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Light Up Your Winter: Living the Testimonies

Quakerism has no rigid creed, trusting instead in the continuous revelation of truth amoung Friends. Still the testimonies- simplicity, peace, integrity, community, equality-- have emerged as corporate leadings that have been tested repeatedly in the experience of Friends over time.

The following readings and links (following the readings) provide some background and a range of perspectives on the testimonies. In some of the readings, the word "testimony'' is not explicitly used although the idea of inner experience of the Light and its outward expression in action is there. We have also not tied readings to particular sessions, focusing instead on providing a variety of perspectives on the idea of a testimony. Also the boundaries between the testimonies are not distinct.

We are providing the readings and links here so that interested Friends can read them before they attend the Living the Testimonies sessions. This will allow the facilitators to spend their one-hour sessions sharing their own understanding, experience, practice and struggles with the testimonies and providing ample opportunity for participants to reflect upon their own experience and share and discuss with others.

Below are some notes on the five excerpts following:

# 1. From Parker Palmer's Let Your Life Speak (2000): Palmer is a Quaker who has communicated principles of Quakerism to a broad, general audience. Here he speaks of the struggle of getting in touch with the true self and its expression in authentic vocation.

#2. From Faith and Practice: Book of Discipline of the North Carolina Yearly Meeting (Conservative) of the Religious Society of Friends (1983 Revision): The excerpt describes how the yearly meeting to which our monthly meeting belongs interprets the idea of t-estimony.

#3. From Duane Elgin's Voluntary Simplicity (1983) in the Northwest Earth Institute Discussion Course on Voluntary Simplicity: Reading this excerpt more than 10 years ago provided my (Virginia Lee) first nudge towards Quakerism.

#4. From John Woolman (1720-1772}'sjournal in Quaker Spirituality: Selected Writings: In this single entry, we can see several testimonies coming into play and Woolman's struggles with them.

#5. From Sandra Cronk's Peace Be with You: A Study of the Spiritual Basis of the Friends Peace Testimony (no date): Cronk writes from a distinctively Christocentric perspective. This passage speaks to the origins of the peace testimony and provides interesting historical perspective through her discussion of the Lamb's War, a powerful image for early Friends from the Book of Revelations.

Friends may also find the following links of interest:

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A short introduction to the testimonies at the Earlham School of Religion website: htt : esr.earlham.edu su

A booklet on the Testimonies at the American Friends Service website:

Booklet. df

hour or two at the base of a tree, the creature we are waiting

for may well emerge, and out of the corner of an eye we will

catch a glimpse of the precious wildness we seek.

That is why the poem at the head of this chapter ends in

silence-and why I find it a bit embarrassing that as this chap­

ter ends, I am drawing the reader not toward silence but

toward speech, page after page of speech! I hope that my

speech is faithful to what I have heard, in the silence, from my

soul. And I hope that the reader who sits with this book can

hear the silence that always surrounds us in the writing and

reading of words. It is a silence that forever invites us to fathom

the meaning of our lives-and forever reminds us of depths of

meaning that words will never touch.

8 LET YouR LIFE SPEAK

.~ r ~ CHAPTER II

Now I Become Myself

A VISION OF VOCATION

With twenty-one words, carefully chosen and artfully woven,

May Sarton evokes the quest for vocation-at least, my quest

for vocation-with candor and precision:

Now I become myself.

It's taken time, many years and places.

I have been dissolved and shaken,

Worn other people's faces .... 1

What a long time it can take to become the person one

has always been! How often in the process we mask ourselves

in faces that are not our own. How much dissolving and

shaking of ego we must endure before we discover our deep

identity-the true self within every human being that is the seed of authentic vocation.

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• I first learned about vocation growing up in the church.

I value much about the religious tradition in which I was

raised: its humility about its own convictions, its respect for

the world's diversity, its concern for justice. But the idea of

"vocation" I picked up in those circles created distortion until

I grew strong enough to discard it. I mean the idea that voca­

tion, or calling, comes from a voice external to ourselves, a

voice of moral demand that asks us to become someone we are

not yet-someone different, someone better, someone just

beyond our reach.

That concept of vocation is rooted in a deep distrust of

selfhood, in the belief that the sinful self will always be "self­

ish" unless corrected by external forces of virtue. It is a notion

that made me feel inadequate to the task ofliving my own life,

creating guilt about the distance between who I was and who

I was supposed to be, leaving me exhausted as I labored to

close the gap.

Today I understand vocation quite differently-not as a

goal to be achieved but as a gift to be received. Discovering

vocation does not mean scrambling toward some prize just

beyond my reach but accepting the treasure of true self I

already possess. Vocation does not come from a voice "out

there" calling me to become something I am not. It comes

from a voice "in here" calling me to be the person I was born

to be, to fulfill the original selfhood given me at birth by God.

It is a strange gift, this birthright gift of self. Accepting it

turns out to be even more demanding than attempting to

10 LET YouR LIFE SPEAK

become someone else! I have sometimes responded to that

demand by ignoring the gift, or hiding it, or fleeing from it, or

squandering it-and I think I am not alone. There is a Hasidic

tale that reveals, with amazing brevity, both the universal ten­

dency to want to be someone else and the ultimate impor­

tance of becoming one's self: Rabbi Zusya, when he was an

old man, said, "In the coming world, they will not ask me:

'Why were you not Moses?' They will ask me: 'Why were you not Zusya?' "2

If you doubt that we all arrive in this world with gifts and

as a gift, pay attention to an infant or a very young child. A few

years ago, my daughter and her newborn baby came to live

with me for a while. Watching my granddaughter from her

earliest days on earth, I was able, in my early fifties, to see

something that had eluded me as a twenty-something parent:

my granddaughter arrived in the world as this kind of person

rather than that, or that, or that.

She did not show up as raw material to be shaped into

whatever image the world might want her to take. She arrived

with her own gifted form, with the shape of her own sacred

soul. Biblical faith calls it the image of God in which we are

all created. Thomas Merton calls it true self. Quakers call it

the inner light, or "that of God" in every person. The human­

ist tradition calls it identity and integrity. No matter what you

call it, it is a pearl of great price.

In those early days of my granddaughter's life, I began

observing the inclinations and proclivities that were planted in

Now I Become Myself II

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her at birth. I noticed, and I still notice, what she likes and dis­

likes, what she is drawn toward and repelled by, how she

moves, what she does, what she says.

I am gathering my observations in a letter. When my grand­

daughter reaches her late teens or early twenties, I will make

sure that my letter finds its way to her, with a preface something

like this: "Here is a sketch of who you were from your earliest

days in this world. It is not a definitive picture-only you can

draw that. But it was sketched by a person who loves you very

much. Perhaps these notes will help you do sooner something

your grandfather did only later: remember who you were when

you first arrived and reclaim the gift of true self."

We arrive in this world with birthright gifts-then we

spend the first half of our lives abandoning them or letting oth­

ers disabuse us of them. As young people, we are surrounded

by expectations that may have little to do with who we really

are, expectations held by people who are not trying to discern

our selfhood but to fit us into slots. In families, schools, work­

places, and religious communities, we are trained away from

true self toward images of acceptability; under social pressures

like racism and sexism our original shape is deformed beyond

recognition; and we ourselves, driven by fear, too often betray

true self to gain the approval of others.

We are disabused of original giftedness in the first half of

our lives. Then- if we are awake, aware, and able to admit our

loss- we spend the second half trying to recover and reclaim

the gift we once possessed.

12 LET YOUR LIFE SPEAK

When we lose track of true self, how can we pick up the

trail? One way is to seek clues in stories from our younger

years, years when we lived closer to our birthright gifts. A few

years ago, I found some clues to myself in a time machine of

sorts. A friend sent me a tattered copy of my high school news­

paper from May 1957 in which I had been interviewed about

what I intended to do with my life. With the certainty to be

expected of a high school senior, I told the interviewer that I

would become a naval aviator and then take up a career in advertising.

I was indeed "wearing other people's faces," and I can tell

you exactly whose they were. My father worked with a man

who had once been a navy pilot. He was Irish, charismatic,

romantic, full of the wild blue yonder and a fair share of the

blarney, and I wanted to be like him. The father of one of my

boyhood friends was in advertising, and though I did not yearn

to take on his persona, which was too buttoned-down for my

taste, I did yearn for the fast car and other large toys that

seemed to be the accessories of his selfhood!

These self-prophecies, now over forty years old, seem

wildly misguided for a person who eventually became a

Quaker, a would-be pacifist, a writer, and an activist. Taken lit­

erally, they illustrate how early in life we can lose track of who

we are. But inspected through the lens of paradox, my desire

to become an aviator and an advertiser contain clues to the

core of true self that would take many years to emerge: clues,

by definition, are coded and must be deciphered.

Now I Become Myself' 13

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, ..

Hidden in my desire to become an "ad man" was a life­

long fascination with language and its power to persuade, the

same fascination that has kept me writing incessantly for

decades. Hidden in my desire to become a naval aviator was

something more complex: a personal engagement with the

problem of violence that expressed itself at first in military fan­

tasies and then, over a period of many years, resolved itself in

the pacifism I aspire to today. When I flip the coin of identity

I held to so tightly in high school, I find the paradoxical

"opposite" that emerged as the years went by.

If I go farther back, to an earlier stage of my life, the clues

need less deciphering to yield insight into my birthright gifts

and callings. In grade school, I became fascinated with the

mysteries of flight. As many boys did in those days, I spent end­

less hours, after school and on weekends, designing, crafting,

flying, and (usually) crashing model airplanes made of fragile

balsa wood.

Unlike most boys, however, I also spent long hours creat­

ing eight- and twelve-page books about aviation. I would turn

a sheet of paper sideways; draw a vertical line down the mid­

dle; make diagrams of, say, the cross-section of a wing; roll the

sheet into a typewriter; and peck out a caption explaining how

air moving across an airfoil creates a vacuum that lifts the

plane. Then I would fold that sheet in half along with several

others I had made, staple the collection together clown the

spine, and painstakingly illustrate the cover.

14 LET YouR LIFE SPEAK

I had always thought that the meaning of this paperwork

was obvious: fascinated with flight, I wanted to be a pilot, or

at least an aeronautical engineer. But recently, when I found

a couple of these literary artifacts in an old cardboard box, I

suddenly saw the truth, and it was more obvious than I had

imagined. I didn't want to be a pilot or an aeronautical engi­

neer or anything else related to aviation. I wanted to be an

author, to make books-a task I have been attempting from

the third grade to this very moment!

From the beginning, our lives lay down clues to selfhoocl

and vocation, though the clues may be hard to decode. But

trying to interpret them is profoundly worthwhile-especially

when we are in our twenties or thirties or forties, feeling pro­

foundly lost, having wandered, or been dragged, far away from

our birthright gifts.

Those clues are helpful in counteracting the conven­

tional concept of vocation, which insists that our lives must be

driven by "oughts." As noble as that may sound, we do not find

our callings by conforming ourselves to some abstract moral

code. We find our callings by claiming authentic selfhoocl, by

being who we are, by dwelling in the world as Zusya rather

than straining to be Moses. The deepest vocational question is

not "What ought I to do with my life?" It is the more elemen-

tal and demanding "Who am I? What is my nature?" ~

Everything in the universe has a nature, which means

limits as well as potentials, a truth well known by people who

Now I Become Mysel( 15

• work daily with the things of the world. Making pottery, for

example, involves more than telling the clay what to become.

The clay presses back on the potter's hands, telling her what it

can and cannot do-and if she fails to listen, the outcome will

be both frail and ungainly. Engineering involves more than

telling materials what they must do. If the engineer does not

honor the nature of the steel or the wood or the stone, his fail­

ure will go well beyond aesthetics: the bridge or the building

will collapse and put human life in peril.

The human self also has a nature, limits as well as poten­

tials. If you seek vocation without understanding the material

you are working with, what you build with your life will be

ungainly and may well put lives in peril, your own and some

of those around you. "raking it" in the service of high values

is no virtue and has nothing to do with vocation. It is an igno­

rant, sometimes arrogant, attempt to override one's nature,

and it will always fail.

Our deepest calling is to grow into our own authentic self­

hood, whether or not it conforms to some image of who we

ought to be. As we do so, we will not only find the joy that every

human being seeks-we will also find our path of authentic

service in the world. True vocation joins self and service, as

Frederick Buechner asserts when he defines vocation as "the

v place where your deep gladness meets the world's deep need."3

Buechner's definition starts with the self and moves

toward the needs of the world: it begins, wisely, where voca­

tion begins-not in what the world needs (which is every-

16 LET YOUR LIH SPEAK

thing), but in the nature of the human self, in what brings the

self joy, the deep joy of knowing that we are here on earth to

be the gifts that God created.

Contrary to the conventions of our thinly moralistic cul­

ture, this emphasis on gladness and selfhood is not selfish. The

Quaker teacher Douglas Steere was fond of saying that

the ancient human question "Who am I?" leads inevitably

to the equally important question "Whose am I?" -for there

is no selfhood outside of relationship. We must ask the ques- 1 tion of selfhood and answer it as honestly as we can, no mat­

ter where it takes us. Only as we do so can we discover the

community of our lives.

As I learn more about the seed of true self that was

planted when I was born, I also learn more about the ecosys­

tem in which I was planted-the network of communal rela­

tions in which I am called to live responsively, accountably,

and joyfully with beings of every sort. Only when I know both

seed and system, self and community, can I embody the great

commandment to love both my neighbor and myself.

JOURNEY INTO DARKNESS

Most of us arrive at a sense of self and vocation only after a

long journey through alien lands. But this journey bears no

resemblance to the trouble-free "travel packages" sold by the

Now I Become Myself 17

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;#t--DOCTRINES AND TESTIMONIES

A religious movement which recognizes that Revelation of Truth is con­tinuous and that any person may be a channel for it, cannot be governed by a rigid creed. A wide variety of beliefs and practices will be found among its members, but underlying these will be certain distinctive doc­trines. The following statement of the testimony of Friends is an attempt to point out certain ideas which traditionally have been used in describing the faith and practice of the Society.

I. The Inner Light The experience of the "Inner Light," or the "Light of Christ," is the cen­

ter of the life of Friends and the ultimate source of all our testimonies. The Inner Light is what Friends call "that of God" in every person which, Friends believe, can be known directly without another's interpretation. The Inner Light gives illumination and clarity to conscience, generating an inward compulsion to follow the leadings of its Spirit. This Spirit is the love of God, implanted in all/overcoming the ambivalence of conscience·, and leading us to a powerful conviction of God's will for our lives.

The Inner Light is our experience of and connection with God. Accord­ing to Friends this experience involves" a body of convictions about God's nature and His requirements concerning our dealings with all persons: When this body of convictions has consolidated itself in one's inner life and style of outward conduct, it is called "Truth." This Truth is a way of following the spirit and not the letter of the law.

All persons are capable of perceiving, recognizing, and responding to God - to His Truth, His love, and His will - as it is given to us in the Light. As George Fox expressed it:

This is the Word of the Lord God to you all and a charge to you all in the presence of the Living God; be patterns, be examples to all countries, places, islands, nations, wherever you come; that your carriage and life may preach among all sorts of people, and to them; then you will come to walk cheerfully over the world, answering that of God in every one.

From this it can be seen that Friends believe in the universality of Grace. To Friends, God reaches out to all people everywhere through the Light, communicating His will, helping them to direct their affairs, and em­powering them to fulfill this will and direction.

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Because Friends see all individuals to be graced with such good gifts, we also see that God demands a great deal from them. From the begin­ning of our Society, we have heard a call to perfection and have believed that this perfection in freedom from actual sin is possible in this world. Perfection means living up to the measure of Light that is given. If we are faithful in a little, we shall be given more. This is not an infinite process, but rather the attainable goal of maturing inner capacities.

Despite our emphasis on the inwardness of true religion, Friends do not deny the reality of objective religious and moral authority. We depend on enlightened conscience and reason in the individual and group. The pragmatic tests of practical experience, and the witness of the Scriptures also act as checks upon one's interpretation of the Light.

Friends are well aware of the need to maintain watchfully the humility necessary to receive respectfully the insights of the meeting and the trad­itional wisdom of others, being always mindful, however, that the ultimate requirement of conviction is one's commitment to the Inner Light.

Therefore, we hold no outward authority as final and believe in a con­tinuing revelation. "The Canon of Scripture may be closed, but the inspi­ration of the Holy Spirit has not ceased." If this Spirit gives one a clear leading, it must be followed as the supreme guide to perceive religious and moral truth.

II. Simplicity The heart of Quaker ethics is summed up in the word "Simplicity." Sim­

plicity is forgetfulness_ of self and rem~ml:>r~nc;eof our humble status as waiting servants of God. Outwardly~· simplicity is shunning supe.riluitielsoT dress, speech, behavior, and possessions, which tend to obscure our vi­sion of reality. Inwardly, simplicity is spiritual detachment from the things of this world as part of the effort to fulfill the first commandment: to love God with all of the heart and mind and strength.

The testimony of outward simplicity began as a protest against the ex­travagance and snobbery which marked English society in the 1600's. In whatever forms this protest is maintained today, it must still be seen as a testimony against involvement with things which tend to dilute our ener- t ' gies and scatter our thoughts, reducing us to lives of triviality and mediocrity.

Simplicity does not mean drabness or narrowness but is essentially positive, being the capacity for selectivity in one who holds attention on the goal. Thus simplicity is an appreciation of all that is helpful toward liv­ing as children of the Living God.

The deeper meaning of simplicity can be seen in the stand of Friends against the taking of oaths. Friends believe that their word should be ac-

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cepted at any time among all persons and thus abjure the right to stand simply on their own word rather than swearing by God to a purity of pur­pose in which God alone is certain. Friends, therefore, "affirm" rather than use oaths requiring them to swear on the Bible or before God, a wit­ness which has gained universal recognition in modern legal practice .

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berately, :an you mdings, s in the

1pter 6 is d outer

mual for ::>luntary :ises for

lins one . nourish affirm a-

::(f-3 VOLUNTARY SIMPLICITY AND THE

NEW GLOBAL CHALLENGE

From Voluntary Simplicity by Duane Elgin, 1993

At the heart of the simple life is an emphasis on harmonious and purposeful living. Richard Gregg was a student of Gandhi's teaching and, in 1936, he wrote the following about a life .of "voluntary simplidty":

Voluntary Simplidty involves both inner and outer condition. It

means singleness of purpose, sincerity and honesty within, as well as

avoidance of exterior dutter, of many possessions irrelevant to the

chief purpose of life. It means an ordering and guiding of our energy

and our desires, a partial restraint in some directions in order to secure

greater abundance of life in other directions. It involves a deliberate

organization of life for a purpose. Of course, as different people have

different purposes in life, what is relevant to the purpose of one person

might not be relevant to the purpose of another... The degree of

simplification is a matter for each individual to settle for himself.

There is no spedal virtue to the phrase voluntary simplidty­it is merely a label, and a somewhat awkward label at that. Still, it does acknowledge explidtly that simpler living integrates both inner and outer aspects of life into an organic and purposeful whole.

To live more voluntarily is to live more deliberately, inten=-7 tionally, and purposefully-in short, it is to live more consdously. yY_e carmot be deliberate w~en we are distracted frmn.life. We can­not be intentional when we are not paying attention. We cannot be purposeful when we are not being present. Therefore, to act in a voluntary manner is to be aware of ourselves as we move through life. This requires that we not only pay attention to the actions we take in the outer world, but also that we pay attention to ourselves acting-our inner world. To the extent that we do not notice both inner and outer aspetts of our passage through life, then our capadty for voluntary, deliberate, a{\d purposeful action . I IS commensurately diminished. -

To live more simply is to live more purposefully and with a minimum of needless distraction. The particular expression of simplidty is a personal matter. We each know where our lives are unnecessarily complicated. We are all painfully aware of the clutter and pretense that weigh upon us and make our passage through the ~more cumbersome and awkward. To live more simply is to unburden ourselves-to live more lightly, cleanly, aerodynamically. It is to establis~ more direct, unpretentious, and unencumbered relationship with all aspects of our lives~the things that we consume, the work that we do, our relation"S"'hips With others, our connections with nature and the cosmos, and more. Simplidty of living means meeting life face-to-face. It means confronting life dearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. It means taking life as it is-straight and unadulterated.

When we combine these two ideas for integrating the inner anct outer aspects of our lives, we can describe voluntary simplidty as a manner of living that is outwardly more simple and inwardly more richfa way of being in which our most authentic and alive self is brought into direct and consdous contact with livini]This Way of life is not a static condition to be achieved, but an ever­changing balance that must be continuously and consdously

NoRTHWEST EARTH INSTITUTE

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I-3 made real. Simplicity in this sense is not simple. To maintain a skillful balance between the inner and outer aspects of our lives is an enormously challenging and continuously changing process. The objective is not dogmatically to live with less, but is a more­demanding intention of living with balance in order to find a life of greater purpose, fulfillment, and satisfaction.

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-=ff:Lf JOHN WOOLMAN

# #

After a while my former acquaintance gave over expecting me as one of their company, and I began to be known to some whose conversation was helpful to me. And now, as I had experienced the love of God through Jesus Christ to redeem me from many pollutions and to be a succour to me through a sea of conflicts, with which no person was fully acquainted, and as my heart was often enlarged in this heavenly principle, I felt a tender compassion for the youth who remained entangled in snares like those which had entangled me. From one month to another this love and tenderness increased, and my mind was more strongly engaged for the good of my fellow creatures.

I went to meetings in an awful frame of mind and endeavoured to be inwardly acquainted with the language of the True Shepherd. And one day being under a strong exercise of spirit, I stood up and said some words in a meetin but not kee in close to the diVine opening, sa1 more ~was required <i__Ele; and ~eing soon sens1ble of my error, I was afflicted in mind some weeks without any ~n t'illaraegfeethatl~d take satisfaction in n'otfimg. I remembered God and was troubled, and in the depth of my distress he had pity upon me and sent the Comforter. I then felt forgiveness for my offense, and my mind became calm and quiet, being truly thankful to my gracious Redeemer for his mercies. And after this, feeling the spring of divine love opened and a concern to speak, I said a few words in a meeting, in which I found peace. This I believe was about six weeks from the first time, and as I was thus humbled and disciplined under the Cross, my understanding became more strengthened to distinguish the language of the pure Spirit

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QUAKER SPIRITUALITY

which inwardly moves upon the heart and taught [me] to wait m silence sometimes many weeks together, until I felt that rise which prepares the creature to stand like a trumpet through which the Lord speaks to his flock.

In the management of my outward affairs I may say with thank­fulness I found Truth to be my support, and I was respected in my master's family, who came to live in Mount Holly within two years after my going there.

About the twenty-third year of my age, I had many fresh and heavenly openings in respect to the care and providence, of the Almighty over his creatures in general, and over man as the most noble amongst those which are visible. And being clearly convinced in my judgment that to place my whole trust in God was best for me, I felt renewed engagements that in all things I mighf act on an inward principle of virtue and pursue worldly business no further than as Truth opened my way therein.

About the time called Christmas I observed many people from the country and dwellers in town who, resorting to the public houses, spent their time in drinking and vain sports, tending to corrupt one another, on which account I was much troubled. At one house in particular there was much disorder, and I believed it was a duty laid on me to go and speak to the master of that house. I considered I was young and that several elderly Friends in town had opportunity to see these things, and though I would gladly have been excused, yet I could not feel my mind clear.

The exercise was heavy, and as I was reading what the Almighty said to Ezekiel respecting his duty as a watchman, the matter was set home more clearly; and then with prayer and tears I besought the Lord for his assistance, who in loving-kindness gave me a resigned heart. Then at a suitable opportunity I went to the public house, and seeing the man amongst a company, I went to him and told him I wanted to speak with him; so we went aside, and there in the fear and dread of the Almighty I expressed to him what rested on my mind, which he took kindly, and afterward showed more regard to me than before. In a few years after, he died middle-aged, and I often thought that had I neglected my duty in that case it would have given me great trouble, and I was humbly thankful to my gracious Father, who had supported me herein.

,.-· My employer, having a Negro woman, sold her and directed me to write a bill of sale, the man being waiting who bought her. The

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JOHN WOOLMAN

thing was sudden, and though the thoughts of writing an instrument of slavery for one of my fellow creatures felt uneasy, yet I remem­bered I was hired by the year, that it was my master who directed me to do it, and that it was an elderly man, a member of our Society, who bought her; so through weakness I gave way and wrote it, but at the executing it, I was so afflicted in my mind that I said before my master and the Friend that I believed slavekeeping to be a practice inconsistent wi'th the Christian religion. This in some degree abated my uneasiness, yet as often as I reflected seriously upon it I thought I should have been clearer if I had desired to be excused from it as a thing against my conscience, for such it was. And some time after this a young man of our Society spake to me to write an instrument of slavery, he having lately taken a Negro into his house. I told him I was not easy to write it, for though many kept slaves in our Society, as in others, I still believed the practice was not right, and desired to be excused from writing [it]. I spoke to him in good will, and he told me that keeping slaves was not altogether agreeable to his mind, but that the slave being a gift made to his wife, he had accepted of her. [30-33]

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~s-Peacemaking: The Call to Faithful Action

Adherence to the peace testimony grows out of our experience of God's transforming love. It grows out of our ongoing life of prayer and worship which nurtures our rela­tionship with Christ. But it also grows out of our obedience to the prophetic call of Christ to follow his will in faithful living in the world.

Peace is a gift, but it does not come magically through our passivity. Only in our faithful response to God's call do

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we receive God's peace. Simon and Matthew, Jesus' two disciples who were political enemies, were called to enter the same band of disciples and learn to live with each other day in and day out. After Jesus entered his house, Zacchaeus made radical changes in the way he acted with his money and possessions. The man in the tombs, once he was healed, followed Jesus' request to return home and proclaim the power of God to all.

Our peacemaking cannot wait until we feel completely loving. Feelings are notoriously unreliable guides. We are called to obedient love even though we may not be feeling very loving. Often it is through the performance of loving acts that loving feelings can be built up in us. We may start with small, perhaps very tiny, steps. It is only as we begin to allow Christ's love to act in and through us that it can become a part of us.

Action requires discernment of God's will. Discernment requires that attention be focused on our Inward Guide who speaks to us through prayer, Scripture, the discipline of our Meeting, and the voices of our brothers and sisters in the church-community. From Christ we learn where our lives need healing and where they need re-ordering. We discover what we are called to lay down and what we must take up. We shall probably find that many of the accepted patterns of life in our society are inconsistent with those of God's kingdom.

Becoming a peacemaker may require changes in our everyday way of life (e.g., the way we earn a living, our unquestioned payment of war taxes, the wasteful manner in which we secure and use possessions). While we are all led toward peace, we are led by many different paths. Some witnesses may be required of us all. Other witnesses may be for those with calls to special ministry. Jesus asked one person to join his band of disciples and another to proclaim God's power at home. We must discern what is asked of us.

Christ's call involves not only discipleship in our per­sonal lives. It is also a call to witness to the world about us: family, friends, community, and nation. We may be led by

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word and deed to speak a challenge to those who follow the path of violence and hatred. We may become witnesses of the love and power of God to bring new life. We may find concrete ways to help individuals and even nations to walk in the path of peace.

Such witness requires knowledge of the specific causes of injustice and war in our contemporary society. We need to be informed about the workings of the social, economic, and political structures which govern so much of our lives. Dis­dpleship is informed obedience, not naive or ignorant action.

Faithful response to Christ's call on both levels, personal obedience and witness to others, is not easy. It involves struggle because we often resist the surrender of our selfish will. We can think of a thousand reasons why we would rather continue in the old ways. But through our failures we are always brought back to the realization that it is not by our own strength that we walk the ways of peace. "I have been crucified with Christ; I no longer live as I myself, but Christ lives within me" (Gal. 2:20 RSV).

The Lamb's War

The Lamb's War was an image used by the first genera­tion of Friends to illumine many levels of insight about the call to become a peacemaker and follower of Christ.

The image of the Lamb's War comes from the book of Revelation, and describes the great cosmic struggle going on between Christ (the Lamb) and the forces of evil and destruction. Christ is at work throughout creation, challeng­ing and overcoming that which turns away from God.

Early Friends recognized that this struggle is taking place within each individual as each is called to surrender to God's will. We all can feel what Friends understood by this image as we think of the interior struggle we undergo to become and remain centered in God rather than our job, our search for money, our desire for reputation and power. In this struggle we are called to choose whom we shall serve: God or Mammon.

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However, this struggle has ramifications beyond our own personal faithfulness. By our choice, we contribute to the Lamb's War which is going on in the larger social order. As the eighteenth-century Quaker John Woolman said:

May we look upon our treasures, the furniture of our houses, and the garments in which we array ourselves, and try whether the seeds of war have any nourishment in these our posses­sions or not. Holding treasures in the self­pleasing spirit is ·a strong plant, the fruit whereof ripens fast. A day of outward distress is coming and divine love calls to prepare

against it." Woolman recognized, as did the earliest Friends, that the

Lamb's War does not just take place within individuals. Christ is struggling with unrighteous social, political, and economic orders. Societies also are called to obedience to God's will. The Lamb continues his struggles as long as the earth bears people who must cry out for the basic necessities of life: food, water, and clothing, while a few spend their resources buying diet soft drinks, designer jeans, and whipped lipstick. In the Lamb's War we are all called to obedience in both aspects of the struggle: personal and cor­porate faithfulness. Both levels of faithfulness inteq~enetrate one another. It is not possible to change social structures without changing personal lifestyles or vice versa.

Our personal obedience to the Lamb may become a sign of challenge to the forces of evil. The first generation of Friends entered the Lamb's vVar by refusing to doff their hats, by wearing simple garb, by charging set prices instead of haggling for the most advantageous price, and by refus­ing to pay forced tithes to the state church. These actions were not only attempts to be faithful to the Lamb in their own personal lives. They were also ways of challenging the unrighteous structures and attitudes of the society around

them. Thes rien~articipate

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