October 5, 2021

“Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers, who have received the law by the direction of angels and have not kept it.”  Acts 7:52-53

Stephen, addressing an assembly of Jewish Synagogue leaders, preached a beautiful history of the workings of God beginning with the calling of Abraham. But the corruption among the religious leaders who had rejected Jesus resulted in a voluntary blindness and deafness to any presentation of God’s Truth, which always—by contrast—points out error. They simply did not want to hear it. This pattern is often repeated in the Scriptures and continues still. Immediately after Stephen’s sermon, they united against him and stoned him to death. The treatment of John Huss and his close friend Jerome of Prague falls into the pattern.

Upon arrival at Constance, despite the guarantees of safe conduct, Huss was arrested and placed in a dungeon by order of the pope and cardinals. Interestingly, the council soon deposed that pope and both “antipopes” and chose a new pope. Then, this same council proceeded to crush the Reformer. Months of imprisonment during a time of appeals by supporters of Huss took a terrible toll. The foul, damp air of the dungeon brought on a fever that accompanied the deteriorating state of his health. Wearing heavy chains before the council to testify, his prayers were answered in that God’s grace enabled him to boldly uphold God’s Word as the sure revelation of His character. Huss was declared an “obstinate heretic” and the vote of the conference was to sentence Huss to be burned at the stake. Jerome received the same sentence a year later, for he had also been seized and placed in a dungeon. Both events involved a ceremonial degradation before being handed to civil authorities for carrying out of the sentence. Curses were pronounced as they were mocked and made to wear paper hats with frightful painted illustrations of red devils. They wore these ignominious paper hats, both commenting to the effect that their Savior had worn a crown of thorns for them. But even their enemies were stunned by the dignity they possessed until the very end. A zealous papist who attended both burnings said: “Both bore themselves with constant mind when their last hour approached. They prepared for the fire as if they were going to a marriage feast. They uttered no cry of pain. As the flames rose, they sang hymns; and scarce could the vehemence of the fire stop their singing.”

Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, “Write: ‘Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’” “Yes,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.”  Revelation 14:12-13