GREENWICH, APRIL 13TH, 1891

GREENWICH, APRIL 13TH, 1891

Mr. J. Edmondson.

My Dear Brother, — In our way of speaking ‘quickening’ has often been used (after the analogy of nature) as the first movement in the soul — as the equivalent of ‘new birth’. It has, I think, a different force in Scripture. It is used, I think, about eleven times in the New Testament and means making alive the dead for blessing (spiritually or physically), see John 5:21; Ephesians 2:5; Colossians 2:13; 1 Corinthians 15:22; and the significance of it is that those quickened live before God after a new order. A dead man never lives again after the old order. A man quickened is of the heavenly order in spirit now, and in body hereafter. New birth has hardly this force but refers directly to the kingdom in which men live after the order of man on earth. It is no use attempting to adjust the two expressions as to point of time. The importance is in seeing their moral distinction. I return your enclosures.

Believe me,
Your affectionate brother,
F. E. Raven.

PS. — I fear Mr. H. means no good.