Minute from Westfield Friends

The following is a minute written by Westfield Friends to the Western Yearly Meeting concerning the upcoming Yearly Meeting Sessions. I thought some of you might be interested in what they had to say.

WESTFIELD FRIENDS MEETING MINUTE OF RESPONSE TO THOSE SEEKING A DIVERSITY OF PATHS TO SALVATION

We serve our tiune God: God the Father, God the Son Jesus Christ, and God the Holy Spirit.

What we have found to be true we declare to all: that God the Father has sent his Son Jesus full of grace and truth to save us from our sins, and that God the Father has sent the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter, Teach and Guide.

The Holy Spirit has inspired the scriptures, and the Bible is therefore true and authoritative. The Church has been established upon the foundation of the prophets and the apostles with Jesus Christ as its Head.

The scriptures teach and we firmly believe that Jesus is the only begotten, divine Son of God. He alone was born of a virgin, and He alone lived a sinless life. He was cricified and died as an atoning sacrifice for sin, was raised from the dead, and now is seated at the right hand of God the Father.

Western Yearly Meeting was founded upon these truths. The Faith and Practice clearly declares these truths in each of the Essential Truths, The Richmond Declaration of Faith, and Fox's Letter to the Governor of Barbados. Western Yearly Meeting has never wavered from this orthodox foundation.

To those Monthly Meetings and individuals who are seeking another gospel to include a diversity of paths to salvation, we repeat the words of the apostle in Acts 4:12, "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."

If other Monthly Meetings or individuals choose to leave the Yearly Meeting in their search for diversity of theology, Westfield Monthly Meeting will grieve their loss, but we will not stand in their way. Westfield Monthly Meeting of Friends chooses to stand with the orthodox declaration of truth as written and approved in the Faith and Practice of Western Yearly Meeting Friends Church.

Approved Seventh Month, Twelfth Day, 2009.

Westfield Friends Monthly Meeting

They sent a copy of this minute to us and I thought I should share it with you. They speak my mind. Many minutes are circulating over this issue on both sides. I'm happy to say that we at Hinkle stand with the Orthodox Declaration of Truth as outlined in our Faith and Practice.

Bob