Unfortunately my computer has been having problems and
the connection to the internet was not working because it is being
“upgraded.” This is, no doubt,
progress. So I will try to get caught up
with sending what I have written.
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One of the most influential Christian writers today is
Nicholas T. Wright, now the retired Bishop of Durham in the Church of
England. He has written over 70 books,
many of them “best sellers” in the theological market. He has spoken in Baltimore
However, he is not the first Bishop of Durham to bring
those qualities of faith and intellect and knowledge to the public
discourse.
Brooks Foss Westcott was Professor of Divinity at Cambridge University Durham Darlington , in 1892. He helped lead the
Church of England into a more Wesleyan understanding of faith in action, social
holiness.
My friends, let us be sure
of this, that the world is for us, that life is for us, as we see it, as we
make it, either an ever-widening vision of God’s glory, or a narrow and pitiful
spectacle of the conflicts of man’s selfishness. We can see only that for which our eyes are
opened, and the Holy Spirit alone can open the eyes of the soul.
Have we realized our wants and our opportunities? Have we grown with the growth of eighteen
centuries? Our faith is not for the
student, or the hermit, or the prelate, but for man as man; not for the cell or
the council-chamber – though it is indeed for these – but for the market and
for the fireside. It is the apprehension
not of a thought, or a message, or a command, but of a fact which reveals what
God is and what man is, a Father whose love is limited only by the uttermost
need of his children, a child whose lasting joy must be to rest with the light
upon him from his Father’s eyes.
Have we mastered this truth in life?
The gospel of the Word incarnate has, I believe, and
alone can have, the power to answer the questions and satisfy the desires of
men which the circumstances of the time are shaping to a clear expression.
No doubt, the end – the divine end – will be
reached. The seed of the tree of life,
of which the “leaves shall be for the healing of the nations,” will grow we
know not how. This confidence can never
be shaken. But oh the difference for us
in that great hour of revelation if we have watched over the earliest growth of
the budding germ with tender foresight, if we have cleared a free space for the
spreading branches of the rising plant
with diligent care, if we have prepared men to seek their rest under its
sheltering arms.
In Christ born, crucified, ascended is the unity, the
redemption, the life of humanity. His
promise cannot fail: “I, if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men
unto me.” In the strength of that
promise let us hasten his coming, each bringing his own service for the
consummation fo the one life. The
learning of the scholar, now as in every age, needs the chastening sense of its
due relation to the whole. The devotion
of the saint needs the invigorating discipline of active ministry. The exercise of authority needs the
sympathetic grace of sacrifice. The
routine of little cares, which forms for most of us the simple record of our
days of labour, needs the ennobling influence of a divine companionship. And Christ is waiting to crown each need with
blessing.
The work to which we offer ourselves is not ours: it is
the work of God.
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It is interesting that it is two bishops
of the Church of England, of which John Wesley was always a priest, even it the
leaders of that church rejected him and his followers left that church to form
Methodist churches, are leaders among those calling for the same reformation of
the Church and Christian life which Wesley sought. And though a century apart, both Westcott and
Wright challenge us to lead a life of scriptural holiness in the world..
Yours
& His,
DED
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