Forerunners of the Reformation / The Pre-Reformers (Waldensians / Wycliffe / Huss)

All right, so this will be lesson number nine, Forerunners of the Faith. Lesson number nine is titled

Forerunners to the Reformation. So we're talking about a few different men,

Waldo, Wickliffe, Huss. So these men are known as the pre -reformers.

So the Protestant reformers, we think of as Martin Luther, John Calvin, people like that.

But these are the men that came before them and actually kind of laid the groundwork for the

Protestant Reformation. So we're gonna read from Acts chapter five in just one moment.

But just to go through this quick, we're gonna look at number one. Section number one is titled

The Papacy in the High and Late Middle Ages. Number two, we're gonna be looking at Peter Waldo.

Number three, John Wickliffe. And then after him, Jan Huss, or John Huss, as we typically say as English speakers.

So Acts chapter five, 29 through 32, the scripture says, but Peter and the other apostles answered and said, we ought to obey

God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you murdered by hanging on a tree.

Him, God has exalted to his right hand to be the Prince and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.

And we are his witnesses to these things. And so also is the Holy Spirit whom

God has given to those who obey him. So the main statement in this passage, who are we to obey?

God or men? And how this applies to the lesson, are we supposed to follow the

Pope and whatever he says and just listen to the Cardinals and these men, or are we supposed to listen to Jesus and the scripture?

Now, who do you think we should listen to? The Pope or the Bible? The Bible. Well, you're

Protestants and independent Christians, so I would expect you to say that, but this wasn't a given hundreds of years ago.

So number one, the papacy in the high middle ages. So this I don't think is in your book, so I'll just read this paragraph or two.

Papal power reached its zenith under Pope Innocent III, that's in the year he lived, from 1160 to 1216.

During his tenure, the Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215 dogmatized the doctrine of transubstantiation.

Now, who knows what that is? Transubstantiation. So this is the idea, you wanna give a brief definition,

Marcus? That when given the wafer, it actually becomes

Christ's body and blood. Yeah, and the cup that contains the wine.

It literally, when the priest does the consecration and the bell rings, the cup, the wine literally turns into the blood of Christ.

You are literally eating his flesh and drinking his blood. They say a miracle happens in communion, so that's the doctrine of transubstantiation.

As opposed to our view, which we take the memorial view of the Lord's Supper where we believe it's symbolic.

Now, symbolic doesn't mean not important. Communion, Lord's Supper is still very, very important, but it doesn't actually miraculously turn into the body of Christ.

I mean, that would be cannibalism if true. It's just kind of a bizarre doctrine, but yeah,

Marcus. And the danger of believing such a doctrine is that receiving

Christ is what is necessary. As many as received him to them, he gave the power to become the children of God.

So if you receive Christ by eating this thing and drinking that, if that's how you do it, if you have to go to church and the priest has to give it to you, if that's how you receive

Christ, well, you're wrong, you're not receiving him. And if you don't, he that hath the

Son hath life, he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. It's as simple as that.

Yeah, we need to understand that we're totally using, we're using the same terminology as the

Catholic Church, but we have totally different definitions. So when we talk about receiving

Christ, we mean you believe on him for salvation. You're putting your trust in his death, burial, and resurrection.

Now they might say they do that as well, but receiving Christ within the Catholic Church is taking the wafer.

That's what they mean as receiving Christ. Just like being born again. To us, being born again is

God has made us alive. He has regenerated our spirit with the

Holy Spirit. For them, being born again is being baptized. So same terms that are biblical, maybe, but totally different meanings.

Okay, let's continue reading. So this is the erroneous notion, transubstantiation, that the elements in communion, the bread and the cup, are physically transformed in terms of their substance into the body and blood of Jesus.

Around 1230, the Western Church adopted the idea of a treasure house or treasury of merit in heaven from which the

Pope could dispense indulgences and pardons, reducing the amount of punishment for sin that is in purgatory.

The notion of papal indulgences is not biblical, but it dominated the

Roman Catholic Church in the late Middle Ages. It did not take long for the system of indulgences, however, to be abused.

By offering indulgences in exchange for money, the Roman Catholic Church was able to raise significant sums of cash.

The sale of indulgences became a major fundraising tool for the late medieval popes.

In the 1300s, due to political infighting in Europe, the papacy relocated from Rome to Avion, France, where it remained for about 70 years.

Pope Gregory XI finally returned the papacy to Rome. When his successor,

Urban VI, insisted on staying in Rome, French cardinals elected a rival pope,

Clement VII, in Avion. In 1409, the Council of Pisa attempted to resolve this schism because,

I mean, now the Catholic Church has multiple popes and they're all excommunicating each other, so it's like, well, who's the real pope?

But this only resulted in the election of another rival pope, a third pope.

The papal schism, also called the Western Schism, was not resolved until the

Council of Constance in 1417. So as you can see, this is just a total mess.

So this is where you had to fill it in in your book. It says, by the late 1400s, the

Roman Catholic Church in Europe was in desperate need of reformation. The corruption of the papacy was evident from the sale of what?

Indulgences. Indulgences. The modern -day indulgences, I understand, and you can pay to have a marriage, even a marriage of several years with children, annulled.

Yeah. If you pay a high enough indulgence. Right, anyway, that depends on the bishop and everything else.

But yes, if you wanna get your marriage annulled so you can marry someone else because in the

Catholic Church that's totally forbidden, you're not supposed to do that. But yeah, I mean, if you find the right guy and you pay enough money, they'll grant you the annulment.

But as far as indulgences go, there are still places in Europe you can travel, actually all over the world,

I think. If you climb these steps, donate money, you'll get time off in purgatory.

The Pope actually said, Pope Francis, if you follow me on Twitter, you will get an indulgence.

I don't know how much time off of purgatory you get for following him. Probably only like 10 minutes, but.

What does Elon Musk say? You say, no, that didn't happen. That's not true. He did say that and you can check it out.

I think I'm pretty sure he was serious. But anyways, the corruption of the papacy was evident from the sale of indulgences to the papal what?

Schism. In which three rival popes each claimed to be the true leader of the church.

So this whole thing, I mean, it's just corrupt. It's a way of making money. And this is really what led to the reformation.

If it wasn't for this abuse, the reformation, it might have happened later, but this is really what kicked it off.

So it says here in my book, in the midst of this, God raised up voices of protest who were willing to confront papal corruption and even defy papal authority when it conflicted with the teaching of scripture.

Okay, can anyone think of just making application as we go along?

Can anyone think of something that this current pope has said that contradicts scripture?

Yeah. Isn't he going with gay marriage now? No, he does not advocate the blessing of gay marriage.

He says the priest can bless gay unions. It's not gay marriages. I mean, that's like a...

This is really like what the Pharisees did. They would split hairs and try to find a way or find a loophole around it so they can do something without actually like doing it, but you are doing it.

Like it's ridiculous, but yeah. Obviously God would not bless a homosexual union, but he said, as long as it's a union and not a marriage, you can bless it.

So it's like, you know, but... So we're still facing the same type of corruption and problem.

These courageous individuals that we're gonna talk about this morning are known as the forerunners of the

Reformation. Their bold convictions anticipated the stand the Protestant reformers would take in the 16th century.

And since we are talking about this and the Catholic church and what they teach, I know a lot of modern day Christians would be offended.

Like, I can't believe you're saying something negative about another church. And they're just, they've never heard such a thing.

This is church history. Like you have to address corruption and false doctrine.

So if this is new to somebody, maybe watching online, it's not new to you because you've heard me talk about it enough.

Just let me make it clear. We love Roman Catholic people, okay? We want them to be saved.

Those who are not saved, we want them to be saved. We're not against any, you know, your neighbor who's

Catholic, we care about them as people. It's Catholicism, the system, right?

And the teachings that we're opposing. Not your aunt who's Roman Catholic.

So I'm sure you love her and everything, but still, truth is truth and we need to just have a frank discussion of it, okay?

Just so you know where we're coming from. All right, so the discussion question, can you name some biblical figures who took a stand for truth in the face of a corrupt political or religious system?

What gave them the courage to take that stand? Okay, can any of you think of biblical figures?

Daniel. Daniel, okay. Anyone else? What? The apostles.

The apostles, yeah. I mean, we just read that in Acts chapter five. They were brought in before the religious authority of their day.

And again, the Pharisees in the Sanhedrin, they were doing the same types of things that the modern or medieval popes were doing.

You know, they took the word of God and kind of brushed it to the side and they elevated their traditions and the doctrines of men.

Actually, the sermon later on, we're gonna be dealing with this. The doctrines or commandments of men where they're elevating that above scripture.

It happened with the Jews, it happened in the Catholic church, and it's still happening today, even outside of the

Catholic church. So yeah, the apostles would be a good example. Anyone else? Biblical figures?

Barb. Elijah with the prophets of Baal. Good. Yeah, Elijah stood up not only against King Ahab and his wife

Jezebel, although he ran from Jezebel, but he did oppose them and spoke truth to them.

But yeah, the prophets of Baal. Anyone else? A lot of examples I'm sure we could talk about.

All right, so let's cover some of these men. The pre -reformers. The first one,

Peter Waldo. So he lived from 1140 to 1210. Waldo lived during this time.

So this is several hundred years before the Reformation. He was a merchant -turned -preacher from Lyon in modern -day

France. After being influenced by the story of a fourth -century

Christian named Alexius, a man who sold all his belongings in devotion to Christ, Waldo sold his belongings and began a life of preaching and service to the

Lord. Initially, Waldo and his followers were known as what? The poor of Lyon.

Okay, the poor of Lyon, right. And they would later become known as the

Waldensians. So this is a group that, they're not that well -known, but some people, who's heard of the

Waldensians? One or two. Waldo, it says, loved the word of God and commissioned a translation of portions of Scripture from the

Latin Vulgate into a local dialect. His reading of Scripture inspired and informed his preaching ministry.

The Roman Catholic Church denounced the Waldensian movement at the

Third Lateran Council in 1179, though he did not receive authorization from the

Pope. Do you think he cared about authorization from the Pope? I don't know, he didn't care about that.

Waldo determined to continue preaching anyway. He boldly insisted that it was better to obey

God than men. And then it says, see Acts chapter 5, 29, the passage we started out with.

That's the same thing that the Sanhedrin, the scribes, Pharisees, elders, chief priests, do not preach in the name of Jesus.

And ironically, the Pope was saying, you're not allowed to preach in the name of Jesus. I mean, it's just, it's bizarre.

Yeah. I think we need to be careful also, more so now than ever.

It says we ought to obey God and not men. So we need to examine Waldo, well, all of them,

MacArthur, Billy Graham. We need to examine everyone.

And this is why Scripture itself, and I'm just saying what you say all the time, but it is the

Holy Spirit himself and the Word of God, the inspired Word of God, and we've got to learn how to hear his voice personally and individually.

I mean, I listen to all kinds of different guys, John Hagee, David Jeremiah, and we could go on and on, even when we're studying these men,

Waldo and them. Again, I'm just reading what you say all the time. Yeah.

Okay, so let's just take up the Catholic Church's position for one moment. Why would they say he's not allowed to preach?

Well, they would claim that what he was preaching is false. You know, he's a heretic, he's preaching the wrong thing.

Obviously, there are some people, depending on what they're preaching, and they can still use the name of Jesus, that yeah, there is some preaching that we would prefer that this person not be preaching, even though they're talking about Jesus, depending on what they're saying.

A good example of this, of testing everybody, whether it's

Waldo or, like you said, John Hagee or David Jeremiah, everything has to be tested against the

Scripture, right? So, like the big thing that just blew up over the past few days, if you follow

YouTube and Christian news, is Alistair Begg, right? Who's heard this?

Alistair Begg is probably one of the most, if you had asked me last week, I would have said, this guy is one of the most dependable

Bible teachers out there. And then, in an interview, he gave advice that this woman, grandmother, said, you know, my grandson is transgender, or he's marrying a transgender, so it's a, whatever, gay wedding, trans wedding, and she says,

I can't go, but I'm conflicted. And Alistair Begg says, you should go, and you should buy them a gift.

So Alistair Begg told this woman, I guess a church member, that she should attend the gay wedding and buy a gift, because if you don't, you're just gonna reinforce this idea that all

Christians are judgmental bigots. So you're gonna appear judgmental if you don't go. Now, if you lodge, and I feel compassion for the woman, and I understand that would be a very difficult situation, but if that's your advice as a pastor, that Christians should attend gay weddings, so you don't appear judgmental, the problem with that is your very presence is a sign of your affirmation.

Even if you say, I don't agree with this, you know, you know, grandson, I disagree with, if you're there, it's still gonna be seen as affirmation or a step towards, so just let, for the record, and I don't wanna know if you've gone,

I don't wanna know, honestly, but my, I do not think any

Christian should ever attend a gay wedding, and that's, let me just state that for the record.

Why, because I don't think Jesus would encourage people to go, and I don't think you could convince me that Jesus would, well, what would

Jesus do? Jesus would go, based on what? Okay, we can disagree on that maybe, but that's,

I think Alistair Begg was dead wrong, and he's getting, he's getting major blowback, like, serious, and I think for good reason, because nobody would have said that 20 years ago.

Nobody, no Christian would have said that 20 years ago. It's a sign of kind of giving in to the pressure, which can happen to any of us if we're not, you know, standing with the

Lord. Sorry, you had a hand up, Stacey? Oh, I just wanted to say, I agree with you, but just kind of thinking on the other side of it is they would say, you know,

Jesus spent time with criminals, and, you know, the least, and, you know, how better to show

Christ and be able to offer apologetics,

I guess, if you will, unless you're in with those people. Yeah, yeah, and that was the common response, and I don't want to get, you know, because this will overtake the whole class, but.

Yeah. I mean, I'm just saying in response to, like, the

Allister Bank, again, I agree with what you're saying. I'm just thinking the other side of it.

What are they, what could they be thinking as an argument? Right, right. Why not be, you know, amongst the people that actually need to hear your message?

Yeah, that was the response. Jesus ate with sinners, so Jesus would go, and if you actually read the story, when

Jesus ate with Levi and his friends, Jesus did eat with sinners, and he did interact with them, but if you read the story, he did it so as to call them to repentance.

That's why Jesus did it. So if the grandmother took them out to eat, and that was her purpose to lovingly talk to them, fine, or if she went, and she did call them to repentance in some manner at the wedding, fine, but Allister Bank wasn't saying go and, you know, not saying make a scene, but he was saying just kind of go along with it to show your love, but Jesus called people to repentance, and that's the part that needs to be there and isn't there.

All right, one more comment on this. I'll keep reading. Okay. Because that was the same point that I wanted to make.

Jesus ate with publicans and sinners. We are not Jesus. We are so different from Jesus, it hurts.

So to place yourself or think that you can do anything that Jesus did, you're stretching the truth by the wrong way.

I don't think that's what's being said, though. Right. But that's not what's being said. But, I mean, I would say this.

There was no possibility of Jesus getting sucked into the LGBT movement. Like, that's not possible.

He wouldn't get hoodwinked into. It is possible for you and I to get sucked into.

I would never do that. Well, I've seen a lot of people I thought were pretty solid Christians get sucked into it.

So, yeah, we're not Jesus in that sense that we're in a lot more vulnerable situation.

But anyways, what does that have to do with the pre -reformers? Probably not much.

I think if Alistair Begg was a Catholic priest and he said that back in 1210, he probably would have been, well,

I don't know what would have happened to him, but it would have been a lot worse than what's happening now. But not that that would have been the right approach.

But anyways, that's my fault for bringing that up. But hey, Sunday school is a good time, good a time as any.

So any other comments? No. Okay, all right. Yes. Yes, okay.

I'm glad you did bring it up. Those are the kinds of things why this relates to today.

I mean, we were talking about people back then and it's relational. So, yeah,

I appreciate you. Okay, all right. Yeah, and anyone who knows me knows

I'm not, you know, I'm not a hateful person towards anybody. But the thing that does get me mad is when

Christian leaders start capitulating to this stuff. That's what really burns me up.

I sympathize with the person who's got a family situation and I don't know what that's like.

But yeah, when the solid conservative preachers are saying stuff like this, it's like we're in rough shape.

We're in big trouble. Okay, so where was I? Peter Waldo. So the

Roman Catholic Church opposed his preaching ministry. It says Waldo and his followers were persecuted by the

Catholic Church, by the authorities, and they were branded as heretics. Okay, so Waldo and his followers were labeled heretics.

However, the movement survived, though the Waldensians were often forced into hiding in the

Swiss Alps. Okay, now here's where you had to fill it in. The Waldensians shared several important convictions with the later reformers.

And what were those convictions? Number one? The authority of Scripture. Okay, the authority of Scripture over the authority of the

Pope. Number two, the need to translate Scripture into the common language.

And then number three, the ability of lay people to understand and preach

God's Word. Okay, so this is something the Catholic Church did not, and there is a danger.

I mean, I recognize that if anybody and everybody can be teaching God's Word, then you're gonna have a lot of confusion because, hey, this is what this means to me, and there's gonna be 1 ,000 different interpretations.

That is problematic. However, I mean, we saw what happened when the

Pope was the sole infallible interpreter. That was bad, too. So no matter what system you have,

Catholicism, Protestantism, you're gonna have the good and the bad mixed in, although with medieval

Catholicism, there wasn't that much good. But the 16th century, or in the 16th century, my book says, the

Waldensians would join the reformed branch of the Protestant Reformation. This was fitting since their movement was a precursor to the

Reformation. All right, any comments or questions on this man, Peter Waldo, or the

Waldensians? So their big contribution is, you gotta listen to the

Bible instead of the Pope. And again, today, it's just like, well, duh.

This is obvious, but back then, it took a lot of courage to say something like this because if you did say this publicly, you realized that you might be executed, burned at the stake, at least put in prison.

I mean, this is something, as Americans, we don't get it because we can pretty much say anything in a religious context, and you're not gonna get arrested for it.

Okay, in Canada, in Europe, you are seeing those stories here and there where people are being arrested for, you know, quote, unquote, hate speech.

But here, it hasn't happened yet, to my knowledge. But any comments on Waldo before we move on?

All right, here's the discussion question. Look at the key passage at the beginning of this lesson,

Acts 5, 29 through 32, when the religious authorities told Peter to stop preaching.

What was his response? We obey God rather than men, right?

Okay, the second man we're gonna look at, John Wycliffe, he lived from 1324 to 1384.

It says the Waldensian movement was primarily a movement of the laity, that is non -clergy.

With John Wycliffe, however, he was an English priest, and this was the beginning of the scholarly movement of resistance against the corruption of the papacy.

Accordingly, Wycliffe is known as what? What was his nickname? Morningstar.

The Morningstar of the Reformation. It says he did not shy away from pointing out the corruption he observed within the priesthood and leadership of the church.

His criticism of the papacy was especially pointed.

Okay, and again, this is what people today, if a pastor says anything negative about anybody or anything, they can't believe it, because in their minds,

Jesus never said a bad word about anybody and a pastor should be the same way. Of course, if you've read the Bible, you know that's not really true.

If you look at the writings of the ancient church leaders throughout history, even someone like Charles Haddon Spurgeon, which today everyone loves,

I think I've shared this with you before, when you read his writings, it's like, wow, this guy.

To me, this seems pretty harsh, the things he's saying against the Church of England. But this was, my point is, this is pretty much just common throughout church history.

They weren't afraid of beating around the bush. They just called it like it was.

So very pointed criticism against the pope. So pointed was it that they called him what?

The, he ends with an A. The pope, yes, he was the, or a, antichrist, right,

Marcus? A couple of my favorite descriptions of heretics and false teachers that Jesus used was brood of vipers and whiteness sepulchers, empty tombs.

Yeah, Jesus said some pretty, you know, harsh quote -unquote things, but you know, is it harsh?

Well, it's harsh in some people's opinion, but. Not as harsh as God's wrath is going to be on those that are blaspheming against his son.

But that's the point. Why were people so direct?

Because they actually thought people's souls hung in the balance. It was that important. I don't think people believe that anymore.

I think the average preacher, even the big -name people and the people on TV, I think in their heart of hearts, they think that as long as you're a good person, you'll go to heaven.

Because there's no urgency, like people are lost and people are being deceived. If you really believe that, you would have a little more, you know, fire towards those leading people astray.

So, totally different deal from today. That's one of the reasons why

I just like studying church history. I mean, you're just seeing things, like it's totally different than what you get today.

And we need to realize that. Okay, Wycliffe advocated the translation of the

Bible into the common language. Along with some of his colleagues at Oxford, he was involved in translating scripture from what?

The Latin Vulgate into English. Okay, the Latin Vulgate is the translation that the

Catholic Church used. That was like their official Bible. It is likely that Wycliffe translated large portions of the

New Testament, including the four Gospels. The rest of the New Testament and the entirety of the

Old Testament were translated by his associates. So, you know, back then, if you didn't speak

Latin, which nobody did, hardly anybody, there's no way you could read the Bible. And even if you did speak

Latin, the only Bible in town was chained to the altar at the local church, if they even had one.

So, again, totally different from today where everyone has what? If you don't have 10 copies at home, you have this thing.

So everyone has a Bible today. In his writings, Wycliffe thundered against Roman Catholic abuses.

He rejected the doctrine of what? Transubstantiation, and disapproved of both the sale of indulgences and the mandatory celibacy of the priests.

Furthermore, he insisted that the church should give up its property holdings and that the clergy should embrace a life of poverty and simple devotion to Christ.

Okay. So, yeah. So we can relate, because we think,

I'm assuming you think this, I'll speak for everybody here, that the idea of celibacy for the ministers is, well, it's the exact opposite of what the

Bible says. I mean, you could make the argument that the Bible demands that a pastor or a bishop be married and have children.

Now, I'm not sure that that's absolutely necessary, but in 1 Timothy 3, the bishop is what?

To be the husband of one wife, and he's to have children and submission. But for the

Catholic church, they said, well, the bishop, here's how they interpreted, must be the husband of one wife.

He must not be the husband. So, it's the exact opposite, and that's just always, but here's the thing, why did they do that?

Well, on the positive side, they wanted him to be completely devoted to Christ.

If you believe that was their motivation, it seems noble. But, you know, if you have children, guess what?

If you have a wife and kids, when you die, all your money and your possessions go to them. If the bishop doesn't have any family, when he dies, guess where all his money and possessions go?

Back to the church. So, I mean, that was probably just as much the motivation.

Anyway, it's not biblical either way. And then there's a thing about Wycliffe, and he taught that the church was made up of the souls of the elect, and then there's a thing with the visible and invisible church, but we don't need to go into that, because I'd really like to cover all three of these men in one lesson.

So Wycliffe, just one comment. I just want to read a quote.

This might be on the next page, however your book is set up. Has a whole bunch of quotes from Wycliffe.

One statement he made, I just want to find it here. Okay, yeah, number five.

Says Wycliffe called the Pope, quote, the Antichrist, because the

Pope stood at the head of a movement which had placed itself above the word of God, and which suppressed the translation of God's word into the common language of the people.

So once you realize that the Catholic church was preventing people from reading the Bible, you're not allowed to read the

Bible. If you translate the Bible into the common language, we will kill you, and that they had basically taken over, and the

Pope was calling himself the head of the church instead of Christ. What is that? They've taken the place of God.

They've taken the place of Christ, and that's what Antichrist means, one who usurps the authority of Christ, takes the place like an imitation of Christ.

So, and you just compare that, whether it's Haas, Wycliffe, Luther, Calvin, all of these pre -reformers,

Protestant reformers, up until today with Charles Haddon Spurgeon or someone like John MacArthur, they all, all of them said the

Pope is Antichrist. But today, the big popular TV preachers, they all say things like Joel Osteen, the

Pope is fantastic, he says. And just all the popular preachers today, they love the

Pope, they praise the Pope. So again, why it's important to study church history, you see how distorted modern day

Christianity has become. It's totally not in line with the true evangelical faith.

So if you don't study church history, if you don't read men like Spurgeon or study some of this, you would never know.

So I think this is definitely worth looking at. Okay, the final guy we're gonna look at, pre -reformer

Jan Hus, or John Hus. He lived from 1369 to 1415.

He lived in the modern day Czech Republic. He was from a village called

Husenik, which means what? Gooseville. Gooseville, okay. The Bohemian word hus means goose and that's gonna matter later on because he got burnt at the stake and that's where we get a common idiom.

But he was educated at the University of Prague and was highly influenced by the writings of John Wycliffe.

Hus was also known as a gifted preacher. He preached on a regular basis in the

Bethlehem Chapel in the city of Prague. By preaching in the Bohemian language rather than in Latin, Hus exposed his congregation to the word of God.

Hus said, I humbly accord faith and trust to the holy scriptures, desiring to hold, believe and assert whatever is contained in them as long as I have breath in me.

Like Wycliffe, Hus preached against the corruption of the clergy and the sale of indulgences.

In his book, On the Church, De Ecclesia, that's the name of it, Hus insisted that Christ alone, not the

Pope, is the head of the church. Hus appealed to Christ as the highest authority over popes, councils and kings.

Again, to us, that's not controversial at all. Again, that's another like, well, obviously, right?

But again, saying that back in this time, it could get you killed, and it did.

Hus said, another quote, if the papal utterances agree with the law of Christ, they are to be obeyed.

If they are at variance with it, then Christ's disciples must stand loyally and manfully with Christ against all papal bulls, et cetera, et cetera.

And I would just say this. If the laws of the United States of America are in line with the teachings of Christ, you should obey them.

And if the laws of Massachusetts or the laws of the United States of America conflict with the teachings of Christ and tell you to do the opposite, you should?

Follow. Follow. Who do we obey? God rather than men?

I mean, it's really not a radical thing to say, but in some people's minds, I mean, you need to follow men rather than God.

That's just the way they're trained to think. Okay, so Roman Catholic authorities summoned

Hus. After John Hus went around preaching this, and it was open what he believed, the Catholic authorities summoned him to defend his views at the

Council of Constance. He was promised safe passage, but guess what? Oh, just come and we'll make sure, we'll assure your safety.

But shortly after his arrival in 1414, he was what? Arrested and imprisoned.

In 1415, Hus was put on trial when it became clear that he would not be given an opportunity to explain his views.

He declared, I appeal to Jesus Christ, the only judge who is almighty and completely just.

In his hands, I plead my cause, not on the basis of false witness and erring counsels, but on truth and justice.

On July 6th, 1415, he was led outside the city of Constance and burned at the stake.

The English phrase, your goose is cooked, comes from his execution.

Remember, Hus means goose. So he was burned at the stake. His goose, the goose, was cooked.

According to Fox's Book of Martyrs, Hus told his executioners, you are now going to burn a goose.

Hus signifying goose in the Bohemian language. But, he said, in a century, you will have a swan which you can neither roast nor boil.

Though these words may only be legendary, they demonstrate the close connection between Hus and the

Protestant Reformation. Why? Because who is the swan? Luther.

I forget why Luther is called the swan. Now, did Hus really prophesy

Luther? You know, it's debated whether, okay, is this a legend? Did he really say that? Although I did hear one story, don't quote me on this, because I tried to find,

I heard it years ago. It was from R .C. Sproul, so a pretty reliable source. I might have the details wrong, but I thought that Martin Luther was actually ordained as a priest, and he laid on the floor, and that was part of the ordination, and he laid in the church where Hus, I don't know if Hus wouldn't have been buried there.

What was the connection? There was some connection between Luther and John Hus that it was like, okay, this is the providence of God.

I forget the exact details, because it says here after Hus was executed, was this the guy?

Well, maybe it was, who was it that was, they dug up his body, and then they burned it.

I think that was Wycliffe. That was Wycliffe. Okay, yeah, Wycliffe, they dug up his body, burned it,

I think, through the ashes in the river, so there could be no spot of veneration. So maybe it really was John Hus who was buried in that church that Luther was ordained, like right over the spot where he was buried.

Again, maybe I got that mixed up, but it's a pretty cool story either way, right?

So. All right, the final question.

Read Ephesians 1, 18 through 23, which we don't have time to do that.

What do these verses teach about the place the Lord Jesus Christ occupies in the church?

Jesus is the head of the church, amen. We obey him, not men, and if the authorities, or whether it's civil or religious authorities, if they ever teach contrary to the word of God, we as followers of Christ are obligated to obey

God rather than men. And all God's people said. Amen. Amen.