tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19785125.post1437510907965637132..comments2024-01-03T07:56:32.311-05:00Comments on quaker oats live: book review part 1: without apologyAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07488876505679035140noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19785125.post-78837968282177169992011-05-14T01:16:46.714-04:002011-05-14T01:16:46.714-04:00Nate--thanks, I agree: it's not just un-Quaker...Nate--thanks, I agree: it's not just un-Quakerly but also not Christocentric to try to control access to God, and I guess that's the point. Who cares if we're Quakers? What we're about is following God/Christ.<br /><br />Marshall, thanks for your good questions! I guess I would say that in quite a bit of that 250 years you speak of, people were trying to control access to God through books of discipline and so forth and so they weren't doing a much better job that some Evangelical Friends. Pretty much they were doing the same thing.<br /><br />But I think you're right that at the heart of the matter, the intention behind this--and the intention behind evangelicalism, for that matter--is to live a godly life, a life that points to God and Christ. The problem is when we let our focus slip from God to living out these forms. And that's what Quakerism has always--in its ideal form--railed against. The hard part is not slipping back into those forms, or creating new forms. Forms we can control; living a life of obedience to Christ is harder to define. It's easier to have a list of who's in and who's out than to just do what feels like "Live and let live."Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07488876505679035140noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19785125.post-44831635965393237352011-05-10T15:17:06.916-04:002011-05-10T15:17:06.916-04:00Truly I do not know evangelical culture well enoug...Truly I do not know evangelical culture well enough to judge what it does right and what it does wrong.<br /><br />I would humbly point out, though, that for more than 250 years, prior to the mid-twentieth century, the Society of Friends was very seriously concerned about who had a right to call herself a Friend and who did not — and also about who deserved to be included in meetings for business, where the Society’s policies were shaped, and who was not committed enough to faithfulness to Christ to be entrusted with a share of that responsibility.<br /><br />These are very hard questions to answer, naturally, and I understand why my liberal Quaker friends do not like to hear them asked.<br /><br />But if we recall that Friends in those two and a half centuries were very concerned about bearing a true and meaningful testimony for Christ to the world, and that they believed the testimony that means the most is a matter of deeds and not just words, then their concern about who had the right to call herself a Friend, and who had the right to help shape the decisions by which Friends were defined, begins to make a bit more sense.<br /><br />I wonder how this evangelical desire that you refer to — the desire to control access to God — relates to that older concern about who should be considered a Friend. Can you speak to that, Cherice?Marshall Massey (Iowa YM [C])http://journal.earthwitness.org/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19785125.post-83122311894401840122011-05-10T14:42:31.433-04:002011-05-10T14:42:31.433-04:00Thanks Cherice!
I would whole heartedly agree, tha...Thanks Cherice!<br />I would whole heartedly agree, that the heart of evangelicalism is about controlling access to God, or maybe to say that it has become that. But, I would add, that's not only "un-Quakerly", but it's not Christocentric either. Thanks for another thought provoking postNatenoreply@blogger.com