All that mankind has in common today is suffering. Joy is alive in this suffering only as hope, but nonetheless as joyful faith in a better future. Without this joyful courage there would be no mutual help. The help given by one person to another proves that in spite of everything, faith in future healing cannot die.
- Eberhard Arnold
- Eberhard Arnold, November 1918 From an EssayWhen poets describe their experience of the powers that move in their inmost hearts, then they speak about longing. If we allow only a few rays of hope from the poets to work upon us, we will be deeply moved by the indissoluble connection between mankind and longing. Even the smallest selection of the poetic outpouring of human longing will confront us with their deepest content: the longing for God and for unity with God. At the deepest level, they have recognized that the essence of all longing is the cry of the soul to God.
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Those truths of the spirit’s struggle are best experienced in life itself. In the steadfast constancy of faith, which is the fighting spirit itself, one then says “Yes” to this out of one’s heart. For this fight is indeed the highest love itself, as we know from Blumhardt and above all from the crucified One himself .
- Eberhard Arnold
I am certain that we are facing our true task, which is very great and powerful. What we need is always one and the same, no matter what we call it: the baptism of the Spirit—perfect love—the works of purity and truth—Jesus Christ!
- Eberhard Arnold