Minute for Mission: Reformation Sunday

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John Knox (Pearl Digital Collections PHS)

On Reformation Sunday, Presbyterians celebrate the tradition that grounds their faith. 

In Scotland, the Protestant Reformation was led by the great reformer, John Knox (1514–1572). During his life in the 16th century, Knox was a tutor, a galley slave to the French, a royal chaplain of King Edward VI, a sword-wielding bodyguard, a scholar and writer, and a preacher of fiery sermons at Old St. Giles in Edinburgh. He was a leading figure in the Scottish Reformation, during which time Protestants fought for religious freedom in countries ruled by the Catholic faith. Knox instilled in his fellow countrymen the duty to oppose unfair government to bring about moral and spiritual change.

In 1559, the leading group of the Reformation movement, the Lords of the Congregation, militarily occupied various cities, including Perth and Edinburgh, where they elected Knox minister of St. Giles Cathedral. Later that year, after hearing Knox’s Thanksgiving sermon, the Lords of the Congregation asked Knox and his colleagues to write a confession of faith. They obliged, and four days later offered up “The First Book of Discipline” of the Scots Confession. The Confession was adopted by Parliament in 1560 and remained the Scottish churches’ official theological doctrine until 1647, when it was superseded by the Westminster Confession.

The adoption of the Scots Confession did not mean total freedom — rather, the return of the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots in 1561 erected a few more roadblocks for the emerging Reformation. But the flames of the movement had caught, and John Knox’s influence continued to spread by and large as the Reformation forever changed the Scottish landscape.

McKenna Britton, Communications Associate, Presbyterian Historical Society

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff:

Michael Fallon, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer, Finance, The Board of Pensions
Margaret Farmer, Senior Facilities Specialist, Building Services, Administrative Services Group 

Let us pray:

On this Reformation Sunday, as we remember the bold acts of our forebears in the faith, let us reclaim anew the watchword that is shared by Presbyterians and other Reformed Christians, that we are a Church “reformed and always reforming” through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.