The Man With Game

This is my speech from the Reformation Party that we had this past Sunday.  It is about John Knox.  There was a surprised noise in the middle of my speech, when people found out John Knox was able to get a girl of seventeen.. when he was fifty.  So that explains the title.  Enjoy. :)

King Henry the VIII was dubbed the “Defender of the Faith” by the Pope.  But who was really the “Defender of the Faith?”  The answer would be the Scottish Reformer, John Knox.  He was one of the great reformers, and an even greater man.  He loved the Lord, and took to heart the saying, “Take up your cross after me.”  Knox was destined to be a man that would rock the world, and would turn Scotland upside down.  He brought the light back to Britain, he was the turning of the tide.

No one knows exactly where John Knox was born.  But historians theorize that he was born in Giffordate, Scotland, just 16 miles outside of Edinburgh, and born somewhere between 1513 and 1514.  Knox later died on November 24, 1572.  But in between that time he would be: a bodyguard, pastor, scholar, friend, protector, shepherd, and slave.

There are so many stories I could tell about the bravery of John Knox.  About the sacrifice and love, and about the aggressiveness of his defense of his Lord.  But one of the big surprises of this Reformer’s life is that he was a bodyguard.  Yes, he actually was a man of arms before he become a pastor.  He was the body-guard of George Wishart.  The man who converted him to Protestantism.  This also symbolizes that he would be the Defender of the Faith.  The True Defender of the Faith.

Another adventure that this man experienced would affect him for the rest of his life.  Some of his friends seized the Castle at St. Andrews, because there was a certain mischievous Bishop there that they finally took action against.  Knox was finally persuaded to come in and preach for them there, as it was turned into a refuge for Protestants.  Soon after John arrived, the place was besieged by Bloody Mary. The castle itself was a very strong one, and could not be taken by land, thus Queen Mary sent messengers to the King of France, bidding him to hurry and come and bring his navy.

Thus you find the Protestants being attacked from land and sea.  Soon, the walls crumbled and the soldiers inside it were put to work in the galleys.  Knox was there for a very long time, and by the time he was able to escape, he was so weakened that he would suffer from all sorts of sicknesses and diseases for the rest of his life. 

After this time, he would run away to Geneva, Switzerland to sit under the tutelage of John Calvin.  After that he would travel into France to take over the charge of an English church… they soon found out that he was too good.  So he went back to Calvin.  Finally, he was to go back to Scotland, and he got married to Margaret Stewart.  The irony is that she was a distant part of the Royal family.  While he was fifty at the time she was only seventeen.  But they would go on to be married. Once Queen Mary died, John Knox was offered a place to preach in the Royal family.  He declined and took a lesser position, arguing that he could serve God better from a lesser position.  He didn’t want to be tempted with the wealth that would be offered to him if he preached to the King’s family.

In the great Reformer’s funeral procession, the Earl of Mortoun said, “ "Here lyeth a man who in his life never feared the face of man, who hath been often threatened with dagger, but yet hath ended his dayes in peace and honour."  But to his dying day, John Knox was the Defender of the Faith.