G. A. Studdard Kennedy: Keep On Seeking!
G. A. Studdert Kennedy (1883-1929)
The faculty of faith is not meant to kill the faculty of criticism and the instinct of curiosity, but rather to keep them keen and alive, and prevent them dying of despair. Faith is the mark of those who seek and keep on seeking, who ask and keep on asking, who knock and keep on knocking, until the door is opened. The passive, weak-kneed taking of everything on trust which is often presented as faith is a travesty of its truth. True faith is the most active, positive, and powerful of all virtues. It means that a man, having come into spiritual communion with that great personal Spirit Who lives and works behind the universe, can trust Him, and, trusting Him, can use all his powers of body, mind, and spirit to cooperate with Him in the great purpose of perfection; it means that the man of faith will be the man of science in its deepest, truest sense, and will never cease from asking questions, never cease from seeking for the reason that lies behind all mysteries.
— G. A. Studdert Kennedy , The Hardest Part (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1919), p. 83-84.
Found on the Internet: here.
More from this blog
John Wesley: The Faith That Saves
When Prayer Makes Things Worse
Some Quotes from the Internet
A Prayer for the Day (Anselm)
What I Mean by Faith
Why I Don’t Trust Politics
Resurrection Happens
Faith and the “Inward Witness”
Rob Bell on Doubting God on Easter
Nick Quient: Perfecting Holiness and the Promises of God: A Brief Exegesis of 2 Cor 7:1- A Discipline of Consecration and Listening
We Need Prophets – Amos 3:3-8
Early on (actually in my early thirties), when I didn’t even know I was a seeker, a wonderful Methodist pastor, Robert G. Tuttle, Sr., looked at me with piercing blue eyes, and told me to keep on seeking. Great counsel for anyone in most any circumstance.
I is interesting how brief comments like that can have a life-changing effect.