Book Description
Since its first publication in 1941, A Testament of Devotion, by the renowned Quaker teacher Thomas Kelly, has been universally embraced as a truly enduring spiritual classic. Plainspoken and deeply inspirational, it gathers together five compelling essays that urge us to center our lives on God's presence, to find quiet and stillness within modern life, and to discover the deeply satisfying and lasting peace of the inner spiritual journey. As relevant today as it was a half-century ago, A Testament of Devotion is the ideal companion to that highest of all human arts-the lifelong conversation between God and his creatures.
I have in mind something deeper than the simplification of our external programs, our absurdly crowded calendars of appointments through which so many pantingly and frantically gasp. These do become simplified in holy obedience, and the poise and peace we have been missing can really be found. But there is a deeper, an internal simplification of the whole of one's personality, stilled, tranquil, in childlike trust listening ever to Eternity's whisper, walking with a smile into the dark."
Amazon Review
Still Mining the Gold from This Little Book
I've read a lot of Christian books by such authors as Augustine, Aquinas, Brother Lawrence, Pascal, Caussade, Teresa of Avila, Dostoevsky, Lewis, Tozer, Sproul, Geisler, Willard, Foster, and many more... but I'm drawn back to this little book above them all. I've come to appreciate the paradox of "nothing matters; everything matters." As Kelly said, God "gives us the royal blindness of faith, and the seeing eye of the sensitized soul, and the grace of unflinching obedience. Then we see that nothing matters, and that everything matters, and that this my task matters for me and for my fellow men and for Eternity. And if we be utterly humble we may be given the strength to be obedient even unto death, yea the death of the Cross." My goal is to write a devotional, theological book to compare to it. I am not yet up to the task. I have many notes from my many readings, but first I must make God's presence and will the deepest realities in my life as they obviously were in Kelly's. I have the head knowledge, but lack the deepest heart's passion and abandonment to divine breathings that are required to pen a masterpiece. I've learned from Kelly that it is more important that I live as God's masterpiece than pen one myself. As Kelly said, "practice comes first in religion, not theory or dogma."
One correction to my earlier review: Kelly discussed the paradox of "nothing matters; everything matters" with a Hindu monk, not a Buddhist one.
In closing, I'm somewhat surprised to find that Kelly's book is not as popular as it deserves to be. But, then again, I'm not. - Brad Clark
MsSVig
Since its first publication in 1941, A Testament of Devotion, by the renowned Quaker teacher Thomas Kelly, has been universally embraced as a truly enduring spiritual classic. Plainspoken and deeply inspirational, it gathers together five compelling essays that urge us to center our lives on God's presence, to find quiet and stillness within modern life, and to discover the deeply satisfying and lasting peace of the inner spiritual journey. As relevant today as it was a half-century ago, A Testament of Devotion is the ideal companion to that highest of all human arts-the lifelong conversation between God and his creatures.
I have in mind something deeper than the simplification of our external programs, our absurdly crowded calendars of appointments through which so many pantingly and frantically gasp. These do become simplified in holy obedience, and the poise and peace we have been missing can really be found. But there is a deeper, an internal simplification of the whole of one's personality, stilled, tranquil, in childlike trust listening ever to Eternity's whisper, walking with a smile into the dark."
Amazon Review
Still Mining the Gold from This Little Book
I've read a lot of Christian books by such authors as Augustine, Aquinas, Brother Lawrence, Pascal, Caussade, Teresa of Avila, Dostoevsky, Lewis, Tozer, Sproul, Geisler, Willard, Foster, and many more... but I'm drawn back to this little book above them all. I've come to appreciate the paradox of "nothing matters; everything matters." As Kelly said, God "gives us the royal blindness of faith, and the seeing eye of the sensitized soul, and the grace of unflinching obedience. Then we see that nothing matters, and that everything matters, and that this my task matters for me and for my fellow men and for Eternity. And if we be utterly humble we may be given the strength to be obedient even unto death, yea the death of the Cross." My goal is to write a devotional, theological book to compare to it. I am not yet up to the task. I have many notes from my many readings, but first I must make God's presence and will the deepest realities in my life as they obviously were in Kelly's. I have the head knowledge, but lack the deepest heart's passion and abandonment to divine breathings that are required to pen a masterpiece. I've learned from Kelly that it is more important that I live as God's masterpiece than pen one myself. As Kelly said, "practice comes first in religion, not theory or dogma."
One correction to my earlier review: Kelly discussed the paradox of "nothing matters; everything matters" with a Hindu monk, not a Buddhist one.
In closing, I'm somewhat surprised to find that Kelly's book is not as popular as it deserves to be. But, then again, I'm not. - Brad Clark
MsSVig