A PROPHECY BY JESSE KERSEY

A Sermon Delivered by JESSE KERSEY Delivered at New York Yearly Meeting, 1845, recalled from memory by Joseph Lafetra
The Journal, Vol. II No. 47 (12th month 23, 1874,) page 371.

This is The Quaker Homiletics Online Anthology, Part 3: The 19th Century

I find among my papers the following memorandum made by the worthy and esteemed minister of Shrewsbury, N.J., whose name it bears. I give it to The Journal under the impression that it will be read with satisfaction at this time, when there seems to be evidence of renewed interest in the society, and an apprehension that it is tending toward an epoch of more widely diffused influence, and of an adaption to the requirements of advancing truth, and to the legitimate demands of the age.

J.L.B.

"It is a source of consolation and calls for our gratitude to the great head of the church, that he hath through all the sittings of this large Yearly Meeting preserved so general a harmony of feeling. We have great cause to trust that his care and special regard will be continued to his militant church. I think I have seen in the light of truth that this people will be blessed and increased, although there may first be some scattering; but the testimonies of truth will subsequently be raised, and will spread and flourish, so that from the East to the West, and from the North to the South of this vast continent, the reign of the Messiah will be established in the hearts of the inhabitants. There shall be no more slavery, neither shall there be any war. They shall be an ensign to the nations of the earth, and they shall be called the people of God. Traveling will be so far facilitated that there will be easy access from the most remote to the most central points on this continent; that representatives will be appointed from all the Yearly Meetings to assemble at each place, where they will agree on rules of discipline; and that four Quarterly Meetings will constitute one of those Yearly Meetings."

The foregoing as near as I can remember wee the expressions of Jesse Kersey near the close of the last sitting of Friends' Yearly Meeting, in Rose Street Meetinghouse, New York, in 1845.

Joseph Lafetra