Love Under Fire

Infallible Authority of Scripture

The grand principle that these Reformers maintained—the same that the Waldenses, Wycliffe, Huss, Luther, Zwingli, and those with them also held—was the infallible authority of Scripture. By its teaching they tested all doctrines and all claims. Faith in God's Word sustained these holy men as they yielded up their lives at the stake. “Be of good comfort,” exclaimed Latimer to his fellow martyr as the flames were about to silence their voices. “Today, by God's grace, we will light such a candle in England as I believe will never be put out.”⁶ LF 106.5

For hundreds of years after the churches of England submitted to Rome, the churches in Scotland kept their freedom. In the twelfth century, however, Catholicism became established, and in no country was the darkness deeper. Still, rays of light came to pierce the gloom. The Lollards came from England with the Bible and the teachings of Wycliffe, and they did much to preserve the knowledge of the gospel. With the opening of the Reformation came Luther's writings and Tyndale's English New Testament. These messengers silently passed through the mountains and valleys, fanning into new life the torch of truth that had so nearly died out and undoing the work that four centuries of oppression had done. LF 106.6

Then, suddenly realizing the danger, the Catholic leaders brought to the stake some of the noblest men in Scotland. These dying witnesses filled the hearts of the people throughout the land with an undying determination to cast off the chains of Rome. LF 106.7