- Welcome back to The Conservative Friend
- PDF Version
- I know I am as He created me
- Living in the Love of God
- Selection from John Wilbur’s “On Plainness and Self-Denial”
- Fox, too, was Spiritual-but-not-Religious
- Quaker Worship
- Christ’s People
- Selection from William Penn’s “A Tender Visitation in the Love God”
Christians have the Spirit of Christ. [Robert] Barclay says that although Jesus is no longer with us in His flesh, He teaches and instructs us inwardly thorough His Spirit, and that the only means of knowing God is the revelation of God though Jesus’ leading us. Barclay [in Apology for the True Christian Divinity] understands this as the essence of Christianity:
Christianity has become, as it were, an art, acquired by human knowledge and industry, like any other art or science. Men have not only assumed the name of Christian by certain artificial tricks, but they have even procured the honor for themselves of being considered masters of Christianity, even though they are altogether strangers to the spirit and life of Jesus. But if we make a definition of a Christian which is scriptural, that a Christian is one who has the Spirit of Christ and is led by it, we will have to divest many [so-called] Christians…of that designation.
When Christians are learned in all other methods of obtaining knowledge—whether it be the letter of the Scriptures, the traditions of the churches, or the works of creation and providence—and are able to produce strong and undeniable arguments from these sources, but remain altogether ignorant of the inward and unmediated revelations of God’s Spirit in the heart, they ought not be considered Christians (p. 22).
Take away the Spirit and Christianity is no more Christianity than a corpse is a man, once the soul and spirit have departed. And a corpse is a noisome and a useless thing which the living can no longer stand and bury out of sight, no matter how acceptable it was when it was actuated and moved by the soul (p. 32).
Discussion Questions:
- If someone confidently considers himself to be a Christian because of his knowledge of the Scriptures, but he is a stranger to the spirit and life of Jesus, what are the consequences—to him and to others?
- When do we have the spiritual duty to tell someone he or she seems to be a stranger to the spirit of Jesus, even though he or she loudly claims to be a Christian?
- What are the differences between being a “seeker” of Jesus and being a “finder”?
- Is there an appropriate role for the “other methods” of obtaining knowledge? How do we know when we are pursing such knowledge under the Holy Spirit’s guidance?
From Traditional Quaker Christianity, Assembled and Edited by Terry H. Wallace, Susan S. Smith, John C. Smith, and Arthur Berk, (Ohio Yearly Meeting, Barnsville OH: 2014) Section 6.A, pp. 121-122.
Robert Barclay references from Barclay’s Apology in Modern English, Edited by Dean Freiday, 1967. Note: this version is abridged. An unabridged version is available from Quaker Heritage Press.
