When we consider the Reformers, we may picture strong men and women with booming voices that echoed around the gathered crowd. We picture them as fearless, rebuking whoever contradicted the true teachings of Scripture, calling out heresy for what it was.
But this isn’t the picture of John Knox that we find when we study him.
Douglas Bond, author of The Mighty Weakness of John Knox, said, “We tend to think of Knox as the bold, thundering, charge-into-the-fray, no-holds-barred Reformer—sort of a giant who walks into the room and says, ‘Everybody move!’ and they do. But the more research I did, the more formidable problems that developed with this stereotype emerged… He was not a giant who just switched loyalties. Knox was a meek, reluctant personality, a weak man in the flesh.”
Knox didn’t have riches or former glory when he became a Reformer to give him boldness either; rather, he shamelessly admitted, “I quake, I fear, and I tremble.”
And yet, John Knox was the Scottish Reformer who founded the Presbyterian church. What made this humble, unnoticeable, fearful man such a mighty man of God? How did God use such a “weak” man?
Read the rest of this article at Whole Magazine.