, toward
the Light and missing the way is in itself a valuable exercise. If the meeting
is failing because of the wrong kind of ministry, each member must realize that
the quality of the meeting depends partly on him and his faithfulness. He must
also realize that in a Friends meeting, as in a democracy, a price is paid for
freedom as contrasted with regimentation. A Friends meeting can rise higher or
sink lower than a church service which is so regulated as to be conducted on a
well-defined level.
As a free, unprogrammed, spontaneous vocal
ministry gives rise to certain problems, a professional, programmed ministry
gives rise to other problems, perhaps equally serious. The division between
clergy and laity does not conduce to congregational unity. Lack of
responsibility on the part of the laity does not conduce to spiritual growth.
Regular preparation of a sermon in advance may result in what Barclay calls
"conned and gathered stuff" (Apology 352) or what Fox calls
"brain-beaten, heady stuff" (Ep. 275, 1669). Friends sometimes called
this "grinding with the water that is passed." The spoken word is
more alive if it springs freshly out of the life and searchings of the
worshipers. In a Quaker meeting a single sentence uttered in response to a
flash of insight may have more effect than a long sermon.
The professional minister is no longer challenged by Friends for receiving pay; indeed, it is recognized that he is meagerly rewarded. 92.
Nevertheless,
the fact that he is paid may quite unfairly detract from the effectiveness of
his message as a sincere expression of his feelings. He is also faced with
another handicap. Too often there is no silence in which the message can sink
into the hearts of his hearers.
The difficulties .inherent in an unprogrammed
meeting were partly roet throughout most of Quaker history by the appointment
of elders, whose primary duty was to counsel those who spoke in meeting.
Problems raised by the freedom of a Friends meeting were more difficult in the
early days of the Society than later because the movement was still fluid and
unorganized. Many came into connection with it who were only partially aware of
what it stood for. Even before there was a system of enrolled membership,
Friends had to issue public statements of disownment.
From the beginning of the Society of Friends
until recent times, the Friends who were accustomed to speak in meting met
together at regular intervals to advise and help one another. Monthly,
Quarterly and Yearly meetings of these Friends who had a special concern for
the vocal ministry did much to strengthen the spiritual life of the meeting.
These were genuine "schools of the prophets." In the course of time
Friends came to feel that those who were often engaged in the work of the
ministry needed criticism from their hearers as well as from themselves. The
following minute of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, dated 1714, marks the
beginning in America of an important change in these gatherings:
This meeting agrees that each Monthly
Meeting where meetings of ministers are or may be held, shall appoint two or
more Friends to sit with the ministers in their meetings; taking care that the
Friends chosen be prudent, solid Friends.
These came to be called "elders." The
meeting of ministers was then called the "meeting for ministers and
elders." Ministers were admitted to this meeting when they were
"approved," "recommended," or "recorded," which
meant that the meeting had expressly stated unity with their ministry. 93. When such ministers wished to visit other Friends
meetings, their meeting, if it approved of the journey, granted them a
"minute" expressing unity with them. This served as a kind r
credential and letter of introduction. Generally, an elder accompanied a
minister in his travels as guide, helper and critic.
"Eldering" is an essential element in
a meeting based on the principle of freedom. Its aim is to lay as much
limitation on the freedom of the individual as will enlarge the freedom of the
group as a whole. Among the many kinds of equilibrium required in a Friends
meeting, there must be a delicate adjustment between the freedom of each and
the freedom of all. If the individual is too much dominated by the group, the
group may never have the benefit of new and perhaps unpleasant truth which the
individual is qualified to impart. Nor must the group be at the mercy of the
caprices of individuals, or it may find that the main purpose in meeting
together is thwarted. Only as both the group and the individual submit humbly
to the divine Light of Truth will they fulfill their proper functions and live
in unity.
"Eldering" came to be a synonym for
adverse criticism but encouragement was often required. Since speaking in a
Friends meeting is a self-assumed responsibility, humble or timid persons tend
to hold back. This is especially true of the young. In 1723 Philadelphia Yearly
Meeting records in its minutes:
It is to be observed that the God and
fountain of all our mercies has opened and is opening in divers of our young
people a divine spring of living ministry. Therefore our earnest desire is that
both ministers and elders may be as nursing fathers and mothers to those that
are young in the ministry.
In 1765 we find:
It is earnestly and affectionately
recommended that ministers and elders watch over one another for good; to help
those who are young in the ministry in the right line; discouraging forward
spirits that run into words without life and power; advising against
affectation of tones and gestures and everything that would hurt their service;
yet encouraging the humble, careful traveller, speaking a word in season to
them that are weary.
A good example of constructive eldership was
given by William Penn and recorded by the recipient. 94 At a large meeting
when it might have been
expected that the main burden of the ministry would be assumed by certain
leading Friends, a young, unknown man, John Richardson, spoke at length. Penn
said to him afterwards:
The main part of the service of this day's work went on thy side and we
saw it and were willing and easy to give way to the truth, though it was
through thee, who appears but like a shrub, and it is but reasonable the Lord
should make use of whom he pleases.8
John
Rutty, a physician and writer of medical books, was an elder of Dublin Meeting.
He includes in his Spiritual Diary many brief prayers, among them (in
1796) the following:
Lord, if I be not a knife among the utensils of the spiritual house, make
me a whetstone.'
An
elder must be able to improve the instruments which God uses to convey his
truth. Fox advises:
Friends, be careful how ye set your feet among the tender plants that are
springing up out of God's earth, lest ye tread upon them, hurt, bruise, or
crush them in God's vineyard.10
William Dewsbury writes:
What gift so ever thou receivest, . . . whether praises, prophesy or
exhortation, I am commanded of the God of heaven to lay it upon thee that thou
quench not His Spirit but bring thy gift unto God's altar and in the strength
of His life in the Light, sacrifice unto Him. So shall thy talent be increased
and the babes shall be refreshed. And dear people of God, be tender over the
least breathings of God's Spirit in one another and all wait to be clothed with
a healing Spirit.'
The
essence of all proper advice to ministers is that given by John Williams:
Begin with, keep with and quit with
the Life.12
Ministry
in the Society of Friends is sometimes classified as prophetic utterance,
though no Friends would style themselves prophets. Their ministry is prophetic
only in the sense that it IS given without human prearrangement under what is believed to be the direct
leading of the Spirit.
95.
Such utterance may
sometimes give evidence of prophetic unction. Of Samuel Fothergill it was said:
His ministry at times went forth as a flame, often piercing into the
inmost recesses of darkness and obduracy; yet descended like dew upon the
tender plants of our Heavenly Father's planting; with these be travailed in
deep sympathy of spirit."
Of
Josiah Coale, who first visited America in 1658, Sewel, the historian, writes:
When he spoke to an ungodly sorld, an awful gravity appeared in his
countenance, and his words were like a hammer and a sharp sword. But though he
was as a son of thunder, yet his agreeable speech flowed from his mouth
like a pleasant stream, to the consolation and comfort of pious souls.14
The
presence of prophets in the New Testament Church was considered an
all-important precedent by the Quakers. Paul in
listing the gifts of the spirit in the order of
their importance puts,
·
first apostles, second prophets, third teachers then workers of miracles,
then healers, helpers, administrators, speakers in various kinds of
tongues," and adds, ". • . desire the spiritual gifts, especially
that you may prophesy" (I Cor. 12:28; 14:1). But the prophetic function
which was ranked so high during the first century of Christian history
became subordinated to the priestly office and, during the second century, it
was eliminated altogether. Attempts to revive prophetism, such as the
Montanist movement in the second century, were violently suppressed. In
Christianity the ancient struggle between priest and prophet, which is
responsible for so many dramatic events recorded in the Old Testament, was won
very early by the priest for two reasons, the necessity of maintaining sound
doctrine and the importance of a specially qualified person to administer the
sacraments. "Ye are subject to the bishop as to Jesus Christ," Writes
Ignatius, perhaps no more than sixty years after Paul had Written, "The
spirits of prophets are subject to prophets" (I Cor. 14:32).
The
presbyter, that is, the elder, or, as he eventually became, the priest, was
thought necessary to control prophets whose utterances were unpredictable,
upsetting, sometimes revolutionary.
96.
We know very little about developments during
the last third of the first Christian century, but it is probable that the
Christian prophets opposed the trend toward sacerdotalism in the same way that
the Hebrew prophets opposed the priestly emphasis six centuries earlier. The
love feast in memory of the Last Supper, a meal eaten together as recorded in
the 11th Chapter of I Corinthians, was becoming a ritual to be presided over by
a person especially ordained for this service.
The
two contributing causes of the decline of prophecy in the early Christian
Church, the growth of a sacramental religion and of an orthodox creed, were
both absent in Quakerism. The sacraments were interpreted by the Society of
Friends as inward experiences directly accessible to all persons without
priestly offices. No fixed authoritarian creed was ever adopted as a basis for
membership, although Friends did not hesitate to state what they believed when
occasion required. More important was the maintenance of a form of worship which
encouraged a free, spontaneous, prophetic ministry untrammeled by outward
authority. As a result, the prophetic type of ministry lasted much longer in
the Society of Friends than it did in Christianity.
It was inevitable that in the Society of
Friends, as in every religious group, the priestly type of mind should appear.
As in early Christianity, so in the Society of Friends the elder assumed some
of the priestly functions, though to a less degree and in a different way than
in early Christianity. During the eighteenth century the influence of the
elders gradually increased. Theirs was an important and necessary function.
Quakerism at this time developed a distinctive cultural pattern, a clear-cut
way of life.
The
Quaker was distinguishable by the way he talked, dressed and behaved. The
elders became guardians of tradition* and,
like
all persons of priestly inclination, were more interested in the conservation
of old truth than in the discovery of new. It was inevitable and necessary that
Quakerism should pass through
*The enforcement of discipline as far as moral
behavior was concerned was in charge of officials called overseers, first
appointed in America about 1704. They are not mentioned here because they were
not concerned with the ministry.
97.
this period
of inward intensification which brought the Quaker religion from the meeting
house and market place into the home and into every aspect of life. The elders
eventually went too far, and tended too strongly to repress the untraditional
springing up of new life. It was not, however, until the Philadelphia elders in
the first quarter of the nineteenth century attempted to regulate theological
doctrine that there was a concerted resistance to their authority. In England
the transition to a freer mode of discipline took place without such schism. In
America the Society of Friends became divided into branches.
The decline of a prophetic type of ministry in
the twentieth century in that part of the Society of Friends which attempted to
preserve a free, unprogrammed ministry cannot be attributed to the elders. They
took extreme precautions to guard the living spring from all contamination. Its
decline is due primarily to the high degree of intellectualism and secularism
which appeared in all religious groups. Higher education, particularly college
education, became more general. A self-conscious, rationalistic point of view
frequently approaching humanism has resulted. The vocal ministry has increased
in intellectual content. For the most part, this has been a gain. There has,
however, too often been a corresponding decrease in spiritual content. There is
no real reason why the intellectual and the spiritual should not develop
together and reinforce each other. Human reason and the Spirit, which is more
than human, are both essential, but the balance is not easy to maintain.
Within a single generation the older type of
prophetic ministry, characterized by complete abandon to inner leadings however
unconventional and unreasonable they might be, has largely disappeared from
the more conservative forms of Quakerism. Elsewhere it disappeared earlier.
The Quaker prophets were persons of unique individuality who spoke as they
felt. Each of these men and women could be described in words that William Penn
used regarding George Fox: "He was an original, being no man's copy."
They could remind their hearers of unpleasant truths in such a spirit of love
and genuineness that no anger resulted. Their faces shone with the peace of God
because inner strains had been removed by obedience to the divine will.
98.
They
were not troubled about their weaknesses because they were confident that God
would not require of them what was "beyond their measure."
The mass-mindedness of the present epoch does
not often produce such unique characters. Colleges, as well as factories, pass
their product through a uniform mold. The surface world of tools, whether
mental or industrial, has become so highly developed that the deeper world of
ultimate meanings concerned with the final destiny of man has faded from sight.
But the Spirit is still present like an underground stream waiting to be tapped
and brought to the surface. The ministry which is devoted to the solution of
social problems must not be abandoned, but it must be deepened and strengthened
by that ministry which reaches solutions by bringing men into union with God
and with one another.
Whittier's sonnet entitled "Utterance"
states the problem which faces him who is called to speak in a meeting for
worship:
But what avail inadequate words to
reach
The innermost of Truth? Who shall
essay
Blinded and weak, to point and lead
the way,
Or solve its mystery in familiar
speech?
Yet if it be that something not thy
own,
Some shadow of the Thought to which
our schemes,
Creeds, cult, and ritual are at best
but dreams,
Is even to thy unworthiness made
known,
Thou mayest not hide what yet thou
shouldst not dare
To utter lightly, lest on lips of
thine
The real seem false, the beauty
undivine.
So weighing duty in the scale of
prayer,
Give what seems given thee. It may
prove a seed
Of goodness dropped in fallow grounds
of need.
