The Great Controversy The Great Controversy | Page 94
word of truth in his mouth, and He set a guard about him that this
word might come to the people. His life was protected, and his labors
were prolonged, until a foundation was laid for the great work of the
Reformation.
Wycliffe came from the obscurity of the Dark Ages. There were none
who went before him from whose work he could shape his system of
reform. Raised up like John the Baptist to accomplish a special mission,
he was the herald of a new era. Yet in the system of truth which he
presented there was a unity and completeness which Reformers who
followed him did not exceed, and which some did not reach, even a
hundred years later. So broad and deep was laid the foundation, so firm
and true was the framework, that it needed not to be reconstructed by
those who came after him.
The great movement that Wycliffe inaugurated, which was to liberate
the conscience and the intellect, and set free the nations so long bound
to the triumphal car of Rome, had its spring in the Bible. Here was the
source of that stream of blessing, which, like the water of life, has flowed
down the ages since the fourteenth century. Wycliffe accepted the Holy
Scriptures with implicit faith as the inspired revelation of God’s will,
a sufficient rule of faith and practice. He had been educated to regard
the Church of Rome as the divine, infallible authority, and to accept
with unquestioning reverence the established teachings and customs of a
thousand years; but he turned away from all these to listen to God’s holy
word. This was the authority which he urged the people to acknowledge.
Instead of the church speaking through the pope, he declared the only
true authority to be the voice of God speaking through His word. And
he taught not only that the Bible is a perfect revelation of God’s will,
but that the Holy Spirit is its only interpreter, and that every man is, by
the study of its teachings, to learn his duty for himself. Thus he turned
the minds of men from the pope and the Church of Rome to the word of
God.
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