The Mayflower Pilgrims

Mayflower Pilgrims

YouTube video: https://youtu.be/ehXwF_eXHqY

We have been ministering in Europe recently and one of the places where we ministered was in England. We also had a chance to visit the coast before our next ministry commitments in Germany and France. 

We were blessed to stop by the coastal town of Plymouth, made famous because it was from that very place that the Pilgrims set sail in the Mayflower in 1620 to the New World.

After a harrowing journey of several weeks crossing the Atlantic Ocean, where they experienced heavy storms and horrible seasickness, they finally made landfall off the coast of Cape Cod in a place they named Plymouth, after the town where they had sailed from in England.

It was a rough journey for those on board, most of who were believers influenced by the Reformation, known as Puritans. Many of this particular group of Puritans were Separatist Puritans who didn’t feel reform could be achieved from within the establishment Church.

They were greatly influenced by Puritan preachers in England who were emphasizing the Great Commission and thus felt the need to help spread and establish the Gospel of Christ in other parts of the world, particularly in the New World.

Because of this, they were willing to endure the suffering that came with the journey and life in the New World, and thus sustained in this first permanent colony. Other colonies had been attempted before them, such as Jamestown, but most people froze or starved to death and those previous colonies fell apart. 

The Mayflower Pilgrims’ Colony became the first permanent colony and thus the reason they are looked back upon as important spiritual pioneers of what would become America. 

These were Christian believers who, influenced by the Reformation, sought to extend the Gospel into the New World, as well as the freedom to worship as they desired. Furthermore, they had good relations with the Native People for many decades and many scholars say that this lasted for at least 80 years. 

These first Pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower declared in their Compact that they had undertaken this journey, “for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith.”

As we celebrate Thanksgiving Day, let us be thankful for the willingness and sacrifice of these believers to risk their very lives in order to spread the Gospel of the Kingdom, thus laying a rich spiritual foundation that later helped give birth to the United States of America. 

Other videos on this topic:

• Plymouth's Pilgrims and their Christian Faith
• Martin Luther and the Reformation
• The Great Awakening 
• The Reformation and Revival and America's Roots

Happy Thanksgiving! The Reformation Simplified and the Early Pilgrims of America

Video: Plymouth's Pilgrims and the Christian Faith

Direct link: https://youtu.be/xRM3-jqexe0

As big a concept as “The Reformation” may sound, it really boils down to just a simple thing, which is those back in history who had personally experienced God’s grace and wanted to share it with others! 

 

Those reformers back in the Medieval Period who experienced this amazing grace saw that it was the central theme of the New Testament. They thus wanted others to know the truth but instead were met with resistance, a stubborn refusal to listen, and persecution. 

 

Grace is inherently free: its meaning in the Bible is “unmerited favor”. This grace is given freely to us simply through faith in Christ and not by any works or any performance of our own: 

 

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith —and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

 

Then they asked him, “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)

 

“My Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” (John 6:40) (There is a long list of Scriptures like this, which speak of God’s grace and mercy which we have compiled. You can have a free booklet of them sent to you by emailing us at info@graceworldmission.org).

 

Instead of receiving that grace themselves, stubborn adherence to dead traditions and rituals that garnered lucrative donations kept the institutional Church from listening and caused them to reject the truth.

 

Jesus and the Pharisees 

 

This is a story that goes all the way back to Jesus and the Pharisees: Christ appears on the scene fulfilling prophecy after prophecy to demonstrate who He is. He first speaks the truth in love, many receive His message and mercy, but the Pharisees—who are the religious leaders of that time—are so entrenched in their traditions and rituals that they attack Him instead of listening, so Jesus must confront their wayward behavior: 

 

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.” (Matthew 23:13)

 

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are…” (Matthew 23:15)

 

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness…You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.” (Matthew 23:23-24)

 

Jesus admonished his followers not to act like them: 

 

“All their works they do to be seen by men... They love to sit uppermost at feasts, and to have the chief seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the markets, and to be called Rabbi by men. But you shall not suffer yourselves to be called Rabbi. For one is your Master, that is, Christ, and you are all brethren. And call no man upon the earth your father, for there is but one your Father, and he is in heaven. Do not be called teachers, for there is but one your Teacher, and he is Christ. He who is greatest among you will be your servant. But whosoever exalts himself, shall be brought low. And he who humbles himself, shall be exalted.” (Matthew 23:5-12)

 

Jesus offered grace and mercy to all and many received Him, but the Pharisees instead stubbornly held to their traditions and rituals and wouldn’t, so He confronted their errors. 

 

This Pattern Continued Through The Bible 

 

Even in the Early Church there were already tendencies to pollute the Gospel with legalism and works of the law. There were those amongst the Pharisees who had become Christians; however, they tried to then force legalistic burdens on other Christians.

 

The Apostle Peter wouldn’t stand for it for a moment and got up at the Council of Jerusalem and laid out the truth in dramatic fashion:

 

“Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, ‘The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses.’” (Acts 15:5)

 

Peter would have none of it and said:

 

“Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”  Acts 15:10-11 [Emphasis mine]

 

That statement: “No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved.” Is what the Reformation is all about. While speaking the truth about God’s grace, the error which has been embraced and pedaled by the religious establishment must also be confronted. 

 

It is important to notice that the truth about the Gospel was more important than any seeming disruption to so-called unity, the very need for a council shows there was not perfect unity in the first place.

 

This is a microcosm of the Reformation. Just as Peter experienced God’s grace and knew it to be the truth and stood up for it, others in history stood up for it as well and became reformers.

 

Enter Paul the Apostle 

 

Paul had actually been a Pharisee himself but got saved in dramatic fashion on the road to Damascus while on the way to persecute more Christians.

 

Having experienced such amazing grace, he became the emissary of God’s grace. Having been a Pharisee, he disdained any attempt of the Early Church in any way to return to the legalism of the Pharisees.

 

The Letter to the Galatians is itself an epistle of grace that also confronts the pharisaical slide into legalism that was happening in the new church in the region of Galatia. Paul even had to straighten out his contemporary leader Peter in the letter because of Peter’s compromising on this subject.

 

Paul wrote strongly that the Galatian Christians had been saved by grace and that the way in is indeed the way on. They began in grace and must continue on in it, as it is the path to life, liberty, and revival.

 

Paul concludes that we are to live by the Holy Spirit: live a personally revived life in Christ led by His Holy Spirit.

 

Paul’s Words Revived the Body of Christ 

 

Luther and other reformers had experienced this grace and mercy of Christ and simply wanted others in the Body of Christ to know and experience it as well. The Catholic Church, however, like the Pharisees, refused the grace of God and held to its traditions instead, and so like the Pharisees was confronted with its error in the process.

 

Martin Luther had struggled under a burden of rituals and rules for a long, long, dark period as a monk and a Catholic priest himself.

 

He was weighed down under this impossible burden of trying to make payment himself for his sin through rituals of the Church and found no peace at all in the Catholic rituals prescribed to him.

 

But then the light broke forth on him. He was sent away to study the Bible as a way to rid the monastery of his onerous presence since he was a constant bother by always coming to the confessional. (Study of the Bible not being a normal part of the program for the priesthood.)

 

As he was wrestling with Paul’s Letter to the Romans, Luther began to understand that Jesus had taken on our sin on the cross and all he needed to do was believe upon Christ.

 

He says “… I then understood that through grace and sheer mercy [Christ] justifies us through faith in Him. Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn…” 

 

What a heavy burden was lifted off of Luther’s back as he understood that Jesus has paid the price on the cross and one doesn’t need to be under this horrible burden of trying to pay for sin themselves!

 

There in a nutshell is what the Reformation is all about: The grace and love of God is experienced and sought to be shared, but instead the establishment, just like the Pharisees reacting to Jesus, refuse to listen!

 

The Reformation Spread and Formed Revival Movements

 

In spite of opposition from the establishment, the Reformation spread and later formed revival movements.

 

The early Puritans in the United Kingdom were a revival movement, according to historian Sydney Ahlstrom, and are directly tied to the Reformation. Grace to them was something that should be known and experienced in the heart and not mere head knowledge; they thus can be seen as early Protestant mystics. 

 

Persecution and a lack of freedom caused them to seek refuge in a new land across the sea where they could worship as they felt led; this new land came to be called America. 

 

The first sustaining colony in America—others had been attempted earlier like Jamestown and folded—was brought forth by those Puritans, Separatists, and Independents* who came across on the Mayflower. (*Separatists wanted to separate from the Church of England, while others originally wanted to purify it from within, hence the more classical name Puritan, though all three of the above mentioned were of Puritan stock.)

 

They took up the colony “for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian Faith” which they wrote in their charter upon landing at Plymouth Rock. 

 

The Great Commission indeed had been a strong theme amongst Puritan preachers of all branches of Puritan faith in England and motivated this journey of leaving all behind and going like Abraham to a land that they knew not, to be lights for the Gospel in the new world. 

 

America’s first sustaining colony was thus founded by a group of outcasts who had been touched by the Reformation and revival and who came with the goal of advancing the Christian Faith. It has been a land where revivals have taken place ever since.

 

Travel Insights 

 

While traveling through Europe on different mission trips, we have been able to visit some different sights connected with the Reformation and different reformers.

 

We have been to some of the places connected with the Reformers William Tyndale, John Knox, and Martin Luther.

 

Each of these reformers experienced God’s grace and sought to return to the Word of God as the foundation for the Body of Christ. Having experienced the grace of God personally and intimately, they desired that others should also experience this glorious grace of Christ given freely and which comes simply through faith in Christ Jesus.

 

Reflecting on that grace and these reformers, I wrote a little song called Grace Alone about their suffering, which came to me on one of those trips and made a video about it, which you can check out by clicking here. (Direct link: https://youtu.be/m7oDc--KlFk)

 

We also have a video about the Christian Faith of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock which was shot right on location in Plymouth, Massachusetts. You can check it out by clicking here! (Direct link: https://youtu.be/xRM3-jqexe0)

 

 

Thanksgiving Blessings: The Connection of the Reformation to the Early American Colonies

This year marks the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, and as Thanksgiving rolls around, we're taking a moment to look back and see the role the Reformation played in the early origins of America. It was quite a large one, in fact, as The History Channel so pointedly declared on a program about this event: “Without the Protestant Reformation there would be no America.” Quite a statement, so let’s take a look at some of the background:

Though it took some time, the Protestant Reformation eventually began to spread into England during the 16th century. Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses had hit the nail on the head among the European population regarding the abuses of the Catholic Church, and an outcry and demand for reform began to spread to many places.

As a desire for a return to New Testament-based Christianity crossed the Channel into England, Cambridge University began to be known as “The Little Wittenberg” because topics like Luther, the New Testament, and teaching on grace and faith, were so commonly being discussed there.

Amongst those converted to Christ during this time was a Catholic priest named William Tyndale who would, like Luther, champion reform and go on to translate the New Testament into a language that people could actually read (the Catholic Church had said, on pain of death, that the Bible was only to be in Latin, a long dead language even then). Tyndale himself transferred from Oxford to Cambridge because of the openness to reform there. He would end up giving his life for his endeavor of translating the Bible into English and was martyred.

Diverse Protestant groups arose in England including a revival movement called the Puritans. The name did not imply they were trying to be purer than others but rather they sought a return to the pure teaching of the New Testament and sought to purify the Church of unbiblical teachings and papal abuses.

Puritans held to the same basic evangelical core beliefs of most reformed believers: Salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, the only mediator between God and man; the same fundamental New Testament belief that had brought Luther to his conversion after reading the New Testament.

The Puritans, however, also taught that Christ must dwell in, and fill the heart of the believer, mere acquiescence to a doctrinal statement wasn’t sufficient. Christ must dwell in our hearts for mere head knowledge doesn’t replace that living relationship. They thus sought to walk with Christ and were amongst what you could call the first Protestant mystics.

Puritans and their name, however, have been mostly misrepresented; for example:

They were not prudish, dourly dressed prigs, but were actually known to embrace the fashion of the times, and in the colonies often dressed very colorfully.

Also, contrary to popular thought, they were not uptight killjoys who preached against sex, but actually were the first Protestant group to openly espouse that the sexual union between man and wife is a gift of God to be enjoyed with pleasure. They disdained the false concept from Catholicism that sexual union in marriage was only for procreation and a sin if you enjoyed it. Sex, between a married man and woman, was a gift from God to be enjoyed in the bonds of matrimony. They typically had hordes of children as a result.

Furthermore, they despised the Catholic notion that celibacy was some kind of higher calling or that one was more holy by being celibate rather than being married. Christ’s blood alone cleanses us from sin, and makes anyone who believes on Him holy before the Father, clothed in the righteousness of Christ, by grace through faith alone! Nothing more and nothing less! (Rom 3:21, Eph 2:8-10, Heb 10:10)

England felt less tolerant to the Puritans as time went on and a group of them sought to find freedom to worship as they saw fit and departed for the New World on a ship called the Mayflower in 1620.

Once across the sea, they dedicated their new colony “to the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith” in their compact when they reached the shores of Plymouth, even before disembarking the ship and stepping foot on the new world, setting down roots that are clearly Christian!

Historian Latourette says that the Protestant movements that came to early America sought to incorporate Luther’s Protestant teaching on the priesthood of all believers into the basic ethic of life—equality for all—something that had been completely foreign in old feudal Europe, and foreign to the elitism that was intrinsic in heirarchical Catholic religious system .

This concept of human equality before God that Luther drew from the New Testament became a concept in the later American Constitution: “All men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” Historian Sydney Ahlstrom estimates that 70% of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were of Puritan stock.

We were blessed to visit the Puritan church where Benjamin Franklin himself was baptized, while in Boston on a trip a little while ago. It caused us to reflect on such a historical place, looking around there and at the Boston Common, where massive crowds would gather during the revival in the early colonies to hear the preaching of George Whitfield. Benjamin Franklin himself was fascinated by this phenomenon and measured the crowds at approximately 25,000 people who came out to these revival meetings!

Another Historical Moment

We also had another very historical moment just recently in Germany:

October 31st, 2017 was the 500-Year Anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. We were blessed to be in Wittenberg, Germany, for the quincentennial celebration.

The little town ended up being packed with people from all over the world for the celebration of this very momentous event. We ended up having to stay in another town because everything had been booked up far in advance with all the people visiting for the big event.

We were stoked to find out the place we were staying had bikes to rent at a very reasonable price. We figured the 35 mi (56 km) round trip adventure would be good exercise after so many planes, trains, and automobiles on this trip.

So we got up early on the 31st and started biking towards Wittenberg. We passed through some quaint little German towns and farms and enjoyed taking in the sights; however, it seemed like every last store and place of business we passed was closed. We found out later that Oct 31st had been declared a national holiday for all of Germany for the first time in its history.

Then, as we were getting closer to Wittenberg, a huge group of black cars and police with a helicopter hovering overhead, passed by us. We hadn’t known that the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, would be heading into the Reformation city for a special service. Because we were on bikes we got a unique view of all this as we rode in.

It was a blessed time to be there and we had lots of divine appointments with many different people whom we shared with and prayed for as we were equipped to share quotes from Luther and the Bible about the importance of being filled with the Holy Spirit!

There were many special events going on, including many special museum exhibitions, as well as a sound and light show, and a huge panorama exhibition on Luther and the town of Wittenberg by a well-known artist. There was also a big musical play about Luther in Berlin which was broadcast nationwide and actually quoted many Bible verses throughout!

It was quite a unique moment for sure and we believe the Lord was using this occasion to plant many seeds in people’s lives about the Gospel as well as draw many to Himself!

Historical Reflection

Luther is often called the "accidental revolutionary" because of the amazing chain of events that were set in motion by this then unknown monk in a little insignificant town who was touched by the Holy Spirit as he read the truth of the Gospel in the Scriptures. That truth reverberated throughout the land and even crossed the sea with those early Pilgrims coming to the New World, a place that would later be called the United States of America.

For further study:

• Martin Luther and the Reformation video playlist on YouTube
• The Protestant Reformation video playlist on YouTube

Plymouth's Pilgrims and Their Christian Faith

FOLLOWING THE REFORMATION TRAIL

Using some airline miles we were able to start our last trip off by going first to the East Coast of the US for just a small extra fee—“you’re using miles we must charge you something.”

I kept thinking, “I can't believe we got all the way across the country for just 15 bucks, wow, not a bad deal!"

So we were able to stop in New England and see some historical places along the way as we started on our latest mission trip to Europe before we ministered in Scandinavia, England, and France.

One place we visited was in Plymouth, Massachusetts, where the Pilgrims from the Mayflower ship landed in 1620 and started the first sustaining colony in the New World.

A couple of other colonies had been attempted, one in Jamestown that ended with most of the colonists starving or freezing to death and the colony folding. There was also another attempt  at a colony by the French actually, at a Protestant colony called Fort Caroline in what would later become the area of Florida.

That French colony was planted and financed by an influential French Protestant Huguenot sympathizer. However, rabid Spanish Catholic fanatics got wind of it, and led by Don Pedro Menendez De Aviles, they went in and put to the sword and massacred every last person, including women and children.

So, one was facing some pretty stiff odds to attempt another colony: possible starvation, death by freezing, or massacre, none being attractive prospects. That, along with the dangers of crossing the Atlantic, surely would give one pause about leaving the homeland to go and found a new place to live in a wild land across the sea.

Persecution, however, was increasing against those who were fully embracing the Protestant Reformation in England.

The English Church had made some reforms: First under Henry the VIII, but especially under his son Edward when he took the throne; however, when Bloody Mary rose to power, she returned with a literal vengeance back to Catholicism and had Protestants hunted down and executed. Included in her massacres was the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer, amongst many others.

The country would turn back Protestant under her half sister Elizabeth, daughter of Anne Boleyn, but her successor King James from Scotland was indifferent to reform. Even though he had authorized a new translation of the Bible into English, King James was no friend of the Puritans and had no tolerance for them, even though many were beginning to win seats in Parliament.

Those, like the Puritans, who wanted a full reformation, found themselves on the outs (the word Puritan came from their desire to purify the church back to New Testament design).

So, in spite of the grim prospects, the Mayflower set off from England in 1620 after its occupants had tried Holland for a time as a refuge from persecution. These Puritans, Separatists, and Independents aboard the Mayflower, were products of the Protestant Reformation and were under threat as Reform-minded believers in England, who wanted a full Reformation and not half measures.

They were part of the Reform movement, which was a return to biblical faith that was going on in Europe in their day, sparked originally by the influences of people like Martin Luther in Germany. It is remarkable what a chain of events were set in motion when that little unknown monk in Germany named Martin Luther found peace with God and set out to communicate about that. The History Channel recently said in a program on the Reformation and its worldwide impact “without Martin Luther and the Reformation there simply would be no America.”

The Reformation’s influence finally came across the channel to England and grew with William Tyndale, Thomas Cranmer, and others on England’s soil, when those reformers were touched by the Holy Spirit and given revelation of the Gospel.

The Puritans had been a revival movement in England that was sparked by the Reformation. They held to the main principles of the Reformation: salvation by faith through grace, through Christ alone, the Scriptures as the sole authority for matter of faith—no pope nor priest had the right to contradict God’s word.

The Puritans, however, also felt that Christ must touch the heart; mere head knowledge alone about God was not sufficient in their view. Mere cerebral acquiescence to a set of doctrines could not substitute for the reality of experiencing God’s touch in the heart. As stated by historian Sydney Ahlstrom, they could be seen as some of the early Protestant mystics.

They sought to purify and return the church back to a New Testament model like in Acts. There were those Puritans that wanted to reform from within the English Church, and those that wanted to separate (Separatists) or be completely independent (Independents). All of these Puritans though, sought as they put it, to “avoid the errors of popery in the new world.”

Like most movements and denominations, they did get formal later in their history; however, early on, they were vital, alive, and revived!

Those that came across the Atlantic were heavily influenced by the Puritan preachers in England and their focus on the Great Commission.  They were thus inspired and willing to face starvation and brutal winters even with the knowledge of how miserably those before them had suffered and how so many had died.

They were taking quite the huge step of faith. Imagine leaving everything to go to a desolate wilderness where most before you had either starved, or frozen to death, or been massacred.

A quick look at the winter Boston experienced last season with all that snow dumped every few days will give you an idea of just how rough it really could get. We happened to grab a few waves in Maine, and man, that is some very cold water and air over on the East Coast of America and that was not even in winter!

The Puritans came in spite of all the dire prospects, moved by the Great Commission and the hope for freedom to worship as they desired. Another large group of Puritans came across later to what would become Boston, as well as other areas a decade later, making up large parts of the population of the early colonies.

Thus, the Puritan revival movement and its influence loomed large in the early colonies. Their influence would continue to be visible in later revivals through people like Jonathan Edwards in the Great Awakening. Benjamin Franklin himself would be baptized in a Puritan church in Boston.

Coming across the Atlantic, these Puritan Pilgrims, contrary to what you may have been taught in school, actually sought to advance the Gospel in the new world and spread the Christian faith.

In fact their written statement on the Mayflower, which they called a Compact that they drew up and signed aboard the Mayflower declared that they were undertaking the new colony: “…for ye glorie of God and advancement of ye Christian faith…”

“…advancement of ye Christian faith…” is pretty straightforward. The earliest settlers came here and founded the first sustaining colony as believers with a prophetic intention that it would work in God’s design as a place that would advance the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

That original purpose and prophetic intention still remains over this land in spite of all the attack to undermine, and obscure, and blind people, from that truth. 

Through the Holy Spirit’s power we are still to carry that prophetic intention forth and see this land, that has experienced so much revival in the past, be revived again!

Video: Plymouth's Pilgrims and their Christian Faith
Direct link to video: https://youtu.be/xRM3-jqexe0
(We shot this video on location in Plymouth, MA.
It is packed with some good information. Check it out!)

The Great Awakening, the Puritans and their Roots in the Reformation

Check out our video on The Great Awakening

Maybe you had a chance to hear our recent program on Thanksgiving talking about America’s Christian roots that were born out of the Reformation in Germany, an event that spawned the Puritan movement out of England and which in turn was brought to the American Colonies and became the young country’s spiritual foundation (if you missed that one you can still hear it by clicking here).

As a follow-up to our Thanksgiving program, we wanted to touch on and share the video on one of the most radical revivals in American history and history in general: The Great Awakening.

This Revival spread Holy Ghost fire throughout the early American colonies with radical manifestations: people being slain in the Spirit, profuse weeping, and much holy laughter and mass conversions.

It changed the spiritual atmosphere and furthered America’s Christian heritage and foundations in a great way.

This incredible revival however, was born earlier on through the Reformation, initiated by Martin Luther and then sown spiritually by the Puritans and their longing for revival that later saw its fulfillment in The Great Awakening.

Interesting facts on the Puritans

The term Puritan was derived from their desire to purify the church from Roman Catholic errors and go back to New Testament standards and not a quest for personal purity, popular misunderstanding of their name notwithstanding. They sowed in tears and prayer hoping to see revival, which was later fulfilled through the Great Awakening. In fact one of the main preachers of the Great Awakening, Jonathan Edwards, was a direct descendant of Puritans.

They valued and longed to see these realities become widespread:

Conversion: They wanted to see people come into a real relationship with Christ and not just become religious, but be converted into a vital and living relationship with the Living Savior Jesus Christ.

Encounter: They were adamant that mere Bible knowledge and knowledge about God alone was not sufficient and by itself could lead to dangerous spiritual pride and arrogance. Though they held the former as of utmost importance, they were strong believers in the biblical example of the need for a real encounter with the living supernatural God and experiencing his real and living presence in one's life, Christ must fill the heart with His Spirit!! They were known as some of the first Protestant-Mystics.

Revival: They wanted to see a revival of true and living faith spread across the different lands they inhabited both in England and the American Colonies

They sowed in suffering, prayer, and tears many years, hoping to see these things become widespread realities in their old and new worlds of England and America's colonies. Their sowing in tears and suffering saw fulfillment in the later radical revival known as the Great Awakening that swept the American colonies with intense revival fire.

For more information on one of its main preachers you can watch this video on George Whitfield and the 18th Century Revivals:

Other little-known facts:

Contrary to popular misconception the Puritans were not negative about sex. In fact they were one of the first known groups to depart from the traditional Catholic view that sex was merely for procreation alone and really shouldn't be enjoyed but rather just endured for the sake of producing children. The Puritans declared that sex between a married husband and wife is a gift from God that should be enjoyed and indulged in regularly. Puritan families thus usually had hordes of children. They were however, adamantly against adultery and fornication.

The United States and the Americas (Latin America) might have had more of a French influence and flavor if not for what happened... French Huguenot Protestants fleeing persecution in France, much like the Protestant Puritans in the North from England, set up a colony in the southern area of what would be now known as Florida. It did not endure due to the fact that Spanish Catholics who saw them as heretics and were inspired by the ways of the Inquisition hunted them down and massacred every last man, woman, and child, wiping out the colony. The same exact thing happened to missionaries sent out by Protestant leader John Calvin (originially of France) to South America.