We know that the church is under a twofold commission: God has sent his people into the world to proclaim salvation and to serve the needy. But he has also called his own from the world to worship and learn of him. Mission without worship can produce empty service, just as worship without mission can lead to careless religion. Thus the church’s life in the world involves a constant conversation: a yes here and a no there. Protestants in nineteenth-century England found society changing so rapidly that they were not always sure whether they were talking to friends or to enemies.
