Quotes
Quotes about Pen
Pentecost Feast of Edward King, Bishop of Lincoln, Teacher, 1910 Commemoration of Martyrs of Uganda, 1886 & 1978 The life of holiness is the life of faith in which the believer, with a deepening knowledge of his own sin and helplessness apart from Christ, increasingly casts himself upon the Lord, and seeks the power of the Spirit and the wisdom and comfort of the Bible to battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil.
Commemoration of Samuel & Henrietta Barnett, Social Reformers, 1913 & 1936 Evil can be interpreted as guilt only where human existence is understood as personal, and that means where the existence of man is understood to be in responsibility to the Divine Thou. This is the depth of human distress, that we are separated from God, that our communion with Him is destroyed, that man has emancipated himself (has taken himself out of the hand of God) and has become independent, his own master.
Commemoration of Sundar Singh of India, Sadhu, Evangelist, Teacher, 1929 The breadth and depth of [William] Carey's missionary service [in India] is well illustrated in the principles laid down for themselves by the Serampore Brotherhood to be read three times a year in each station in their charge. Here is a summary: To set an infinite value on men's souls. To abstain from whatever deepens India's prejudice against the Gospel. To watch for every chance of doing the people good. To preach Christ crucified as the grand means of conversions. To esteem and treat Indians always as equals. To be instant in the nurture of personal religion. To cultivate the spiritual gifts of the Indian brethren, ever pressing upon them their missionary obligation, since only Indians can win India for Christ.
To relinquish any of the Psalms on the excuse that its sentiments are too violent for a Christian is a clear sign that a person has also given up the very battle that a Christian is summoned to fight. The Psalms are prayers for those who are engaged in an ongoing, spiritual conflict. No one else need bother even opening the book.
Behind the words of Jesus and the memories about him, there shines forth a self-authenticating portrait of a real person in all his human uniqueness, an impression which is accessible alike to the layman and to the expert, to believer and non-believer. No reader of the gospel story can fail to be impressed by Jesus' humble submission to the will of his God on the one hand, and his mastery of all situations on the other; by his penetrating discernment of human motives and his authoritative demand of radical obedience on the one hand, and his gracious, forgiving acceptance of sinners on the other. There is nothing, either in the Messianic hopes of pre-Christian Judaism or in the later Messianic beliefs of the early Christian Church to account for this portrait. It is characterized by an originality and freshness which is beyond the power of invention. (Continued tomorrow).
Feast of Edward the Confessor, 1066 Our wills are not ours to be crushed and broken; they are ours to be trained and strengthened. Our affections are not ours to be blighted and crucified; they are ours to be deepened and purified. The rich opportunities of life are not held out to us only to be snatched away by an invisible hand patiently waiting for the hour when the cup is sweetest; they are given to us that we may grow, alike through their rise or their withdrawal. They are real, they are sweet, and they are worthy of our longing for them; we gain nothing by calling them dross, or the world an illusion, or ourselves the victims of deception, or by exalting renunciation as the highest virtue. When these opportunities are denied us, it is a real, not an imaginary, loss which we sustain; and our part is not that of bare renunciation, of simple surrender; our part is to recognize the loss, to bear the pain, and to find a deeper and richer life in doing the will of God.
Whatever may be our differences of colour, culture, and class, the unity that is ours in Christ is given visible expression at every Synod. Here we all gather around the one Altar, here we all share in shaping the policy of the Church in this diocese; here we all take part in making provision for carrying on the work of the Church during the coming year. At this time, year by year, we are specially conscious of our unity in Christ, and are made aware afresh that we are members of this new race of human beings which is made up of all those of every ethnic group who have been added to Christ. We are members of that Kingdom in which all human antagonisms are transcended. Yet we shall not interpret aright this unity which is ours in Christ Jesus unless we continually remind ourselves that it has its origin in His death and resurrection. The Church springs out of the deeds of Jesus done in the flesh, and we can only fulfill our destiny in the Church as we learn that we are utterly dependent upon the whole Body of Christ. . . . Whatever gifts we possess belong to the Body, and are useful only as they are used in the common life of the Church. All this is made very plain in the New Testament Epistles, for in them we are taught that each local Christian community is a fellowship in which every member is to live in humility and in love to the brethren. Yet no local church is to live to it self. Again and again, local churches are reminded of their close relationship to one another, in life, work, worship, pain, and death. Not that such a relationship is to be regarded either as a matter of convenience or as a question of organization. On the contrary, this intimate relationship is seen as the direct outcome of the saving work of Christ. This unity with one another, and of local churches with each other, is the unity which belongs to the Body of Christ, arising from the unity of God Himself, uttered in the dying and rising again of Jesus, and now expressed in the order and structure of the Church.
Commemoration of Clement, Bishop of Rome, Martyr, c.100 We say, and we say openly, and while ye torture us, mangled and gory we cry out, "We worship God through Christ!" Believe Him a man: it is through Him and in Him that God willeth Himself to be known and worshipped.
Commemoration of Richard Meux Benson, Founder of the Society of St John the Evangelist, 1915 It is easy to throw angels and demons and the cosmic character and relevance of Christ's work upon the scrap heap of ancient superstition and mythology, and to consider them but a manner of speech that is utterly irrelevant for our space age. But if we should feel entitled to throw out one part of the witness of Ephesians to Christ, why not the rest of it also: for instance, Christ's Lordship over the church and in the heart? It is unfair and scarcely honest to consider the Bible or parts of it as a cake from which we can pick out merely the raisins we happen to like. Speaking the truth in love and witnessing to the biblical Christ may imply the necessity to speak also of some very strange things.
Commemoration of Amy Carmichael, Founder of the Dohnavour Fellowship, 1951 We, and all things, exist in God's lnfinitude now; our individuality begins with it; our personality grows strong because of it; and we know, if we know anything, that while the more we approach the good the more we please God, at the same time the more men approach the good the more nobly distinctive, the more beautifully individual do their characters become. To imagine, then, at the end of this life we shall cease to exist as conscious beings, that our characters, our personalities, will fall back into some boundless being, instead of becoming more and more definite, more and more individual, is certainly not to exalt God; for it is founded on the belief, either that God is now belittled by our present individuality, or that our present individuality is a mere delusion. In the latter case God, whom we find in the depths of our souls, is doubtless also a delusion, for if the self is not real it is no respectable witness on whose testimony we can accept God. Our deepest mature conviction is that finite and infinity interpenetrate, as time and eternity interpenetrate, and our problems must be solved in the light of that conviction.
Commemoration of Richard Rolle of Hampole, Writer, Hermit, Mystic, 1349 It behoves thee to love God wisely; and that may thou not do but if thou be wise. Thou art wise when thou art poor, without desire of this world, and despisest thyself for the love of Jesus Christ; and expendeth all thy wit and all thy might in His service. Whoso will love wisely, it behoves him to love lasting things lastingly, and passing things passingly; so that his heart be set and fastened on nothing but in God.
Commemoration of Brigid, Abbess of Kildare, c.525 There is a cowardice in this age which is not Christian. We shrink from the consequences of truth. We look round and cling dependently. We ask what men will think; what others will say; whether they will not stare in astonishment. Perhaps they will; but he who is calculating that, will accomplish nothing in this life. The Fatherâthe Father which is with us and in usâwhat does He think? God's work cannot be done without a spirit of independence. A man is got some way in the Christian life when he has learned to say, humbly yet majestically, "I dare to be alone.".
Feast of David, Bishop of Menevia, Patron of Wales, c.601 The scandal of the Bible does not lie so much in its claim to record the Word of God, as in its insistence that the Word of God is to be heard in a particular historical happening, in a particular localityâand only there. To put it in a provocative manner: the Bible is theology. It is historical theology. It can reveal its meaning only to those who regard it as the Word of God, and are able to preserve a strict confidence in the universal significance of particular historical occasions.
Like summer seas that lave with silent tides a lonely shore, like whispering winds that stir the tops of forest trees, like a still, small voice that calls us in the watches of the night, like a child's hand that feels about a fast-closed door; gentle, unnoticed, and oft in vain: so is Thy coming unto us, O God. Like ships storm-driven into port, like starving souls that seek the bread they once despised, like wanderers begging refuge from the whelming night, like prodigals that seek the father's home when all is spent; yet welcomed at the open door, arms outstretched and kisses for our shame; so is our coming unto Thee, 0 God. Like flowers uplifted to the sun, like trees that bend before the storm, like sleeping seas that mirror cloudless skies, like a harp to the hand, like an echo to a cry, like a song to the heart; for all our stubbornness, our failure, and our sin: so would we have been to Thee, O God.
Feast of English Saints & Martyrs of the Reformation It seems to me that testimonies should once again become a part of the life of our churches. I have not made a study of why the testimony fell into disrepute and was discarded, but I suspect these were three of the factors: (1) The same persons gave the testimony every time. (2) They gave the same testimony every time. (3) The testimony they gave was about something that happened ten, or twenty, or thirty years before.
I need not shout my faith. Thrice eloquent Are quiet trees and the green, listening sod; Hushed are the stars, whose power is never spent; The hills are mute: yet, how they speak of God!
It seems to me, as time goes on, that the only thing that is worth seeking for is to know and to be known by Christâa privilege open alone to the childlike, who, with receptivity, guilelessness, and humility, move Godward.
Insofar as theology is an attempt to define and clarify intellectual positions, it is apt to lead to discussion, to differences of opinion, even to controversy, and hence to be divisive. And this has had a strong tendency to dampen serious discussion of theological issues in most groups, and hence to strengthen the general anti-intellectual bias...
Above all, the group must keep remembering that true growth in grace is not to be achieved by our own efforts or contriving, but must be received as the gift of God's Spirit, working in and among us. The work of the group is to keep open the channels of receptiveness through study, discipline, prayer, and self-offering. When a group learns to live in this faith, it can keep the lines of endeavor tentative and sensitive to new headings and possibilities, on the one hand; and, on the other, move forward resolutely under such light as is now given.
Commemoration of Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, 1099 These things I did not see by the help of man, nor by the letter, though they are written in the letter; but I saw them in the light of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by his immediate Spirit and power, as did the Holy men of God, by whom the Holy Scriptures were written. Yet I had no slight esteem of the Holy Scriptures; they were very precious to me, for I was in that spirit by which they were given forth; and what the Lord opened in me, I afterwards found was agreeable to them.
We must face the recognition that what the early Christians saw in Jesus Christ, and what we must accept if we look at him rather than at our imaginations about him, was not a person characterized by universal benignity, loving God and loving man. His love of God and his love of neighbor are two distinct virtues that have no common quality but only a common source. Love of God is adoration of the only true good; it is gratitude to the bestower of all gifts; it is joy in holiness; it is "consent to Being." But the love of man is pitiful rather than adoring; it is giving and forgiving rather than grateful. It suffers for them in their viciousness and profaneness; it does not consent to accept them as they are, but calls them to repentance. The love of God is nonpossessive Eros; the love of man pure Agape; the love of God is passion; the love of man, compassion. There is duality here, but not of like-minded interest in two great values, God and man. It is rather the duality of the Son of Man and Son of God, who loves God as man should love Him, and loves man as only God can love, with powerful pity for those who are foundering.
We must be ready, indeed eager, to see God's Name being hallowed outside the Church as well as inside. It may be that today the philosopher is honouring the Name af God when he insists that we should know what we mean when we utter our religious language and that we should be ready to have that meaning tested. It may be that other philosophers hallow the Name when they refuse to allow us to withdraw it to some supernatural realm, but insist on wrestling with the unknown God in the agony and joy of existence, crying with Jacob, "Tell me, I pray thee, thy Name." And is not the scientist honouring the Name when he patiently and obediently follows where the evidence leads? Or the social scientist when he asks us to understand what is before we begin pronouncing what ought to be? God does not spend all His time in Church.
Feast of John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, Teacher, 407 You must not lose confidence in God because you lost confidence in your pastor. If our confidence in God had to depend upon our confidence in any human person, we would be on shifting sand.
The Gospel is not presented to mankind as an argument about religious principles. Nor is it offered as a philosophy of life. Christianity is a witness to certain factsâto events that have happened, to hopes that have been fulfilled, to realities that have been experienced, to a Person who has lived and died and been raised from the dead to reign for ever.
Feast of Luke the Evangelist Study universal holiness of life. Your whole usefulness depends on this, for your sermons last but an hour or two: your life preaches all week. If Satan can only make a covetous minister a lover of praise, of pleasure, of good eating, he has ruined your ministry. Give yourself to prayer, and get your texts, your thoughts, your words, from God.
