by Christopher Sammond
I had the delightful experience of facilitating a workshop with a group of ardent seekers, some with many years’ experience, at Pendle Hill last weekend. As one part of our work together, I shared a recent time when I had experienced the extraordinary power of the Divine, and then our elder, ,O, did the same. The participants then split up into groups of three, each also sharing such a time with each other. When they came back together as a large group, they were on fire, deeply alive in the Spirit. One participant said that she had somehow lost the sense of power in the experience as it had faded from view, but sharing that experience with others brought it back to her, with much the same power she had first experienced. And then hearing of others’ experiences reinforced the sense of the reality of God’s power. Many nodded their heads as she shared this.
In another session, I invited them to share experiences of how they reach for, and find, the “place where the words come from” in giving vocal ministry. When the small groups came back from this opportunity to share, they were equally aglow in the Spirit. We named each of these opportunities as testimony, giving testimony.
Testifying to how God was active in our lives used to be a common part of Friends worship. We would do well to reclaim this practice. I remember reading with some delight the recounting of Ireland Yearly Meeting’s minutes from 1676. They gathered, and worship
…began on the Fourth-day of the week, at the ninth hour in the morning, and the meeting for worship continued until after the first hour. About an hour after, friends met again in order to consider the affairs of the church: but the power of the Lord brake forth so mightily among friends in many testimonies, prayers and praises to the Lord, that there was no time to enter upon business that day, so the meeting broke up.
The same thing happened on the second day, and then on the third day that they met. It wasn’t until the morning of the fourth day that they were ready to enter business. There was too much to testify to before that!
The point is, there is great power in testimony, in sharing our direct experience of the power of the Divine. As many of us search for ways in which we can be empowered by the Spirit to stand against the “principalities and powers,” it’s time to revive Friends practice of giving testimony. Can I get a witness?
