My dear friends,—When you were formerly in a profession, you took your servants, your apprentices, your children along with you to your places of worship. And now, that you are come to truth, and are convinced that the same is the truth of God, through which you come to have a portion and inheritance of life and salvation, and of a kingdom and world which hath no end [Luke 1:33, Eph 3:21], and into a possession of that which formerly you did profess in words. Now, therefore, friends, you that are come to this possession, and go into the assemblies of the people of God, that are gathered into his name [Mat 18:20], (where salvation is,) and in no other name under heaven, but in the name of Jesus Christ [Acts 4:12]. . . . And then after you may come to find fault with your servants, children, &c. and for a small matter put some of them away, when the fault is in yourselves, that you did not take them along with you to the meetings, and govern them in the wisdom of God, and true understanding and knowledge; which is to know the <23> true God, and his son Jesus Christ, whom he hath sent; whom to know is life eternal [John 17:3]. . . . Therefore rouse up yourselves, that you may exercise the right wisdom and understanding in that which lives for ever, and is and will remain when all the contrary is gone; into which all must be brought; that in that you may be good patterns [Tit 2:7] and examples [1 Tim 4:12] in all your families, and bring them forth with you to your meetings, that they may find the substance of that which you did formerly profess in words. And now you enjoying the substance, be more careful, be more diligent and circumspect, that God may be glorified throughout all your families, and his name may be called upon, and honoured, and exalted, who is God over all, blessed for ever. . . .
<24> . . . . Therefore in it they should train them up in the truth, through which all should be free; not in the eye-service of men, but serving the Lord [Eph 6:6] in righteousness and diligence, in their services: that they may be partakers of the heavenly life, [Heb 3:1?] and come to be heirs of salvation [Heb 1:14], and children of the promise [Gal 4:28], and sons and daughters of Sion, to whom Christ is elect and precious [1 Pet 2:6], and through him their conversations may be brought up into heavenly things, and their minds and affections to be set on things above [Col 3:2]. So friends, all these things consider of in the life which was before death was, in the truth which the devil is out of [John 8:44], in the wisdom of God, which is pure from above [Jas 3:17], and in the righteousness, which was before unrighteousness was, that God may be glorified throughout all your families, who is blessed for ever.
G. F.
Be the first to react on this!
George Fox (1624 - 1691)
Was an English Dissenter and a founder of the Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as the Quakers or Friends. This was a group the Lord started through the ministry of George Fox. God called him apart from all other forms of Christendom in his day because of the lack of Biblical obedience and holiness.The emphasis in George Fox's ministry was firstly prophetic. He called out the people of God to show them that they had the Holy Spirit of God and could be taught of Him and not to solely rely on the teachings of ecclesiastical leaders. Secondly, he spoke directly to many ministers in his day to show them they were hirelings and did not have a true shepherds heart for the people of God rather they were seeking after financial gain.
Founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers). George Fox was born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire, England, the son of Puritan parents. Little is known of his early life, apart from what he wrote in his journal: "In my very young years, I had a gravity and stayedness of mind and spirit not usual in young children. Insomuch that, when I saw old men behave lightly and wantonly toward each other, I had a dislike thereof raise in my heart, and I said within myself, `If ever I come to be a man, surely I shall not do so, nor be so wanton.'"
At the age of 19, he gained deep, personal assurance of his salvation and began to travel as an itinerant preacher, seeking a return to the simple practices of the New Testament. He abhorred technical theology, and preached a faith borne of experience, freshly fed and guided by the immediate presence of the Holy Spirit.
Fox was persecuted almost daily, yet his power of endurance was phenomenal. He was beaten with dogwhips, knocked down with fists and stones, brutally struck with pikestaves, hard beset by mobs, incarcerated eight times in the pestilential jails, prisons, castles and dungeons--yet he went straightforward with his mission as though he had discovered some fresh courage which made him impervious to man's inhumanity.
He undertook as far as possible to let the new life in Christ take its own free course of development in his ministry. He shunned rigid forms and static systems, and for that reason he refused to head a new sect or to start a new denomination, or to begin a new church. He would not build an organization of any kind. His followers at first called themselves "Children of the Light," and later adopted the name "The Society (or Fellowship) of Friends."
Fox preached and traveled for 40 years throughout England, Scotland, Holland, and America. His life demonstrated the truth of his famous saying, "One man raised by God's power to stand and live in the same spirit the apostle and prophets were in, can shake the country for ten miles around."