First, all you vintners that sell wine, that keep taverns, or such-like houses; and all you innkeepers, and you that keep victualling-houses, ale-houses, strong-water shops, &c. see that you never let any man or woman have any more wine, ale, strong drink, brandy, or strong waters, or other strong liquors, than what is for their health and their good; <222> in that they may praise God for his good creatures. For every creature of God is good, and ought to be received with thanksgiving [1 Tim 4:4]. . . . <223> . . . .
See what a dreadful wo the Lord pronounced against them, ‘that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink, that continue until night, till wine inflame them: then they call for the harp and the viol, the tabret and the pipe, &c. But such regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands [Isa 5:11f]:’ a sad state! ‘Wo unto them that are mighty to drink wine, and are men of strength to mingle strong drink [Isa 5:2].’ And therefore all to shun such things; all are to be sober, and to mind and fear God, that they may escape these woes: as you may see in Isaiah chap. v.
And therefore all vinters, and such as sell wine, with ale-houses, inns, and victualling houses, who sell ale, brandy, and strong liquors, never let any one have more than doth them good, and is for their health, (as is said before,) so that all may eat and drink the good creatures of God to his praise and glory [1 Cor 10:31]; which drunkards and gluttons cannot, nor they who let them have the creatures of God in excess or immoderately, till they are drunk and surfeited, for such do feed themselves without the fear of God [Jude 1:12].
Secondly. Let all who go under the name of christian families, train up their children in the fear of God [Prov 22:6/Psa 34:11], and keep themselves in the fear of God, that they may keep all their servants and females in the fear of God; out of all looseness and wantonness, and vanities and excess, and from all drunkenness, fornication, whoredom, or uncleanness, and unrighteousness, and all ungodliness; that they may keep out of all those things that displease or dishonour the Lord God [Rom 2:23]. And do not nourish up the lust of the eye, nor the pride of life, nor the lust of the flesh [1 Jn 2:16]; for if you do, you nourish up that which is not of God the Father. And therefore to shun all these evils, and to depart from them, and keeping in the fear of God [Job 28:28]; this is the way to bring the blessing of God upon a land, kingdom, nation, or family.
‘God will destroy them which destroy the earth [Rev 11:18].’ Rev. xi. 18. . . .
G. F.
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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."