Protestant Reformers

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Many faithful reformers were brought to service by our God to overcome the aims of the Papacy by bringing the truths of the Word of God to the people. 

William Tyndale (1494-1536) Continued the powerful work of John Wycliffe in translating the Bible into the English language.  His New Testament was printed in 1526 ant the complete Bible in 1536, the year he was burned at the stake for his faithful work for God.  It is said that the King James Bible of 1611 was 90% unaltered Tyndale translation, which was to a great extent from the work of Erasmus in 1516.  The work of Erasmus corrected many former versions, and the sense was more clearly rendered. 

Tyndale fearlessly preached his convictions; urging that all doctrines be tested by the Scriptures.  To the papist claim that the church had given the Bible, and the church alone could explain it, Tyndale responded, "Do you know who taught the eagles to find their prey?  Well, that same God teaches His hungry children to find their Father in His Word.  Far from having given us the Scriptures, it is you who have hidden them from us; it is you who burn those who teach them, and if you could, you would burn the Scriptures themselves."  D'Aubigne', History of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century, B. 18. ch. 4

John Knox (1513-1572) brought the truths of the Bible to Scotland.  When brought face to face with the queen of Scotland, in whose presence the zeal of many a leader of the Protestants had abated, John Knox bore unswerving witness for the truth.  He was not to be won by caresses; he quailed not before threats.  The queen charged him with heresy.  He had taught the people to receive a religion prohibited by the State, she declared, and had thus transgressed God's command enjoining subjects to obey their princes.  Knox answered firmly: "As right religion took neither original strength nor authority from worldly princes, but from the eternal God alone, so are not subjects bound to frame their religion according to the appetites of their princes.  For oft it is that princes are the most ignorant of all others in God's true religion...If all the seed of Abraham had been of the religion of Pharaoh, whose subjects they long were, I pray you, madam, what religion would there have been in the world?  Or if all men in the days of the apostles had been of the religion of the Roman emperors, what religion would there have been upon the face of the earth?...And so, madam, ye may perceive that subjects are not bound to the religion of their princes, albeit they are commanded to give them obedience."  Said Mary:  "Ye interpret the Scriptures in one manner, and they (The Roman Catholic teachers) interpret in another; whom shall I believe, and who shall be judge?"  "Ye shall believe God, that plainly speaketh in His Word," answered the Reformer; "and farther than the Word teaches you, ye neither shall believe the one nor the other.  The Word of God is plain in itself; and if there appear any obscurity in one place, the Holy Ghost, which is never contrary to Himself, explains the same more clearly in other places, so that there can remain no doubt but unto such as obstinately remain ignorant."  David Laing, The Collected Works of John Knox, Vol. 2, pp. 281, 284.

Much more could be said of such reformers as: Hugh Latimer :1485 - 1555; George Wishart: 1513-1546; Nicholas Ridley: 1500-1555; and Thomas Cranmer: 1489-1556. 

The persecution of Christians by the Papacy continued on through the 17th Century.  Between 1660 and 1675, John Bunyan wrote his books in prison.  John and Charles Wesley, and George Whitefield, brought a major revival to England.  George was converted in 1735; John and Charles in 1738.  All three spent the rest of their lives preaching Christ.  Charles wrote 6,000 hymns and John traveled 250,000 miles on horseback from one speaking appointment to the next.