We find -- if we will but seek -- that the power of the Living Spirit guides each of us and helps us to meet one another in harmony and love.
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If we mutually keep to that Spirit and Power which crucifies to the world, which teaches us
to be content with things really needful and to
avoid all superfluities, giving up our hearts to fear
and serve the Lord, true unity may still be
preserved amongst us.
-- John Woolman |
We urge Friends to accept one another's revelations with tender hearts, knowing that anyone can speak truth, and we can participate in one another's joy in spiritual growth. Such shared experiences enrich our faith.
George Fox and others brought the message that "Christ has come to teach his people himself." This direct experience of the Divine Spirit exhilarated the first small groups of Friends and called them to witness to the power of God. That inspiration continues today.
It is an overwhelming experience to fall into the hands of the living God, to be invaded to the depths of one's feelings by His presence, to be, without warning, wholly uprooted from all earthborn securities and assurances, and to be blown by a tempest of unbelievable power which leaves one's old proud self utterly, utterly defenseless, until one cries, "All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me." Then is the soul swept into a loving center of ineffable sweetness, where calm and unspeakable peace and ravishing joy steal over one.
-- Thomas R. Kelly, "Holy Obedience,"
in A Testament of Devotion, 1941