[GO FORWARD IN THE NAME OF THE LORD - A FAREWELL MESSAGE TO ELIZA PAUL GURNEY]

A Summary of a Sermon Delivered by WILLIAM FORSTER, Liverpool, 1850, at a special Meeting called on the eve of her return to the U.S. following the death of her husband, Joseph John Gurney.
Mott, Richard F., ed. Memoir and Correspondence of Eliza P. Gurney. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1884.


This is The Quaker Homiletics Online Anthology, Part Three: The 19th Century.

"Great peace have they that love thy law, and nothing shall offend them." Although I cannot always appropriate this promise to myself, yet I think t have been enabled to rejoice in it on thy account, my dearly beloved sister, believing that thou art one of those who do indeed love the law of the Lord, and that thou hast been faithfully endeavoring, since thou hast been called from thy kindred and thy native country, to yield obedience to its manifested requirings, in doing which thou hast known the blessed promise abundantly verified. Great peace has been thy portion, and nothing has been able to offend thee. And I have felt comforted in the persuasion that, in following the leadings of thy Lord and Master, who is now taking thee from us for a season, thou wilt continue to witness the fulfilment of this gracious assurance; so that whatever trials may be permitted to assail thee, the angel of His presence shall encamp round about thee and nothing be permitted to offend.

The memory of the just is blessed and will not decay. Very precious has been the remembrance of our tenderly beloved departed brother since we have been assembled together on this very interesting and to me deeply affecting occasion; for I feel that I am parting with a precious sister,--a sister in the unchangeable truth, a sister dearly beloved in the Lord. Ah, I believe our dear departed brother has been very near to many of us at this time, and I have rejoiced in thinking how thy various steppings since thou wast written "widow and desolate" would have been approved by him, how entirely he would now sanction this step; so that, in a little fresh faith and confidence, I can bid thee go forward in the name of the Lord, believing assuredly that He will never leave thee nor forsake thee; for He has promised (and His promises are yea and amen forever)that He will be with His children always, even unto the end of the world. Yea, and I believe He will again and again put the new song into thy mouth, even praises unto His great and ever-excellent name.