Look to the Light is a series of short messages shared weekly with subscribers to the Friends Journal email newsletter, discussing matters of Quaker faith and spirituality. You can have those messages delivered to your inbox, along with information about other Friends Journal articles and features, by filling out the adjacent form.
Woe to You Who Desire the Day of the Lord (November 3): “How do you think that’ll work out for you, Amos asks—or, as the Beastie Boys put it, you think that you can front when Revelation comes?”
Beloved, We Are God’s Children Now (October 26): “’This is the message you have heard from the beginning,’ the author of First John writes: ‘that we should love one another.’”
The Lord Watches Over the Way of the Righteous (October 19): “‘The Lord doth require more from Friends than all other people, because he hath given more to them,’ as George Fox wrote.”
2026
Give Therefore to Caesar the Things That Are Caesar’s (October 12): “There comes a point when liberty of conscience, or obedience to God if you prefer, requires us to pull back on giving Caesars what they consider their due.”
Both We and Our Ancestors Have Sinned (October 5): “People and nations have fallen under the sway of the gods of this world over and over again.”
The Law of the Lord Is Perfect (September 28): “George Fox and his peers… did not allow the suffering they endured at the hands of men to diminish their love for God.”
Get Yourselves a New Heart and a New Spirit (September 21): “Embrace ‘the life, and power, and wisdom of God,’ as George Fox puts it, and love your neighbor as yourself.”
Live Your Life in a Manner Worthy of the Gospel of Christ (September 14): “Jesus doesn’t offer his followers greater abundance in life—instead, he invites us to a greater abundance of life.”
…and Abounding in Steadfast Love (September 7): “We can’t deny the vast imbalance of power between God and humanity, but we can trust God does not and will not exploit the advantage.”
You Shall Give Them Warning from Me (August 31): “Some Friends may consider Ezekiel’s tone intolerant. They might even regard it as incompatible with the peace testimony.”
Do Not Be Overcome By Evil (August 24): “By refusing to participate in Empire’s power games, we can snuff out evil’s flames and make space for a new society to spring forth.”
Do Not Be Conformed to This Age (August 17): “In the time of Antichrist’s reign, the rejection of Empire begins in our imaginations.”
Woman, Great Is Your Faith! (August 10): “The Canaanite woman has seen what Jesus has done for other people, as the popular meme goes, and she wants that for herself.”
He Went Up the Mountain by Himself to Pray (August 3): “Why did Jesus want some time by himself? And what did he do when he finally got it?”
Jesus Withdrew to a Deserted Place by Himself (July 27): “Jesus never set out to feed five thousand people at one event. You can see it in the beginning of the story: He was trying to get away from everybody.”
Your Decrees Are My Heritage Forever (July 20): “Early Friends believed Jesus when he said he had come not to abolish the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill their promises.”
Who Hopes for What One Already Sees? (July 13): “Why does hope require us to live as the blessed community promised by God has already been realized?”
To What Will I Compare This Generation? (June 29): “In the spaces between empires rising and falling, fragments of a more blessed community have sometimes come together.”
My Heart Shall Rejoice in Your Salvation (June 22): “How did early Friends, despite their persecution, ‘stand in the will of God being guided by that which is eternal unto God?'”
Whenever I Speak, I Must Cry Out (June 15): “Jeremiah tried to keep quiet. But once Spirit removed the veils from his eyes, he could no longer continue compromising.”
The Harvest Is Plentiful, But the Laborers Are Few (June 8): “I think about the ‘harassed and helpless’ crowds who came to see Jesus as he went about his ministry.”
I Desire Steadfast Love and Not Sacrifice (June 1): “Hesed describes a relationship—sometimes between two people, but more often between God and humanity.”
I Am With You Always, to the End of the Age (May 25): “Do we believe the promise Jesus made to his disciples before he left?”
I Will Pour Out My Spirit Upon All Flesh (May 18): “As the miracle of Pentecost continues to unfold, prophetic imagination will spread among all the people.”
The Time Has Come for Judgment to Begin (May 11): “When I was growing up, people believed the world might end at any moment.”
Do Not Fear What They Fear (May 4): “On Saturday, April 25, authorities say, a man set out to assassinate the president of the United States.”
Let Yourselves Be Built Into a Spiritual House (April 27): “God certainly wants each of us to prosper, but not for any of us to prosper at the expense of another.”
They Devoted Themselves to the Apostles’ Teaching and Fellowship (April 20): “The early Christians began laying the foundations for a society grounded in mutual aid.”
Were Not Our Hearts Burning Within Us? (April 13): “‘We had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel,’ Cleopas and his companion tell the stranger they meet outside Jerusalem.”
Do Not Doubt but Believe (April 6): “Thomas required proof—but once he had it, he went all in, having experienced something akin to what the earliest Quakers called convincement.”
Why Are You Weeping? Whom Are You Looking For? (March 30): “In Mary Magdalene’s place, we too might find it difficult to pull ourselves out of despair without direct intervention.”
The Lord God Has Opened My Ear (March 23): “I came to do the Will of my Father,” Mary Dyer said, “and in obedience to his Will, I stand even to the Death.”
More Than Those Who Watch for the Morning (March 16): “The night after the United States and Israel began bombing Iran, I went to a vigil at a church in Brooklyn.”
Walk as Children of Light (March 9): “Do you imagine you can speak to someone’s condition better than God can?”
Is the Lord Among Us or Not? (March 2): “When people become convinced God has abandoned them, they usually decide that they need to fend for themselves.”
Their Minds Are Set on Earthly Things (February 23): “One could easily identify the Machine’s end as destruction, its animating deity a belly ravenous for ‘growth’ and ‘progress.'”
We Are Treated as Impostors and Yet Are True (February 16): “Empathy reflects the highest of Quakerly aspirations—to accept the summons of the Inward Light to pattern our minds after that of Jesus.”
No Prophecy Ever Came by Human Will (February 9): “Whether or not I hear God’s call depends upon the state of my ears,” Oswald Chambers wrote, “and what I hear depends upon my disposition.”
Is This Not the Fast That I Choose? (February 2): “God wants us to love our neighbors as ourselves—and expects us to put some backbone into it.”
God Chooses What Is Low and Despised in the World (January 26): “Every person rejected by the elites has that of God in them. Every outcast has a home in the blessed community.”
I Delight to Do Your Will, O My God (January 19): “The blessed community doesn’t need to send armed enforcers into the streets to shoot women in the face or to launch tear gas at infants.”
Your Law Is Within My Heart (January 12): “Those who knew Renee Good say her celebration of God’s faithfulness and steadfast love for the world shone through her actions daily.”
For He Delivers the Needy When They Call (January 5): “The 72nd Psalm offers praises for a king who acts in accordance with a divine sense of justice and righteousness.”