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George Fox
George Fox (1624 - 1691). English Dissenter, founder of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire. Apprenticed as a shoemaker, he left home at 19, seeking spiritual truth amid Puritan and Anglican tensions. In 1647, after visions and direct experiences of God, he began preaching an “inner light” accessible to all, rejecting clergy and formal worship. By 1652, he gathered followers in northern England, forming the Quakers, known for pacifism and simplicity. Fox traveled across England, Ireland, the Netherlands, and America, enduring eight imprisonments for his beliefs, including at Lancaster Castle. He wrote Journal (1694) and numerous letters, shaping Quaker theology with calls for equality and justice. Married to Margaret Fell in 1669, a key Quaker leader, they had no children, but she had eight from her prior marriage. His 1660 Declaration rejected violence, influencing conscientious objection. Fox’s emphasis on personal revelation transformed Protestantism, and his writings remain central to Quaker thought.
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Sermon Summary
George Fox encourages believers to not fear the powers of darkness but to maintain unity and love through the power of God. He emphasizes the importance of meeting together in faith, recognizing the eternal nature of Christ, the second Adam, who transcends earthly struggles. Fox urges friends to remain faithful in God's life and power, allowing Christ to reign among them and fostering a community rooted in peace and love. He highlights the transformative power of God's word, which saves and strengthens the soul against opposition. Ultimately, he calls for a collective commitment to live in the love of God, which builds up the body of Christ.
Epistle 23
Friends,—Fear not the powers of darkness, but keep your meetings, and meet in that which keeps you over them; and in the power of God ye will have unity. And dwell in love [1 Jn 4:16] and unity one with another, and know one another in the power of an endless life [Heb 7:16], which doth not change. And know the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, which is above the first Adam, the earthly [1 Cor 15:47], where all strife and transgression is. And all Friends every where, be faithful in the life and power of God, and keep your meetings (above all the world) in that which changes not, that nothing but Christ may reign among you, the power of God, and wisdom of God [1 Cor 1:24], the sanctification and redemption; that the just over all may reign, and the seed of God may have the dominion in you all; that with that ye may all be ordered to the glory of God, and kept in the bond of peace [Eph 4:3], and reign in the love of God, (which is out of the iniquity, and rejoiceth not in it,) which thinks no evil [1 Cor 13:5f]. And have this love shed abroad in all your hearts [Rom 5:5], and feel it abiding in you; which love of God edifies the body [Eph 4:16]. And know the word of God abiding in you, which was in the beginning [John 1:1], and brings to the beginning; which word being ingrafted [Jas 1:21], it saves the soul, and hammers down, and throws down, and burns up [Jer 23:29] that which wars against it. G. F.
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George Fox (1624 - 1691). English Dissenter, founder of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire. Apprenticed as a shoemaker, he left home at 19, seeking spiritual truth amid Puritan and Anglican tensions. In 1647, after visions and direct experiences of God, he began preaching an “inner light” accessible to all, rejecting clergy and formal worship. By 1652, he gathered followers in northern England, forming the Quakers, known for pacifism and simplicity. Fox traveled across England, Ireland, the Netherlands, and America, enduring eight imprisonments for his beliefs, including at Lancaster Castle. He wrote Journal (1694) and numerous letters, shaping Quaker theology with calls for equality and justice. Married to Margaret Fell in 1669, a key Quaker leader, they had no children, but she had eight from her prior marriage. His 1660 Declaration rejected violence, influencing conscientious objection. Fox’s emphasis on personal revelation transformed Protestantism, and his writings remain central to Quaker thought.