the centering of life on the realities of inward intercourse with god is the great mark of the prophetic and apostolic type of religion and is in sharp contrast with religion of the priestly or institutional type. the prophet was a man who knew 22what it was to have converse with jehovah and sure knowledge of his will. he became a seer, a man of insight and foresight, aware of the true values of things, the true values as weighed in the balance of the sanctuary. he became thereby a great social and moral reformer. his ideal was of a time when all would be prophets—when “your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions.” and we may remember that this ideal is recognized on the day of pentecost as the natural first-fruits of the spirit. if it had been realized the church would have been a school of prophets from generation to generation. unfortunately the church has more often stifled the seer and glorified the priest.
as i understand it, it is the specific mission of quakerism to propagate a christianity of this prophetic, apostolic type, a christianity in which the church is a living fellowship of disciples at work for the social and moral ends of the kingdom of god. but the church is not simply, in the 23quaker conception, a fellowship of disciples at work for the kingdom of god; it is such a fellowship plus jesus christ himself, in whose spirit, the spirit which unites them one to another and to him, they become together “one flock, one shepherd.”
fellowships, made up of groups of men and women who are with christ, redeemed by him, learning from him, following him, helping in his work, looking out on life with something of his devotion to the will of god and his passion to seek and save the lost—such are the true quaker churches. it is worth while to analyze the conception a little. the church, we say, is a living fellowship—not in the first place an organization, but in the first place an organism—not an institution, but a body, built up of many cells, many individuals, just as the body has cells that grow and change and perform their several functions under the direction of an all-pervading, all-embracing life. that is what a living fellowship means. this life received through direct contact with the divine life is the one essential of the christian church. it is the business 24of the church to see that it is fostered in every possible way, so that the body may freely grow under its influence and freely express the life in all forms of worthy living.
historically, quakerism is the product of this vital experience and while we gladly recognize that the experience is shared by us with many other branches of the christian church, it remains true that no other religious community so deliberately and emphatically bases its individual and corporate life upon this supreme fact of the soul’s immediate contact with god.
our special position among the churches is sometimes stated—not by the five years’ meeting—in a series of desolating negatives. we do not practice water baptism, nor partake of the outward elements of the lord’s supper, we are against war and oaths and priestcraft, our meetings are held on a basis of silence, and so on—all negatives. but we were gathered as a people out of the world through the force of dynamic positives. we withstand priestcraft because every disciple is ordained for 25service. as george fox said, every man hath an office and is serviceable. we witness against oaths, because we uphold a single standard of truth speaking, and against distinctions of dress and address, because all men are equal in the sight of god; we oppose war because the armor of the children of light is the armor of righteousness, and disuse the outward form of baptism because the all-important thing is not the form but the inward repentance and cleansing by the blood of christ. we cannot narrow down the experience of communion with our lord to special ceremonials and places and ministrants, when we hold that jesus offers himself as the bread of life to his people day by day—in the home, in the factory, at business, in all our common work and in all our loftiest worship—the whole of life may be a sacrament of communion with jesus christ.
it is as a “religion of life” that quakerism will be presented in the future and is being presented now.
its distinguishing note will be its resolve 26to bring all this human life of ours under the transforming power of spiritual life. it will stand out against all divisions and compartments that separate the sacred from the secular, the sanctuary from the outward world of nature, the sacrament from the day’s common work, the clergy from the laity.
it will tell of a christian experience that makes all life sacred and all days holy, all nature a sanctuary, all work a sacrament, and gives to every man and woman in the body fit place and service. its concern will be to multiply men and women who will have a message of power because they are themselves living in the power of god, who will spread the light because they are themselves the children of light. it will claim the whole of a man’s life, and the whole of life, individual, social, national, international, for the dominion of the will of god.
