True and genuine worship is when man, through his spirit attains to friendship and intimacy with God. True and genuine read more

True and genuine worship is when man, through his spirit attains to friendship and intimacy with God. True and genuine worship is not to come to a certain place; it is not to go through a certain ritual or liturgy; it is not even to bring certain gifts. True worship is when the spirit, the immortal and invisible part of man, speaks to and meets with God, who is immortal and invisible.

Feast of John Keble, Priest, Poet, Tractarian, 1866 The deaf may hear the Saviour's voice, The fettered tongue its chains read more

Feast of John Keble, Priest, Poet, Tractarian, 1866 The deaf may hear the Saviour's voice, The fettered tongue its chains may break; But the deaf heart, the dumb by choice, The laggard soul that will not wake, The guilt that scorns to be forgiven -- These baffle e'en the spells of heaven.

Commemoration of Samuel Seabury, First Anglican Bishop in North America, 1796 A Christian cannot help being free, because in read more

Commemoration of Samuel Seabury, First Anglican Bishop in North America, 1796 A Christian cannot help being free, because in the pursuit and attainment of his object, no one can either hinder or retard him.

Feast of Margaret, Queen of Scotland, Philanthropist, Reformer of the Church, 1093 Commemoration of Edmund Rich of Abingdon, Archbishop of read more

Feast of Margaret, Queen of Scotland, Philanthropist, Reformer of the Church, 1093 Commemoration of Edmund Rich of Abingdon, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1240 He does not believe, that does not live according to his belief.

Pentecost The Spirit is Love expressed towards man as redeeming love, and the Spirit is truth, and the Spirit read more

Pentecost The Spirit is Love expressed towards man as redeeming love, and the Spirit is truth, and the Spirit is the Holy Spirit. Redemption is inconceivable without truth and holiness. But the mere fact that the Holy Spirit's first recorded action in the gospels is an expression of redeeming love should cause us to suspect a teaching which represents His work as primarily, if not solely, the sanctification of our own souls to the practical exclusion of His activity in us towards others. It is important to teach of Him as the Spirit of holiness; it is also important to teach of Him as the Spirit which in us labours for the salvation of men everywhere.

The great unity which true science seeks is found only by beginning with our knowledge of God, and coming down read more

The great unity which true science seeks is found only by beginning with our knowledge of God, and coming down from Him along the stream of causation to every fact and event that affects us. .

Feast of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, Teacher, 397 Another criterion was loyalty to the community of Christ both read more

Feast of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, Teacher, 397 Another criterion was loyalty to the community of Christ both as gathered congregation and as organized church. The pride of spiritual gifts had led the Corinthians to jealousy and strife. They had divided into factions owning the leadership, one of Paul, one of Apollos, another of Cephas, and another of Christ -- but such factions, the apostle tells them, were not characteristics of the "spiritual", but of the carnal. To divide the Church was to destroy the temple of God, where the Holy Spirit dwelt among them (I Cor. 3:1, 3, 16). And the very gifts about which they quarreled should have been a power to unite them, for they all proceeded from one and the same Spirit, from one and the same Lord, from one and the same God, who worketh all in all. The Spirit was indeed the principle of unity in the Church, "for in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body" (I Cor. 12:13). Therefore, to divide the Church was to drive away the Spirit... The tests of spiritual phenomena in the life of the community, and the proofs that they were of the Holy Spirit, were unity, order, and edification. [Continued tomorrow].

From thine, as then, the healing virtue goes Into our hearts -- that is the Father's plan. From heart to read more

From thine, as then, the healing virtue goes Into our hearts -- that is the Father's plan. From heart to heart it sinks, it steals, it flows, From these that know thee still infecting those. Here is my heart -- from thine, Lord, fill it up, That I may offer it as the holy cup Of thy communion to my every man.

Continuing a short series on education: It is ironic that, although fundamentalists are implacably opposed to liberalism, their read more

Continuing a short series on education: It is ironic that, although fundamentalists are implacably opposed to liberalism, their extreme reaction shows the same weakness. They, too, stress the leap of faith and make irrationality almost a principle, dismissing the serious questions of seeking modern men as intellectual smoke-screens or diversions to conceal deeper personal problems. All this masks a desperate intellectual insecurity, barely disguised by the surrounding hedge of taboos to preserve purity. The strident intolerance of much guilt-driven evangelism betrays the same insecurity. In these circles, much that is taught has to be unlearned in the wider school of life, and it is not surprising that universities are littered with dropouts from such groups. Their non-rational, subjective faith is cruelly punctured by varsity-level questions, and many manage to survive only by resorting to a severely schizophrenic faith which they hold to be true religiously but not intellectually, historically, or scientifically.