THE LIFE of faith requires that we have vision, that we be attentive and obedient to revelation. It requires that we have a sense of the potential for God’s work to take place in and through us— the capacity to apprehend the ideals which we can grow to embody and personify in our lives. It also requires an awareness that much of what we must do to live life fully in faith has been revealed and is to be heeded— a commitment to being mindful of what Friends have long called Truth and right order in our lives...
In some places one see Friends who with some justification, have taken pride in their Quaker heritage, but who now are content merely to abide comfortably in their familiarity with other members of the meeting and their versions of the Quakerly way of doing things. One finds Friends basking in the reputation of Quakers as good people, and resting on their or their ancestors' laurels...
Our religious life becomes little more than a maintenance project where we strive to uphold lifeless forms of an ancient and honorable, but increasingly empty, tradition....
We must be cognizant of how much God has already shown us and our ancestors about what it means to be in harmony with divine purpose. These revelations are available to us in the Bible, in the journals of our Quaker forbears, in the devotional literature, and in the rich and varied record of human history... It is the challenge to become a people with a vision…so that Truth might flourish in our lives for the benefit of all. It is the challenge to become the people God wishes us to be.
— Thomas H. Jeavons, 1987.
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