John Woolman

John Woolman’s fire

burned

fiercely,

silently,

gently,

as he roamed wilderness roads

in the 1700s.

He was lean of speech,

trusting the loud silent stirrings

in his heart to awaken

what words never could.

He vowed never to touch

anything that resulted from slave labor.

Prompt results did not matter to him.

He trusted Spirit to pass Truth onward,

person to person,

generation to generation.

His heart lived in ever-abiding resistance

that flowed out of daily surrender,

open always to any truth

that might be spoken through him.

When words did not appear,

a silence spoke from within

with unavoidable power,

so strong that a native chief once

put his hand on Woolman’s heart and said,

“I love to feel where the words come from.”

John Woolman,

brother,

prophet of silence,

so richly endowed

with the fewest words necessary;

all the silences between your words

have been passed on to us,

bearing Truth,

patient in its awakening,

century after century.

– Randall Mullins, Memphis and Tacoma Friends Meetings (NPYM)