Reformanda

Have you heard of “The Boot?”
credit: Jeff Rose

Captured after the Jeff Roser rising of 1666, the young preacher Hugh McKail was brought before his enemies and commanded to betray his brethren.

He refused.

The tormentors then fastened his leg within the dreadful instrument known as the boot. Iron bands gripped his limb while ex*****oners drove wooden wedges between the frame and his leg with heavy blows of the hammer. Each strike crushed the flesh and splintered the bone.

Yet even under such savage torture, McKail would not yield the names of his fellow Covenanters, nor deny the crown rights of Christ. Soon afterward he was led to the scaffold in Edinburgh.

Looking upon the ladder that would lead to the gallows, the young martyr declared it to be “the sweetest ladder that ever I climbed.” Moments later he sealed his testimony with his blood.

If someone decided to crush your fingers and thumbs to get you deny Jesus, what would you do?

We must remember that even the Dreaded, “Thumbscrew,” cannot combat the power of the Holy Spirit.

During the fierce persecution of the Scottish Covenanters, William Spence was seized by government authorities and brought before the Privy Council in Edinburgh. The council demanded that he reveal the hiding places of Covenanter leaders and disclose the plans of those who continued to gather for forbidden field preachings.

Spence refused.

To force a confession, the tormentors fastened his hands into the dreadful instrument known as the thumbscrews—an iron device that crushed the fingers as the screws were tightened.

With each turn the pressure increased, grinding bone and tearing flesh.

Still he would not betray his brethren.

Though suffering intensely, William Spence remained steadfast, choosing torment rather than give up those who stood for the crown rights of the Lord Jesus Christ.

“They tortured her from morning until evening.”

She was small — a slave girl, unknown, unnamed in the world’s records except for this: Blandina. The believers feared for her. When the arrests came and the chains closed around their wrists, they trembled not for themselves but for her frail body. Surely she would not endure what was coming.

The governor sought to break the Christians publicly. They were accused of atheism, of cannibalism, of crimes whispered in the dark. The crowds roared for spectacle.

They stripped her and suspended her on a stake, arms stretched wide, her body exposed before the jeering mob. The soldiers scourged her again and again. Hooks tore at her flesh. Each question came like a hammer:

“Swear by the gods.”
“Curse Christ.”
“Confess your crimes.”

And from torn lips came the same answer, over and over:

“I am a Christian. Among us no evil is done.”

They tortured her from morning until evening. The ex*****oners themselves grew weary. One account says they confessed in frustration that they had never seen a woman endure so much and still breathe.

She was returned to prison — a dungeon thick with stench and darkness. The wounded lay around her. Yet those who had feared she would fall now said she strengthened them.

On the day of spectacle, they led her into the amphitheater. The crowd howled. She was tied again — this time to a stake — as wild beasts were released. The Christians watching said she appeared as if hanging upon a cross, and that her prayer stirred courage in their hearts.

The beasts would not kill her.

So they reserved her for the final day of games.

They scourged her again. They placed her upon a red-hot iron chair, and the smell of burning flesh rose into the arena. Still she confessed Christ. Still she would not deny Him.

At last, after enduring torments meant to break a nation, she was handed to a gladiator and killed by the sword.

She was likely young. She was certainly powerless in the eyes of Rome. A slave. A woman. Easily discarded.

Yet the letter sent from Lyons said this of her: that Christ showed in her what the world counts weak, He makes invincible.

No recantation.
No curse.
No surrender.

Only this:

“I am a Christian.”

In the early 1400s, the churches of Bohemia were filled with ceremony, wealth, and Latin prayers the common people could not understand. The Bible was known to the scholars, but its voice was distant from the hearts of the ordinary worshipers.

Then a village born preacher began to speak in the language of the people : Jan Hus.

From the pulpit of Bethlehem Chapel in Prague, Hus opened the Scriptures and declared that

Christ not the pope is the true Head of the Church.

He preached that salvation could not be bought, that moral corruption in the clergy was an offense to God and that the Word of God stood above every human authority.

The crowds filled the chapel. The poor understood the Gospel in their own tongue. Bohemia began to awaken.

But the authorities in Rome could not remain silent.

Hus was summoned to the Council of Constance promised safe conduct by Sigismund. Trusting the emperor’s word, he went not to defend himself only but to bear witness to the truth of Scripture.

Instead of a fair hearing, he was imprisoned.

For months he was kept in chains, sick and isolated. He was urged again and again to recant. His books were burned before his eyes, and his priestly garments were stripped from him.

Yet his answer remained:

“I would not for a chapel full of gold recede from the truth.”

On July 6, 1415, he was led to the stake.

As the flames rose around him, he began to sing committing his soul to Christ.

Before his death, he declared a prophecy to his ex*****oners:

“You may kill this goose (Hus) but in a hundred years a swan will arise whose singing you will not be able to silence.”

Almost exactly a century later (104 tears), Martin Luther would nail his theses to the church door in Wittenberg, and the Reformation would sweep across Europe.

They burned the preacher,
but they could not burn the truth.

“He declared that he was as ready for death as he was to eat his dinner.”

William Hunter was a young apprentice from Brentwood in Essex, only nineteen years old. His arrest came from a simple act — he was found reading the English Bible in a chapel and openly confessed Protestant beliefs.

When questioned, Hunter denied the doctrine of transubstantiation and rejected the idea that the Mass was a sacrifice. He refused to recant, even when urged repeatedly to save his life.

For this, he was condemned for heresy during the reign of Mary I of England.

On March 26, 1555, Hunter was brought to the place of ex*****on at Brentwood. Foxe records that he showed remarkable calmness for someone so young. Before the fire was lit, he prayed and read from the Bible.

According to the account, he declared that he was as ready for death as he was to eat his dinner.

When the flames rose, the young apprentice remained steadfast, lifting his hands toward heaven as he died.

So vile, they even throw poor fisherman in the fire!

Rawlins White was a poor fisherman of Cardiff in Wales, unable to read, yet eager to hear the Scriptures when they were first spoken in English during the reign of Edward VI. He listened carefully, learning God’s Word by memory, and came to believe firmly that salvation was through Christ alone, not through the Mass.

When Queen Mary restored the old religion, White continued to confess his faith openly. He was arrested and brought before the bishop of Llandaff, who mocked him for being an unlearned fisherman. But Rawlins answered simply that God had taught him by His Word, and what he believed he would not deny.

After long imprisonment, he was condemned to die.

In 1555, Rawlins White was led to the stake at Cardiff. Seeing the fire prepared, he fell to prayer and spoke to the people gathered there. Foxe records that he endured the flames patiently and with strong faith, committing himself to Christ until death.

Thus a humble Welsh fisherman, who could not read the Scriptures with his eyes, bore them faithfully in his heart unto the fire.

“God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise.”
— 1 Corinthians 1:27

From punching a priest to repentance and flames!

William Flower, once a monk, later embraced the Gospel in the days of King Edward VI. His conscience burned against what he believed to be false worship in the Mass. In misguided zeal, he struck a priest at St. Margaret’s, Westminster, wounding him during the service.

For this act he was seized and condemned.

Flower repented of the violence, confessing freely that he had sinned in shedding blood. Yet he would not deny the truth he believed from Scripture. His judges therefore sentenced him both for the assault and for heresy.

At the church door his right hand was cut off, the instrument of his offense. Bleeding and weakened, he was led to Smithfield, where he committed his soul to Christ in prayer.

Thus William Flower, though imperfect, sealed his repentance and faith in the flames, trusting not in his own righteousness but in the mercy of God.

Strangled and Burned….

On October 6, 1536, William Tyndale was strangled and burned at the stake for simply translating the Scriptures into English for the common man.

William was greatly accused of being a heretic. He was given an opportunity to recant, but prayed with a loud voice, "Lord, open the King of England's eyes!"

Four years after his death, several English translations of the Bible were published in England at the King's request, all based on Tyndale's work.
- Brian Taylor

Charles Spurgeon