September 28, 2012

In my quest to feature and contrast Protestant faiths of the 16^th and 17^th centuries and beyond, I took on the task of studying the Puritans, whose body of literature was so incredibly important in early America. Today I pulled out the book “The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions” and chose a poem to share:

“A Present Salvation”

Creator and Redeemer God,

Author of all existence, source of all blessedness,

I adore thee for making me capable of knowing thee,

           for giving me reason and conscience,

           for leading me to desire thee;

I praise thee for the revelation of thyself in the gospel,

           for thy heart as a dwelling place of pity,

           for thy thoughts of peace toward me,

           for thy patience and thy graciousness,

           for the vastness of thy mercy.

Thou hast moved my conscience to know how

    the guilty can be pardoned,

    the unholy sanctified,

    the poor enriched.

May I be always amongst those who not only hear but know thee,

    who walk with and rejoice in thee,

    who take thee at thy word and find life there.

Keep me always longing

     for a present salvation in Holy Spirit comforts and rejoicings,

     for spiritual graces and blessings,

     for help to value my duties as well as my privileges.

May I cherish simplicity and godly sincerity of character.

Help me to be in reality before thee as in appearance I am before men,

           to be religious before I profess religion,

           to leave the world before I enter the church,

           to set my affections on things above,

           to shun forbidden follies and vanities,

           to be a dispenser as well as a partaker of grace,

           to be prepared to bear evil as well as to do good.

O God, make me worthy of this calling,

     that the name of Jesus may be glorified in me and I in Him.

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 27, 2012

Martyrs’ Mirror and Its Continued Importance

Recently I became interested in Anabaptists of the 16^th and 17^th centuries, and I began to research various historical and religious events that might have involved them. During this research I saw a lot of references to Martyrs’ Mirror. I had a basic idea of what it concerned but wanted to relearn the basic facts of this most-feted piece of history.

Martyrs’ Mirror is a very influential publication authored by Thieleman van Braght. It was first circulated in the 1660s due to the need for a book that would speak only of Anabaptist martyrs (Foxe’s Book of Martyrs rarely mentioned this particular denomination) and in the following centuries it became an Anabaptist standard. It was praised for being a much-needed memorial to those “Brethren” who had died for their faith. In the 1740s it became available in German. Many Mennonite and Amish families consider this book to be of utmost importance, and Protestants of all stripes will find it interesting.

Martyrs’ Mirror is available online at www.homecomers.org. I found the “Index of Anabaptists Who Were Persecuted or Martyred 1525-1660” to be particularly interesting. I love the idea of illuminating names of martyrs and sufferers who have long been forgotten, thus I have included some random names to cherish and honor: Hendrick Aerts and his wife Janneken Cabiljaus . . . Uly Baumgartner . . . Henry Gutwol . . . Tanneken van der Leyen . . . Hans van Overdam (featured in my post of September 05^th) . . . Jeronymus Schepens . . . Maritgen de Vette . . . and Maerten Zaeyweuer.

The online version of Martyrs’ Mirror is indispensible for those of Anabaptist heritage or for anyone studying Protestantism in the 16^th and 17^th centuries. One of my favorite sections was, “An Account of Those Who Suffered in the Sixteenth Century,” as this is my particular area of interest. Stories of primitive Christians and early “dissenters” that were injured and/or martyred for the faith throughout the centuries are also included. I recommend Martyrs’ Mirror simply for its invaluable place in early Protestant culture and for the enduring importance it still enjoys today.

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 26, 2012

Reading the Bible In A Year

Yesterday I enjoyed a very important accomplishment: Thanks to the Bible Gateway reading plan I began on September 26, 2011,  I finished reading through the entire Bible! What a feeling. I am incredibly proud of my Protestant heritage and of the martyr-blood running through my veins, and to finish reading through the very same Bible that my ancestors and spiritual forerunners would have died to possess --- and often did --- was an incredible and soul-warming feeling. I learned some very important do’s and don’t’s concerning reading through the Bible in a year:

Do: Set aside time to read every day. If you don’t feel like it or have other things to do, do it anyway! Not to say that anyone should lament having to read the Bible, only that many people have different attention spans, get stressed with reading too much at a time, etc. But it takes only a short amount of time to read a section of the Old Testament and a section of the New Testament every day.

Do: Study. If you find a chapter or concept confusing, ask friends and family with religious backgrounds. Ask a pastor. Research online. It is a tremendous help to truly understand the context of what you are reading. There are many wonderful study Bibles and online study aids to get you started.

Don’t: Get discouraged. It may be difficult to read through the violence in the Old Testament and to read of certain ideas that people living in the 21^st century might find difficult to grasp, but try to understand that everything has a purpose and came to pass for a reason. If you still find it hard, focus mostly on the New Testament until you get your “land legs” and want to try the Old Testament.

Don’t: Ever lose hope. It should be impossible to read the New Testament and not feel a warm, genuine sense of hope, peace, and joy, for “saved by grace through faith” is the most beautiful concept ever created!

One of my biggest stumbling blocks was the aforementioned Old Testament violence. I liken the Bible to a beloved family recipe . . . there are steps that are easy to follow, and there are steps that are difficult to follow. A cook might look at those difficult steps with wariness and consternation, but the truth is, without all steps, both difficult and easy, there will be no finished product and no tasty meal.

Scripture is like that. We all like the easy steps best. Jesus’ parables. The story of crucifixion and resurrection. The hauntingly powerful Psalms and Proverbs. Then there are the parts we may wave away as “too hard” to understand or “too harsh” to appreciate. But without them, the story would not be complete, and everything would not fall into place. The result of this eternal “recipe” is God’s love and mercy, baked on the hearth of Christian hearts on fire for God.

Amen and amen.

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 25, 2012

Spiritual Courage: Reverend Chancellor Tobias Wagner of Germany

When studying the 16^th and 17^th century I like to showcase Protestant individuals who “pop out” at me during my research or who particularly interest me. Today I researched Reverend Tobias Wagner. Born February 21, 1598, in Heidenheim, Germany, he had the distinction of being a direct descendant of Doctor Martin Luther and Katharina von Bora. An affinity for the ministry was certainly passed on to Tobias, who became the chancellor of Germany’s University in Tubingen in the early 1660s.

The young Wagner’s talents became obvious when he was rather young, as he was placed in Nordlingen’s Latin School. By age 23 he was tackling theology at Tubingen. His adulthood assignments included ministering in Esslingen and becoming, as “A History of the Lutheran Church in Pennsylvania” says, “Dekan [Deacon] of the Tubingen Diocese.” He was also Doctor of Theology.

Chancellor Tobias Wagner’s claim to fame was his outstanding defense of the Lutheran faith. He also helped hold the University of Tubingen together in the dark years of the 17^th century, where, although Protestantism was no longer new and vulnerable, it was violently under attack from outside sources and from Catholic academics that had set up shop in Germany. In that era it became increasingly difficult to know where one stood. Tobias Wagner knew exactly where he stood. The book “History of the University of Tubingen” by August Friedrich Boks states, “He was a profound scholar and as teacher and preacher on various occasions showed himself an accomplished theologian: he was singularly clear in his expositions and moderate in his treatment of controversial subjects.”

Boks goes on to say, “In theological casuistry he possessed extensive knowledge and experience, and for this reason his counsel was often sought from various and distant places in the most complicated cases.” Wagner authored about seventy-eight works, half of which were constructed in Latin. It is interesting that he was in a position of authority during the ravaging Thirty Years’ War. History is silent on what burdens he bore during that time, but it is safe to say that they were probably great. The theologian’s death came on August 12, 1680. Academics like Wagner shattered the 17^th century image of Germans as backwards country peasants who could never keep up with times.

Chancellor Wagner lived and breathed one of the statements of his epitaph: Hie Evangelici conditur orbis honor. “This world is built on the honor of the gospel.”

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 24, 2012

Georgian Englishmen and Floridian Spaniards: Religious Struggle or Land Grab?

In my posts I often speak of the battle against Protestantism that took place in Florida in 1565, when hundreds of French Protestant civilians and soldiers were killed by Spanish conquistadors at Fort Caroline and Matanzas Inlet. This religious struggle did not end there, however, for a new Protestant power came forth . . . the English. The fact that the English were a bit “tardy to the party” in the colonization effort meant little. By 1742, the Protestant east coast, which stretched from Maine to Georgia, felt itself in danger from the brooding presence of Catholic Spaniards in Florida.

Whether the war quaintly called the “War of Jenkins’ Ear” was religiously-based or not, religion certainly played a large part in prejudices. To the English, Spaniards were the carriers of the “Black Legend,” bold, cruel, fanatical individuals who would uphold their Catholic rituals so obsessively that they would kill Protestant believers without a second thought (which, fair enough, is what they did two centuries earlier at Matanzas). To the Spaniards, Englishmen were dandies and fops with heretical doctrines and arrogant notions. This mutual hatred came to a head in 1740, when English troops besieged the Spanish town of San Agustín (St. Augustine, Florida, the nation’s oldest city) and attacked the old Castillo de San Marcos.

This was not the only reason Spaniards were bitter against Englishmen. In 1702, during another such siege, British soldiers had burned and desecrated nearly every Spanish church. So the Spanish had that resentment under their belt, and the English despised the Spanish for their atrocities at Matanzas and beyond. (It did not help that in the siege of 1702, Protestant Englishmen who fell on the Castillo lawn were simply interred unceremoniously and forgotten, as Spaniards at that time did not believe that Protestants needed or deserved “legitimate” burials.

In July 1742 there was a clash at Saint Simons Island, Georgia, and an event that would become known as the Battle of Bloody Marsh (which coincidentally wasn’t that very bloody). The religious ideas behind the excursion were muted but still powerful. In England’s eyes, Catholic Spain, allowed to flourish and creep further up the coast, would be a direct threat to England’s many colonies, all of whom were Protestant and were filled with various settlers who were discomforted by the idea of Spaniards in America. The “War of Jenkins’ Ear” was not a religious struggle, but the spiritual struggles present between Spaniard and Briton were very obvious and definitely set the tone throughout the conflict.

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 23, 2012

Huguenots and the Cape of Good Hope

It has consistently come up in my research that a rather large number of Huguenots fleeing the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in the 1680s settled in South Africa. The notion has always seemed strange to me . . . dark and wild Africa, as Europeans viewed it at the time, was hardly a place for pious-minded individuals. Or was it? While one might think of Africa in terms of savannas, hidden tribes, and exotic animals, there were bundles of beautiful farmland ripe for the taking. Just what those who had implemented the “Protestant work ethic” needed most. Many have argued that the slaughter and exile of French Protestants was detrimental to France’s financial health, few at that time in history there were perhaps no harder-worker individuals whose earnestness and integrity in business dealings gave them a name even among their enemies.

The only problem with this seemingly-perfect solution was that few of the Huguenot settlers were farmers, and many were venturing into an area they had never before attempted. There were other professions to champion in South Africa, of course . . . medical positions, shoemaking, carpentry, vineyard-tending, teaching, etc.

So why here? Prior to the Edict of Fontainebleau in 1685, Huguenot travelers and businessmen developed a fascination for the Cape of Good Hope. Probably the first Huguenot in South Africa, Marie de la Quellerie, gained fame for settling at Table Bay. A portrait shows her as light-haired and plainly-dressed, with an unusual tab-fronted head-covering that marks her as a modest woman. Perhaps better known in the region was her husband, Dutchman Jan van Riebeeck. Their intercultural family setting was very common throughout the 1600s, as many Dutch Calvinists in New York and other areas married into Huguenot families.

Throughout the 1680s, both desiring colonists and knowing of the horrors French Protestants were facing, officials decided that South Africa would serve as a stab at religious freedom. Like many other regions in which the Huguenots settled, French was never elevated to the status of official tongue. The Dutch, who were proprietors of the Cape of Good Hope at that time, forbade any language but Dutch to be spoken professionally. Yet they looked upon the Huguenots --- fellow Calvinists --- fondly, and were quite generous with the land they bestowed. One particular region in South Africa where the Huguenots settled became known as “Franschhoek,” “French corner,” and today there is a large Huguenot memorial in that place.

At Franschhoek there is a large complex of memorials and museums. At the wine cellar complex, which symbolizes one of many trades in which the Huguenots flourished, there is a plaque that reads, “After darkness comes light.” In the later years of the 17^th century (and indeed, throughout much of the 16^th and 17^th centuries) it must have seemed to the Huguenots as if there was nowhere to hide, as if they would eventually be funneled into the charnel-house of prejudice and intolerance.

I have randomly chosen a few of the family heads who settled in South Africa between the late 1600s and the mid-1700s: Pierre Dumont, an agriculturist, who was married to Cecile d’Atis; Jacques Naudé, a sailor, married to Suzanne Taillefert; Abraham Prévost, married to Anna van Marseveen; and Durand Sollier, a shoemaker, who was married first to Marthé Petel and secondly to Isabeau de Villiers. Interestingly, Abraham Prévost was born in 1670, thus he was only about eighteen when we arrived in South Africa. What an exciting life he must have led . . .

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved

September 22, 2012

What’s In a Name? What Our Protestant Ancestors Called Themselves

The names that came to represent various Protestant denominations of the 16^th century were not always the names our ancestors would have known or would have preferred to be called.

Anabaptists. Anabaptists had many names for themselves, including Brethren and simply Christians. Their enemies, however, called them “Anabaptists” (“re-baptizers”) or even “revolutionaries.”

Anglicans. In the 16^th century, the Anglicans, much like the Huguenots, preferred the term “Reformers.” They also used “Protestants” to distinguish themselves from Catholics, whom they thought of as “old believers” or as belonging to the “old religion.”

Calvinists. Like Martin Luther, John Calvin’s followers balked at being called “Calvinists” as if they followed a man instead of God. Scottish Calvinists became known as Presbyterians, while French Calvinists, Huguenots, preferred “Reformed.” (Réformé)

Lutherans. Martin Luther fought against his followers being known as “Lutherans,” wanting all the praise and glory to go to God. He disliked the idea of lending his name to new evangelical doctrines. However, the term “Lutherans” soon became popular and was used even among believers.  Lutherans probably came to dislike the name when every 16^th century Protestant, even those of the Calvinist faith, was referred to as “Lutherans” by enemies who simply did not care to learn the differences.

Huguenots. No one is exactly sure where this name came from, but it was first coined by Catholics and used in derision against their foes. Huguenots preferred to be called “Reformed.”

If one were to call 16^th century Protestants by any of these controversial names, the calling might or might not have been offensive depending on the group. For instance, while “Calvinist” and “Lutheran” were not preferred, they were not particularly offensive. “Huguenot,” on the other hand, had become an epithet, although many Frenchman doubtlessly disregarded its origins and used it for themselves anyway.

(c) 2012 Joyously Saved