“It is possible to study — even to study theology — in an entirely secular spirit. I said a little while ago that what religion does is to send a man to his work with an added quality of devotion. In saying that, I meant the word ‘devotion’ to be taken in both its senses — in the sense of ‘zealous application,’ and in the sense of ‘a religious exercise,’ as the Standard Dictionary phrases the two definitions.

A truly religious man will study anything which it becomes his duty to study with ‘devotion’ in both of these senses. That is what his religion does for him: it makes him do his duty, do it thoroughly, do it ‘in the Lord.’ But in the case of many branches of study, there is nothing in the topics studied which tends directly to feed the religious life, or to set in movement the religious emotions, or to call out specifically religious reactions. If we study them ‘in the Lord,’ that is only because we do it ‘for His sake,’ on the principle which makes ‘sweeping a room’ an act of worship. With theology it is not so.

In all its branches a like, theology has as its unique end to make God known: the student of theology is brought by his daily task into the presence of God, and is kept there. Can a religious man stand in the presence of God, and not worship? It is possible, I have said, to study even theology in a purely secular spirit. But surely that is possible only for an irreligious man, or at least for an unreligious man.

And here I place in your hands at once a touchstone by which you may discern your religious state, and an instrument for the quickening of your religious life. Do you prosecute your daily tasks as students of theology as ‘religious exercises'? If you do not, look to yourselves: it is surely not all right with the spiritual condition of that man who can busy himself daily with divine things, with a cold and impassive heart.

If you do, rejoice. But in any case, see that you do! And that you do it ever more and more abundantly. Whatever you have done in the past, for the future make all your theological studies ‘religious exercises.’ This is the great rule for a rich and wholesome religious life in a theological student. Put your heart into your studies; do not merely occupy your mind with them, but put your heart into them. They bring you daily and hourly into the presence of God; His ways, His dealings with men, the infinite majesty of His Being form their very subject matter. Put the shoes from off your feet in this holy presence!” — B.B. Warfield, The Religious Life of Theological Students (1912-1913)