“There is no greater need in our time than that those who teach religion
should concern themselves,
not with tightening up the machinery,
developing organization,
or arranging more meetings;
but rather to make Jesus real to men;
to invite them into that transforming fellowship which cannot be proved
save by personal experience,
but which, when realized, brings men that glorious exhilaration,
that sense of ineffable peace,
and that escape from all bondage
which are promised in the New Testament.”*
The machinery of faith has influence for good in this world. But it also forces upon us lots of problems of its own making. Is it possible to do what Leslie Weatherhead suggested 76 years ago? I believe so.
*From Leslie Weatherhead, The Transforming Friendship, Epworth, 1928, p51.