500th Anniversary of Tyndale's Translation of the New Testament

Direct link: https://youtu.be/ZEAl5iOyY6c?si=PpAa86Ddi9n37aHO

2026 marks the 500-year anniversary of the publication of William Tyndale’s English Translation of the New Testament.

Tyndale was the first to translate the New Testament Scriptures into English from the original Greek.

When the British Library paid over one million dollars, some years ago, for one of the last remaining copies of a Tyndale New Testament— only 3 are known to still exist—they stated that “This is the most important book in the English language.” That is quite a statement especially with how many historical books there are!

When Tyndale published and then smuggled his New Testaments into England, it furthered a renewal of faith in Christ, which had already been ignited by the Reformation. 

The ability to read for oneself such verses as: “It is by grace you are saved through faith… it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one may boast” (Eph. 2:8), opened the spiritual eyes of many that faith in Christ was what was called for, meanwhile undermining things like rituals, penance, and indulgences, which were born not of Scripture but of the religious system.

That renewal spread far and wide and his English New Testament fueled the fires of faith, causing the British Isles to become known for a time in history as “People of the Book.” 

It furthermore codified the English language into a comprehensive whole while helping spread literacy throughout England. These things made it most important, yet most dangerous.

Because of the Oxford Constitutions of 1408 that made it illegal to translate the Bible into English, Tyndale was forced to flee England and he subsequently met with Martin Luther in Germany.

Luther’s German translation was a great aid for Tyndale in finishing and then publishing his New Testament. It was from Worms, Germany where Tyndale first published his New Testament in 1526, and then had printed copies shipped and smuggled into England.

His task was most dangerous because “the powers that be” a phrase coined by Tyndale himself by the way, sought to rid the earth of him and continued to hunt him down even after he fled England. 

He was finally caught, and after being imprisoned for some time, was brought to the stake where he was strangled and then burned in a public execution in Vilvoorde, Belgium. All for his efforts to give the English the Word of God in their own language, but not before Tyndale led his jailer and the jailer’s family to Christ, as well as praying these powerfully prophetic final words as he was about to be executed, “Lord, open the King of England’s eyes!”

Not only was Tyndale burned, but his New Testaments were bought up and burned by Tunstall, the Bishop of London, in his fanatical quest to stop the spread of the Word of God and the Reformation.

The Bible, according to “the powers that be,” must be kept in Latin. Since hardly anyone except a few elites knew Latin, the few elites of the cloth could  interpret it and stay in control.

The New Testament in the language of the people undermined their money-making schemes: From selling indulgences, which is paying for forgiveness and reduced time in Purgatory, to things like the adoration of relics, which were old bones and such allegedly belonging to Saints. Give a donation while adoring a relic and voilà, more reduced Purgatory time. These relic claims got so fanciful they even claimed to have a twig from the burning bush of Moses and a hair from Jesus’ head… yeah, sure who had the gall to sneak up on Jesus and pull out a hair out of his head and then kept it for the next 1500 years… the more time that passed, it seemed the more ludicrous these relic claims became! 

According to Oxford and Reformation Scholar Diarmaid MacCulloch, only three Tyndale New Testaments remain because people who got them back in the 16th Century were reading them so voraciously, they wore them out. Furthermore, they had to keep them hidden since they were illegal contraband Bibles. Constant reading and turning pages alongside hiding, for example, under a bed or in a bushel of hay, didn’t help perpetuate their longevity.

Interestingly however is that Tunstall’s fanatical burning of the Bibles backfired in numerous ways. Many were outraged that a man of the cloth would actually burn the sacred Scriptures, causing public sentiment to turn against him. 

In addition, the money used to buy up the Bibles was secretly given to Tyndale who published more of them as a result. When Thomas More inquired about who was funding Tyndale, it was answered that “the Bishop is! The money he is using to buy up the Bibles is secretly being given to Tyndale to print more!” 

Tyndale was influenced by the Reformation and went from being a priest who was just religious to having a conversion that brought him into a relationship with Christ based upon faith and grace. Tyndale writes: “Take no account of your works, be they either good or bad, faith in Christ is everything.”

Right before he was executed, Tyndale  prayed out loud:  “Lord, open the King of England’s  eyes.” Three years later King Henry the Eighth had Tyndale Bibles placed in all the churches in England so that all could read them! 

The Reformation caused a renewal of faith and led in time to revivals, renewal movements, missionary movements, evangelism, prayer movements, as well as raising up preachers, bringing about social reforms, and as stated, Bible translations. 

It spread across the channel into the UK from Germany and then in time came across the Atlantic, leading to the birth of a new nation called America.

It was a blessing to hear Oxford professor and Reformation scholar  Diarmaid MacCulloch’s recent lecture on Tyndale at St. Paul’s Cathedral, and while I watched the video, I noticed that he covered a lot of the same material that we have ourselves in our own videos on Tyndale featured here, so we encourage you to check them out!

There is a lot more interesting information to learn about in this subject. You can get a good overview in our videos from our new Tyndale and Other Translators of the Bible playlist on YouTube and other platforms.
 
A Note on Creating Content

When I was attending Fuller Theological Seminary I did a concentration—what you would call a major elsewhere—in Christian History. 

There was so much material to cover that a clear brief view of the person, or topic, was often obscured in the fog of extraneous details. 

I was thinking that it would be great if  there were some videos that would briefly explain certain figures and events in Christian History, that focused on the major aspects about them and their role. Especially since not everyone wants to read some lengthy, not very riveting, giant tome, just to get an idea of how the Lord may have worked through a particular historical figure.

The idea of doing short videos on some of these topics stayed with me… As I thought about that, I discerned the Holy Spirit impressing me with: You could do that!

The Lord subsequently took us through a journey that had us learning to shoot and edit videos. Editing is not as exciting as watching paint dry but … almost 😅!

As we have ministered in Europe over the years it has also served as something akin to attending another Spiritual Seminary as we have been led to visit certain key places and sites where events in Christian History actually took place, which has in turn driven us deeper into learning more about these subjects.

As a result, we have both been touched by the grace of God and the testimonies of those who encountered the Lord’s grace and mercy including in the Reformation!

We have thus made quite a few videos on that topic, and many others including Revivals, and have also recently made a “Reformation Playlist.”

The Reformation is an important event and, as stated above, it led to: Revivals, Renewal Movements, Evangelism, Raised up Preachers, Prayer Movements, Missionary Movements, and on and on, and even led to the birth of a new nation.

We are seeking to make clearer the connecting threads of the work of the Holy Spirit through the History of the Faith. 

Take a little time to check out some of our videos here, especially the main one featuring Tyndale, as it will give you a good overview in a short amount of time.

We would appreciate you considering donating to help us in our unique ministry that ranges from ministering renewal in the power of the Holy Spirit, to teaching and preaching, to doing evangelism, as well as teaching and making videos and other things on Christian History like this. Click here to give:https://www.graceworldmission.org/contact_us.htm

Thank you for all your support.
Love and blessings
Bryan and Mercedes Marleaux
www.graceworldmission.org
https://linktr.ee/graceworldmission

500th Anniversary of Luther's New Testament

Happy Reformation Day!

Photo reflections back from the 500-year Anniversary of the Reformation where a quarter million people flooded the little town of Wittenberg in Germany! 

October 31st is the 505th year anniversary of the Reformation, and it was also just the 500th year anniversary of Martin Luther’s translation of the New Testament into the German language.

 

A Little Background

 

We may take the easy access we have to the Bible today a little too much for granted. After all, we can just open an app on our phone, and we can have the Bible right there at our fingertips.

 

However, it was not always so easy for the common person to access the Bible. In fact, the Bible had become shuttered from access during the Medieval Period. The Catholic Church forbade the laity to even own or possess the Bible at the Synod of Toulouse in 1229, on the pain of torture and death, which many indeed ultimately endured. Vernacular translations were also opposed and only the Latin Vulgate was permitted for the Scriptures.

 

Since Latin was already a dead language, it was another barrier used to prohibit access to the Scriptures. As Oxford scholar David Daniell puts it, “It might as well have been in Chinese for all the good it did being kept in Latin! Very, very, few people could read Latin!”

 

Instead of the Scriptures “The Little Hours of Mary” were proffered which promoted the cult of Mary worship, church rituals, and generated money through stipulated donations. 

 

Enter Martin Luther 

 

Martin Luther had endured a long and difficult spiritual journey after entering the monastery in 1505. In fact, he felt further from God after going down the path of the prescribed rituals of the religious system than when he had first become a monk.

 

In all earnestness, Luther had sought to follow all the prescribed rituals dictated by the religious system and constantly confessed his sins as required. For, according to Catholic teaching, each and every sin must be confessed to be forgiven. Luther kept remembering things he’d done even as a small boy, and he came and confessed so much—once spending 17 hours at the confessional—his superior finally blew up at him saying: “Why don’t you go out and commit some real sins and come back when you actually have something to confess!” 

 

He was finally sent away from the monastery—as a way to offer him some distraction and get him out of their hair—and was thus directed to go into study of the Bible as a form of diversion.

 

It should not be assumed that this was normal activity during this time. Reading the Bible was not practiced, neither by those in the priesthood nor the laity. As mentioned previously, the Catholic Church had banned the laity from even owning or in any way having possession of a Bible at the Synod of Toulouse in 1229. Reading the Bible was reserved exclusively for those elite few who were considered theologians established in the hierarchy of the church. Only they were allowed to read and interpret it and had to stay in line with the papacy.

 

Luther was sent to study the Bible merely as a diversion; he had been a law student formerly so he was able to read Latin.

 

While reading the New Testament himself, Luther came upon passage after passage that declared that simple faith in Jesus Christ was all that was necessary for salvation. This was a complete contrast to what he experienced as a monk.

 

As a Catholic monk, he had grown exhausted and alienated from the heavenly kingdom he had sought. The heavy weight of constant rituals foisted upon him in the monastery did not draw him into relationship with the Almighty but instead created animosity in his heart and the peace with God that he so earnestly sought was nowhere in sight.

 

Here, however, in the very pages of the New Testament, he was finding something completely different from the teachings of the religious system: 

 

There was no requirement to confess all your sins to a priest. Rather the New Testament declared “There is one God and one mediator between God and man… Christ Jesus” 1Tim. 2:5

 

Nor did salvation require good works like the Catholic Church commanded, which included: giving donations to the church, venerating relics, confessing to a priest, praying to saints, vigils, holy water… and on and on! 

 

Rather the Word declared: 

 

“For it is by grace you are saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.” Eph.2:8-9

 

“Then they asked [Jesus] ‘What must we do to do the works God requires?’ Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.’” John 6:28-29

 

The religious system Luther encountered had required rituals and works for salvation as well as to lessen one’s time in purgatory. These things they required however were not found in the teaching of the New Testament. “Purgatory” itself was just another pure invention of Catholicism not found anywhere in Scripture.

 

Simple faith drew Luther into a living and saving relationship with the Savior Jesus Christ.

Luther wrestled with the Apostle Paul’s teaching in Romans about being justified by grace through faith night and day. He finally understood that Christ had paid the price on the cross, for our sins, once for all, and all that is required is to believe upon Jesus!

 

When he finally understood this the Holy Spirit came upon him, and his guilt and sin were lifted off his back! He says he was "born again" as he understood that his sin was washed away by simply believing in Jesus Christ! 

 

After being set free and experiencing the liberty of God’s grace, Luther was of no mind to return to the dead rituals of the religious system. 

Luther Nails the 95 Theses

 

He in time drew up some statements or "Theses" to engage some of the church theologians on the wayward path the church had taken. It bears mentioning that Luther did not challenge other doctrines that were still orthodox within Catholicism, and there were still many orthodox foundations. Luther only wanted to challenge where they drifted from the Scriptures especially in regards to salvation. 

 

However, the Ninety-Five Theses he drew up to challenge the errors the church had embraced, set off a spark that soon fanned into an international flame. 

 

After Luther had nailed his Theses to the Castle Church door in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, some students took them and copied and widely distributed them, using the recently invented Gutenberg printing press to reproduce them. 

 

A perfect storm soon erupted fueled forth by the truth based on the Living Word of God and the distribution of this document through new technology. Before he knew what was happening, the Reformation had been ignited and Luther was in the middle of a conflagration.

 

To paraphrase Didier Erasmus, the famous theologian from Rotterdam, this confrontation Luther sparked posed a threat to: The religious establishment’s money-making system as well as the dictatorial nature and infallibility of the papacy.

 

When the Pope got wind of the issue, he said he would “have this drunken German burned at the stake within two weeks!” Although many attempts were made to shut down the emerging Reformation, it continued to roll forward.

The Leipzig Debate

 

A debate was proffered which many in the hierarchy believed would slap Luther down. They figured the renowned Catholic theologian Johann Eck would quickly shut down this simple monk Martin Luther quite handily. 

 

However, Luther rose to the occasion at the Leipzig debate, and was equal match for Eck in his knowledge of Scripture and understanding of Christian history. Luther showed that the church had itself strayed and had contradicted its own earlier councils and teachings during its slide away from the truth in the Medieval Era. 

 

Eck in response accused Luther of being a Wycliffite and a Hussite. Many had attempted to bring reform before Luther’s era, figures such as John Wycliffe in England, and Jan Hus in Bohemia (modern-day Czech Republic), as well as others like early reformer Peter Waldo in France and the Waldensians, who sought to distribute Bibles and pray for the sick. 

 

The Catholic Church had come out against these earlier reformers and continued to persecute those who attempted reform and translation of the Bible. William Tyndale was a contemporary and friend of Luther’s who was arrested and executed for his faith and work in translating and distributing the Bible in the common English language.

 

Luther declared that he himself was indeed a “Wycliffite and a Hussite” throwing caution to the wind! Luther, normally a mild-mannered person, boldly threw himself in with these earlier reformers, even though the followers of Hus and Wycliff had been ordered to be executed by the Pope, this was thus quite a daring thing to say. The Leipzig debate pretty much backfired and Luther’s popularity only seemed to grow.

 

The Diet of Worms

A Diet—a type of trial—was then set up in hopes of quelling the Reformation. Luther would have to answer before the Holy Roman Emperor—the most powerful and important man in the Western world at that time—Luther, a mere peon in contrast, sweated profusely as he was cross-examined in his presence.

 

He was originally told he would be able to explain and defend his writings and teachings. However, after he arrived in the town of Worms, Germany for the Diet, he found he had been lied to and was only given the opportunity to recant or face the consequences.

 

Before the council, while being questioned and cross-examined, Luther was being pressed hard to recant, but in response he finally retorted: “I cannot and will not recant, my conscience is captive to the Word of God, to go against conscience and the Word, is neither right nor safe, I can do no other, here I stand, so help me God.”

 

Luther threw up his hands into the air in the gesture of a knight and marched out to the applause of the Germans and the hissing sneers of the Spaniards—some of which were dyed-in-the-wool fanatics and enforcers of the Inquisition, torturing dissenters of Catholic strictures.

 

Frederick the Wise, the Elector Prince of Luther’s German region of Saxony, who was on the council judging Luther, saw that he was merely returning to the true roots of the Christian faith and declined to condemn Luther, as did some others in the Diet, but a rump of the Diet still voted to condemn him as a heretic.

 

During the night, however, the Bundeschuh—the sign of the peasants’ revolt—was placarded on the wall of the building where the Diet was taking place. This was a serious threat from the people that if Luther was arrested there in Worms, there would be rioting by the people. This sent the Diet into a panic. To appease the peasants—to whom Luther was becoming a hero—he was allowed to return home to Wittenberg and would be remanded into custody later to face the consequences of being condemned as a notorious heretic.

 

Frederick the Wise knew fanatics and assassins would be waiting for an opportunity to murder Luther on his return home, so he arranged for some of his own knights to hold up and kidnap Luther shortly after he embarked on his return home, so as to secretly take hold of him and hide and protect him.

 

The knights grabbed him shortly after he left the town of Worms, and with much yelling and cussing—purposely making a loud ruckus—they then had different knights ride off in different directions, while having Luther hidden and taken away to an old, abandoned castle, making sure no one followed after them.

Luther Translates the New Testament at the Wartburg

For ten months Luther was hidden away, holed up in the abandoned Wartburg Castle in Eisenach, Germany, where he testifies to experiencing some heavy and serious spiritual warfare. He says the attacks of men, including other priests and the pope railing against him and everything else he had endured, paled in comparison to the onslaught of Satan’s attacks on him while alone in the Wartburg. Isolated and without other things to distract his attention, Luther took on the great task of translating the New Testament into the common German tongue and completed his translation while he was there at the Wartburg.

 

Luther wanted others to see the clear teaching of the New Testament for themselves and see that: The Scriptures teach that Jesus Christ alone is the Savior! That Jesus Christ alone is the one Mediator between God and man. That one only need come to Christ in faith for salvation. These simple declarations became foundations of the Reformation and led to later revivals.

 

His publication of the New Testament spread a return of the true roots of the Christian faith throughout Germany and Europe and fanned the flames of the Reformation and spawned numerous revivals later. 

 

Jan Hus’s Prophecy Fulfilled

After the Diet of Worms in 1521, with Luther still at the Wartburg and his popularity seeming to only increase, the time passed and the possibility of safely arresting him was even less viable and was eventually abandoned, thus fulfilling the prophecy of Jan Hus, the Bohemian reformer, from a century before. 

 

Hus had attempted during his time to reform the wayward religious system of his day, and as he was about to be executed and burned at the stake for seeking to bring these reforms, he spoke out and prophesied:

 

“Today you burn me a goose (Hus’s name in Czech meant goose) but in 100 years another [reformer] shall rise, he shall be a swan, him you will not be able to burn nor boil!”

 

Hus was martyred in 1415. It was one hundred years later in the year 1515 when Martin Luther began to study Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, which led to his conversion. This encounter with God and His grace during Luther’s born-again experience set off the chain of events which fomented into the Reformation. 

Luther pictured with a swan

The Holy Spirit had opened Luther’s eyes to the salvation which is given freely through faith in Christ and the justification given by His grace. Try as they might they were not able to kill this swan. In his later years, Luther often had himself pictured in paintings with a swan next to his side, showing that God had fulfilled Hus’s prophecy through him!

 

 

These are some videos we’ve produced are helpful to learn a bit more about Martin Luther:

 

Martin Luther and the Reformation 

 

Martin Luther: Born Again into Amazing Grace 

 

The Priesthood of All Believers 

 

Luther quotes on the need to be filled with the Holy Spirit (short video with notable quotes)

The Reformation Spreads: Playlist of Reform Spreading into other Areas.

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King James and the Authorized Version of the Bible and Its Ties to the Reformation

This year is the 504th Anniversary of The Reformation and the 410th Anniversary of the King James Bible. Along with the Reformation igniting a widespread return to biblical faith throughout Europe, with the realization that it is Jesus Christ who saves and not the religious institution, there were also a number of Bible translations that came forth. This would result eventually in the publication of the King James Bible later in England. 

The following is a brief overview of how that came about. 

King James and the Bible 

King James had been taught from his earliest days by a Protestant tutor. Thus raised as a Protestant, the new King in England, who for the first time ruled both England and Scotland, was approached by a group of Puritans who brought forth a number of requests known as the Millenary Petition, a document signed by one thousand Puritans. 

The Puritans originally were a revival movement in England that came out of the Reformation, whose name indicated a desire to purify the Church and return completely to the New Testament. 

Though raised as a Protestant, King James still had a lot of his own ideas, and he viewed the Puritans as quite extreme. 

He would, however, grant one of the Puritans’ requests and publish an authorized official version of the Holy Bible. 

This one request King James granted became his most enduring legacy. The King James Bible, known in England as the Authorized Version and in America as the King James Version, became renowned throughout the English-speaking world for centuries, and from its publication to our present day it has been widely used. 

Martin Luther’s Influence on the English Reformation 

Martin Luther was reading the book of Romans when he experienced the grace of God that is given through faith in Christ. Luther had suffered under the burden of performing the ongoing rituals prescribed by the Catholic Church to merit salvation. However, he came into a place of liberty and freedom in Christ having the heavy burden lifted off when he read about the forgiveness and grace given to us when we just put our faith in Christ and receive the grace and forgiveness He gives through His work on the cross. 

Luther began teaching on this amazing grace after his born-again experience and also drew up a list of things he wanted to challenge and debate with other theologians regarding the errors the Catholic Church was teaching. He tacked this list, called the Ninety-Five Theses, to the Castle Church door in Wittenberg on October 31st in 1517. 

Luther’s Theses sparked The Protestant Reformation, igniting a widespread return to faith in Christ in Europe, with the realization that it is Jesus Christ who is the one who saves, not the religious institution. The New Testament teaching that salvation is a gift given through faith in Christ by grace, not by religious performance of rituals, spread far and wide in Europe. 

Repercussions Across the Channel 

The Reformation’s impact eventually began to come across the English Channel into Great Britain and it was regularly discussed at Cambridge University. 

One of the places in Cambridge that held lively discussions on the topic was a pub known as the White Horse Inn, where long discussions would take place late into the evenings. Cambridge became known as a Little Germany and Little Wittenberg due to the adoption of Reformation truths. 

Those that were able to read the New Testament, saw that Luther was just drawing from its central teaching and merely saying that Christ has paid for our sin on the cross already, which is to be received by faith and is not something that we can earn or work for by performing religious rituals, nor can this forgiveness and salvation be merited by any other religious performance nor work. 

Here lay an important problem though, as the religious institution of the day, the Catholic Church, saw to it that the Bible was not available. 

They had made it illegal for common people to own or possess the Scriptures in any way. In fact, at the Synod of Toulouse in 1229, the Catholic Church officially forbade the laity to possess the Bible, and from that time onward people were burned at the stake—including women and children—for possession of illegal Bibles or sometimes merely having just some pages of the Bible. 

They also opposed translations into the common vernacular languages. The Catholic Church wanted the Bible kept only in Latin so as to limit who could read it or have access to it. Latin was a long dead language at this point and the vast majority of people, including most of the clergy in the Catholic Church, could neither read it nor understand it. Scholar David Daniell says: “The Bible might as well have been in Chinese for all the good it did forcing it to be kept in Latin.” Because Luther had been studying to be a lawyer before he entered the monastery, he was able to read Latin. 

Luther had made a translation of the New Testament into German while hiding in the Warburg Castle escaping those who wanted his death. His translation further fueled the Reformation. Now people could read for themselves that the New Testament taught that salvation is a gift from God given through faith in Christ. He later finished translating the rest of the Bible into the German language once he was able to return home to Wittenberg. 

William Tyndale 

William Tyndale had been a Catholic priest in England, and like Luther, had also experienced a conversion to Christ and was touched by the grace of God. 

He had spent time studying in Cambridge and having discussions at the White Horse Inn, and being influenced by the Reformation and Martin Luther, wanted to make a Bible translation available in the English language. 

Tyndale had transferred from Oxford to Cambridge because Oxford towed the Catholic line and held in its Constitutions prohibition against the Bible being in the common English language. 

Influenced by the impact Martin Luther had in translating the New Testament into the German vernacular, Tyndale sought to do the same for the English-speaking world. 

He set out to create a translation of the New Testament first, and then the rest of the Bible. In an effort to begin his quest, Tyndale left Cambridge and found favor with a couple who provided him a place to stay and work out in Little Sodbury where he began his work of translation. 

Tyndale eventually came over to Germany to meet with Martin Luther in Wittenberg, after leaving England due to persecution. 

It was shortly after this time with Luther that Tyndale began to have his translation of the New Testament printed first in Worms, Germany, then smuggled into England. 

Tyndale’s pocket-sized New Testaments, which could be easily hidden, became a huge hit in the United Kingdom and caused quite a stir, to the consternation of Woolsey, the Catholic Bishop in London who sought to buy them up so he could burn them. 

This plan of Woolsey backfired in numerous ways. The larger population was outraged that a clergyman would have the outrageous audacity to burn the Holy Scriptures. Furthermore, the seller of the New Testaments had the money secretly sent to Tyndale who printed three times as many of his translation of the New Testaments which further flooded into England. 

Woolsley was shocked when he was told he had actually been unwittingly funding Tyndale through his fanatical efforts to liquidate the Word of God. 

One of the great blessings that Tyndale and Luther both had was the work of Didier Erasmus, a Cambridge professor from The Netherlands who assembled and published a Greek text of the New Testament which gave them accessibility to the original text. 

Thus, Luther and Tyndale made their translations of the New Testament from the original Greek. John Wycliffe, a little more than a century earlier, had made an English translation but only had the Latin version to work from. Wycliffe Bibles also had to be copied by hand, as the printing press had not yet been invented, and most copies were rounded up and burned along with many believers. The invention of the printing press greatly accelerated the Reformation and the distribution of the Scriptures. 

Tyndale and His Dying Words 

Tyndale was persecuted, and was eventually betrayed, arrested, and put to death. His dying words, as he was about to be burned at the stake, were a prayer: “Lord, open the king of England’s eyes.” 

A year after the death of Tyndale, King Henry VIII had Bibles placed in churches to be available to be read by the people. The dying prayer of Tyndale went even further though, when King James later granted the Puritans one request, which was the publication of an authorized version of the Bible, which became known in America later as the King James Bible. 

Scholar David Daniell says the sages and scholars King James assembled to do the work used Tyndale’s translation as their framework, and actually 90% of the King James New Testament is Tyndale’s work. The Lord carried forth this reformer’s effort and prayer into an amazing legacy 

We have numerous videos for more on these subjects: 

• Martin Luther and the Reformation 

• William Tyndale and the English Reformation 

• Wycliffe Morningstar of the Reformation 

• John Knox and the Reformation in Scotland 

• Scotland, John Knox and the King James Bible

• Zwingli and the Swiss Reformation 

• Martin Luther and the Priesthood of All Believers 

• Martin Luther Born Again Into Amazing Grace

"I am a Wycliffite and a Hussite." - Martin Luther

Video: John Wycliffe: Morning Star of the Reformation

Direct link: https://youtu.be/_i-37P2k3nw

We were ministering at a church in London last year, where we experienced a powerful move of the Holy Spirit. Many of the those who came to the meetings got blessed as the Holy Spirit poured out, empowered, healed, and filled those there.
 
We later on in the trip ministered at one of their sister churches in Paris. There was a lot of warfare and difficultly getting to this church in Paris, especially with a crazy parking fiasco, that had us under serious stress and warfare. 
 
The pastor said when we finally got into the building, albeit a bit late, “I believe the Lord will manifest His power as you minister!” That was an encouraging word after such a struggle and distraction.
 
It turned out that he nailed that! The Holy Spirit moved in radical power and some people were knocked backwards, almost looking like they were hit by a bomb blast as the Holy Spirit poured onto them when we prayed for them. We had a revival time as the Lord poured out His power at the service that day.

Sometimes God’s power is strongest when we were are at our weakest, being so ruffled from the parking mess I was quite distracted going in to the service, but surprised and rejoiced by the way the Lord moved! Hallelujah!
 
Well in between ministry, when things are a little calmer, we like to visit, when the opportunity arises, some of the places that tell something about some of the history of the area, especially when it involves something about Christian History, revivals of the past, or the Reformation.
 
We had a few unexpected surprises in that vein on the last trip. One of them was while we were going through London after that aforementioned ministry there, before heading off to France. 
 
We were in the area of the British Library and decided to pop in for a visit.  We’d been there before, but I have figured out over time and visits, that they tend to change their exhibitions of historical books and artifacts quite regularly.
 
As we walked up to the display cases, we were stoked to come upon one of the last remaining Wycliffe Bibles in the world. John Wycliffe is known as the Morning Star of the Reformation, meaning he was a forerunner to many of the things that Martin Luther took on later.
 
The Reformation 
 
When Martin Luther posted his Ninety-Five Theses on the Castle Church door in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31^st, 1517, it turned out that it was the spark that initiated the Protestant Reformation.
 
The Pope’s response to Luther’s Theses was: “Who is this drunken German? I’ll have that heretic burned at the stake within two weeks!” Well, it didn’t really go the way the Pope said, even though popes had done just that with dissenters many times; the Word of God was on Luther’s side and he wouldn’t be so easily silenced.  Many were impacted by the truth Luther was bringing forth and turning back to biblically-based faith and supporting Luther.
 
As Luther’s confrontation of church abuses caught fire and spread, another tactic was tried by Rome: Have Luther debate the Catholic theologian Johann Eck. Known as a master debater, they figured Eck would bury Luther and make quick work of him. 
 
Luther was a Catholic priest himself, but through reading the Bible, his spiritual eyes had been opened to see that the Catholic Church had long since abandoned its roots and substituted a host of money-making schemes like indulgences (papers declaring forgiveness of sins when the proper donation was made which was no less than selling forgiveness) and the veneration of relics (bits of bone allegedly from Saints of the past). These relics, according to the Catholic Church, could confer time off purgatory when viewed along with the always demanded stipulated donation.
 
Rome didn’t realize the depth of insight, wisdom, and knowledge that Luther had garnered from studying the Word of God and they underestimated his ability.
 
Luther rose to the occasion in the debate with Eck and was an equal match in his command of Christian History and scriptural truth. Luther made it clear, citing early Church Councils, that it was none other than the Catholic Church itself, that had strayed from its original roots and teachings.
 
Eck came back with an accusation that Luther was a Wycliffite and a Hussite.
 
During a break in the debate, Luther searched the library to find out that both John Wycliffe and Jan Hus were leaders that had attempted to bring reform in previous centuries before him, but were condemned as heretics for seeking to turn the Catholic Church back to its foundations in the Word. 
 
Hus was burned at the stake, and while Wycliffe had escaped their clutches while alive, his bones were dug up after he died and were burned as well. The implication was clear: Luther better cool it or he could face the same fate. 
 
Instead of shrinking back in fear, Luther came back as the debate resumed and declared boldly: “I am a  Wycliffite and a Hussite!” In the end, the debate only served to elevate Luther’s status, the last thing they wanted.
 
Wycliffe and Hus
 
John Wycliffe and Jan Hus were forerunners of the Reformation.
 
Jan Hus, who was from Bohemia (modern-day Czech Region) was also a Catholic priest who began to see the errors the Catholic Church had embraced and sought to bring reform. Hus was greatly influenced by Wycliffe’s writing and confronted the Pope’s claim that he was a mediator between God and man, which the Pope had made at the Fourth Lateran Council. This meant the Pope was above a normal person and equated himself with the savior. This was a gross contradiction of the Scriptures, which say emphatically that there is only one mediator between God and man: Jesus Christ!
 
Hus also said that it is Jesus Christ who is the head of the church and not the pope, which is of course what the New Testament Scriptures teach in Col. 1:18.  Hus was persecuted and burned at the stake in the year 1415 for his efforts to turn the church back to the Word of God. He actually made a prophecy right before he died: "You are now going to burn a goose, but in a century you will have a swan which you can neither roast nor boil." (Hus' name means goose in the Czech language.) This was fulfilled through Luther 100 years later. Luther has been pictured with a swan in some paintings to show the fulfillment of that prophecy.
 
John Wycliffe, is known as the Morning Star of the Reformation.
 
Wycliffe lived in the mid and latter 1300’s and attended Oxford University. He was a stalwart figure there and in the church. In fact, Oxford’s early reputation in scholarship owes much to Wycliffe. Over time, Wycliffe saw the way the Catholic Church had drifted away from the anchor of truth in the Scriptures during the Medieval Period. Its wealth and opulence had corrupted it, and it had replaced the Gospel with money-making rituals and superstitions like relics and indulgences and the cult of the saints.
 
This constant drift away from the truth seems endemic in humankind’s very existence. Paul the Apostle had to write, not too long after planting the Gospel in Galatia, quite strongly to the Galatians to deal with their similar drift away from the Gospel and confront their return to clinging to rituals and dead works. This is why the Book of Galatians was a centerpiece in reform and one Luther relied on quite heavily during the Reformation.
 
Much like Luther later, Wycliffe had become quite disturbed by these practices. While reading the Bible Wycliffe, much like other reformers including Luther, found no relics, indulgences, purgatory, saint worship, nor prayers to saints; no holy water, no processions or the like, through which the Catholic Church lavishly garnered lucrative donations. In fact, these were more aligned with pagan practices. Nor did he see that the Pope, nor priests, had the place to confer and issue forgiveness. Like Luther, he saw in the Bible that it was only faith in Christ which was taught as necessary for receiving forgiveness and salvation.
 
He thus felt that he should put the Bible into the hands of the people in their own language that they may see for themselves that it is faith in Christ that brings salvation and not all these rituals the church was using as replacements for the Gospel.
 
Like Martin Luther, and William Tyndale later, Wycliffe thus worked to translate the Scriptures into the vernacular language of the people: in his case the English of Great Britain, and make it accessible to all, not just priests and bishops. 
 
This was a high crime at that time, the Catholic Church at the Synod of Toulouse in 1229 officially forbade the laity to even possess a Bible—yes, as crazy as it sounds, having a Bible according to the Catholic Church was a crime—and they also opposed vernacular translations. They allowed only Latin as the permitted language for the Bible.
 
Latin was a long dead language that very, very, few could read and comprehend. It was obvious that keeping the Bible in Latin could keep the people in the dark regarding all the rituals the Church had used to replace the Gospel. 
 
Wycliffe saw the need for the Bible to be in the language of the people and worked to translate and distribute the Bible to the common person, who he felt could read and understand it and be blessed by it, regardless of the Catholic Church’s prohibitions.
 
He employed common people to help him as well in these endeavors, and in so doing was employing that New Testament practice that Luther highlighted later as well called: “The Priesthood of all Believers.”
 
Wycliffe managed to do all this in the last nine years of his life; God saved the best for last. Like Corey Ten Boon, he served God the most in his latter years, as it is never too late in God’s Kingdom.
 
Wycliffe made a valiant effort in his translating, but the Latin was all he had access to in order to translate the Bible into English. He and his helpers, called Lollards, who he sent out to preach and distribute Bibles, also helped copy the translations by hand, which was a very long, and painstakingly slow process.
 
Luther and Tyndale, roughly a century and a half later after Wycliffe, would have the advantage not only of the invention of the printing press by Gutenberg to make copies of the Bible they translated, but they also had access to a Greek text of the New Testament that had been recently assembled and published in their time by Desiderius Erasmus. Those advances greatly helped further their efforts and fanned the spread of the Reformation, which in turn spawned revivals in later times.
 
Wycliffe stands as a Morning Star of the Reformation, a forerunner in his effort to bring reform and make the Bible available in the language of the people. His efforts made a great contribution and helped lay a foundation for the later Reformation and subsequent revivals.