The great Puritan pastor, Richard Sibbes, spoke of the Reformation as ‘that fire which the entire world shall never be able to quench’; a bright and blazing gospel rediscovery that shone around the world.
Perhaps Sibbes remembered the prophecy of the Bohemian ‘Morning Star of the Reformation’ Jan Hus (the surname means ‘goose’), who, at the stake, warned his executioners, ‘You are now going to burn a goose, but in a century you will have a swan which you can neither roast nor boil’. 102 years later, Martin Luther, whose family seal was a swan, nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. Luther’s Reformation in Germany was the firstfruits of the rest of Europe. Perhaps Sibbes remembered the words of the English bishop, Hugh Latimer, spoken to his friend Nicholas Ridley in 1555. The two men were tied to the stake in Oxford’s Broad Street, and as the lighted fagot was laid at Ridley’s feet, Latimer encouraged him: ‘Be of good cheer, Ridley; and play the man. We shall this day, by God’s grace, light up such a candle in England, as I trust, will never be put out.’
The courage and conviction that drove the likes of Hus, Luther, Ridley, and Latimer to theological revolution, ecclesial reform and even martyrdom found its source in the simple gospel of salvation in Christ alone, by grace alone, through faith alone, revealed in Scripture alone. For long years buried and distorted by the medieval Roman Catholic church, the gospel was rescued: a glistening gem from the mud of indulgences, papal corruption, and (most importantly) a perverse system of salvation by human effort. The lives, work, and brave deaths of these men and women are the heritage of every believer whose faith is that, in Christ, we have a gracious God.
