John Welsh was a Scottish reformer who showeed remarkable prophetic powers. Samuel Rutherford (1600-1661), one of the most famous of the Scottish reformed theologians, called Welsh: "That heavenly prophetical and apostolic man of God." By all accounts, Welsh was an extraodinarily godly man. It was said of him that "he reckoned the day ill-spent if he stayed not seven or eight hours in prayer." When he became the pastor of the church of Ayr, it was not incommon for him to spend the whole night in prayer at the church.Welsh was also famous for prophesying judgements over individuals. On a number of occasions, he prophesied the loss of house and property to individuals who refused to repent. These judgements came true.The most famous incident in Welsh's life occoured while a godly young man, the heir of Lord Ochiltree, captian of the castle of Edinburgh, was staying at Welsh's house. He fell sick there and, after a long illness died. Welsh had great affection for the man and was so grieved by his death that he would not leave the young man's body. After twelve hours, some friends brought a coffin and attempted to put the body into it. Welsh persuaded them to wait. He stayed with the body a full 24 hours, praying and lamenting the man's death. Again they attempted to put the body into the coffin, but he refused to let them. They came again 36 hours after the death of the young man, now angry with Welsh. He begged them to wait twelve more hours. But after 48 hours, Welsh still refused to give up the body!At this point, Welsh's friends were besides themselves. They could not understand his strange behavior. Perhaps he thought they young man had not really died but had succumbed to some kind of epileptic fit. So the friends summoned physicians to the room in order to prove to Welsh that the young man was truly dead. With their instruments, they pinched the body of the young man in various places and even twisted a bow string about the corpse's head with great force. No nerve in the body of the corpse responded to all these mesaures. The physicians pronounced him dead. One last time, Welsh persuaded both friends and physicians to step into the next room for an hour or two.Welsh fell down on the floor beside the body and cried to God with all of his strength. The dead man opened his eyes and cried our to Welsh, "Oh sir, I am all whole, but my head and my legs." He was restored to his life and healed of his long illness. The only ill effects he suffered were in his legs where they had been pinched by the physicians and around his head where they had twisted the bow string. Later this man became Lord Castlestuart, the Lord of a great estate in Ireland.
