GOD'S TROUBLE MAKER
Quakerism was born in the fires of revival. In the first of two parts we look at George Fox, the movement's founder
George Fox was born in 1624 in Leicestershire, England, the son of a weaver. His parents were devout churchgoers and one ancestor had been martyred for his faith under Queen Mary.
Fox records how from an early age he was disgusted with all religious hypocrisy and longed for a Christianity that would consume his whole being.
Apprenticed to a shoe-maker, George could not settle, but drifted around the country in a search for God. He sat in orchards and read the Bible, which convinced him that the only true church was the gathering of reborn people. He found no biblical grounds for special buildings, Sunday religion and paid clergymen.
At the age of 23 he finally found salvation through Christ, and with it an experience that today we would probably call being baptised in the Holy Spirit. He saw a vision of heavenly glory, an ocean of light and love flowing out to cover an ocean of darkness. He felt himself made pure within, knew the inspiration and revelations of the Holy Spirit, and was overwhelmed with a longing to save the lost.
This new life, allied to a bold and outspoken nature, was very volatile! He often wandered into a church service and addressed the people after the vicar had ended the sermon. He then fearlessly declared the narrow way of following Christ. Frequently he was set upon by the congregation, beaten, put in stocks, even stoned: but always one or two who had received his words would rescue him, and so he slowly built up a band of followers. On several occasions his wounds were miraculously healed.
Within a short time he had been imprisoned three times. At one of his trials he had urged the court to "tremble at the word of God", and the judge scornfully termed him a 'Quaker' - the name by which his followers have been known ever since.
In 1652 George was in Lancashire when he felt led to climb Pendle Hill. At the top he had a divine vision of thousands of souls coming to the Lord. He set off in the direction shown in the vision and, as a result, came into contact with the Westmoreland Seekers (in present day Cumbria). These were groups of Christians disenchanted with denominational churches, who met together to pray and study the scriptures.
One sermon was preached to around a thousand of these Seekers at Firbank Fell, and a plaque there declares this to be the birthplace of the Quaker movement.
Margaret Fell, wife of a local circuit judge in Cumbria embraced the Quaker cause together with all her family. In later years, after the judge's death, she became Fox's wife. Swarthmoor Hall became the first centre of the movement and the place from which it sent out its first missionaries abroad. It is still a Quaker centre today.
Wherever he went, there was turmoil. The 'common people' heard him gladly, but many of the gentry and clergy did all they could to oppose. At Ulverston, for example, a churchwarden urged the mob to seize Fox. He was kicked and beaten inside the parish church! - and then whipped by constables outside, before being turned over to the crowd, who beat him unconscious.
It is characteristic of Fox that he did his best to wash off the blood, walked three miles to a friend's house where he arrived scarce able to speak. He had no interest in bringing the ruffians to trial.
Other Quaker evangelists endured terrible suffering for the sake of the gospel. They were beaten unconscious, flogged and imprisoned. Quakerism was born in blood. But the more they were persecuted, the more they were sought out - especially by the poor.
George Fox records in his journal that during his imprisonment in Carlisle in 1653 (when he came near to being hanged), the rich came to gawp and triumph, while vermin-infested beggars and thieves showed him love. In time, many of these poor, uneducated folk were transformed by the Holy Spirit into valiant missionaries for Jesus Christ.
Part Two
This article has been extracted from Revival Fires, available online from the Jesus People Shop.
Source: George Fox and the Valiant Sixty, E. Vipont (Hamish Hamilton. London 1975)
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