John Robinson (1576–1625) and “Reformation Day”

John Robinson, pastor to the Pilgrims who sailed to the New World, has some relevant words for those speaking of a “Reformation Day.” I celebrate what the Reformers accomplished in Christ’s name in so far as their thoughts and actions correspond to scripture. However, I am not one to so sing the praises of the Reformers such that I don’t notice where they made mistakes and acted wrongly. I am grieved when I am around Christians who fall prey to Reformation propaganda to the extent that they refuse to go beyond the Reformers. This sometimes happens because they are so locked into their traditions and confessions (taking great pride in them), that they can go no further than Luther, Calvin, or their successors. These types of people may have favorite teachers that they so admire, that they will not hold anything contrary to what these men teach.

John Robinson has appropriate words for such people. Speaking about his memorable charge to the departing company at Delft Haven, the following is reported:

All things being ready, Mr. Robinson observed a day of fasting and prayer with his congregation, and took his leave of the adventurers with the following truly generous and Christian exhortation:

“Brethren,
“We are now quickly to part from one another, and whether I may ever live to see your faces on earth any more, the God of heaven only knows; but whether the Lord has appointed that or no, I charge you before God and his blessed angels, that you follow me no farther than you have seen me follow the Lord Jesus Christ.

“If God reveal any thing to you, by any other instrument of his, be as ready to receive it as ever you were to receive any truth by my ministry; for I am verily persuaded, the Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of his holy word. For my part, I cannot sufficiently bewail the condition of the reformed churches, who are come to a period in religion,^* and will go art present no farther than the instruments of their reformation. The Lutherans cannot be drawn to go beyond what Luther saw; whatever part of his will our God has revealed to Calvin, they will rather die than embrace it; and the Calvinists, you see, stick fast where they were left by that great man of God, who yet saw not all things.

“This is a misery much to be lamented, for though they were burning and shining lights in their times, yet they penetrated not into the whole counsel of God, but were they now living, would be as willing to embrace farther light as that which they first received. I beseech you remember, it is an article of your church-covenant, that you be ready to receive whatever truth shall be made known to you from the written word of God. Remember that, and every other article of your sacred covenant. But I must here withal exhort you to take heed what you receive as truth,—examine it, consider it, and compare it with other scriptures of truth, before you receive it; for it is not possible the Christian world should come so lately out of such thick antichristian darkness, and that perfection of knowledge should break forth at once.

“I must also advise you to abandon, avoid, and shake off, the name of Brownists; it is a mere nickname, and a brand for the making religion and the professors of it odious to the Christian World.”
_______________
* The remarks of Acontius [Giacomo Aconcio (1492–1566)] are pertinent here. “The cause (says he) that the relics of error and superstition are perpetuated is, that as often as there is any reformation of religion, either in doctrine or worship, men think that every thing is not to be immediately reformed at first, but the most distinguishing errors only are to be done away; and that when some time has intervened, the reformation will be completed with less difficulty. But the event hath, in many places, shewn that it is more difficult to remove the relics of false worship and opinions, than it was at first to subvert fundamental errors. Hence it is better to correct every thing at once.” “Sed ex eo etiam fieri potest, ut maneant errorum atque superstitionum reliquiæ,” &c. Acontii Stratagemetum Satanæ, libri octo. ed. 1652, p. 330.—ED.

Daniel Neal, The History of the Puritans; Or, Protestant Nonconformists, 5 vols. (London: William Baynes and Son, 1822), 2:110–11. “Sed ex eo etiam fieri potest, ut maneant erorum atque superstitionum reliquiae, quod quo tempore aliqua facienda fit divini cultus, piorumque dogmatum restituio, arbitrentur non statim initio restitui omnia posse, sed primum ea tollenda esse in quibus insignis aliqua sit impietas, interjecto deinde tempore aliquo minore impedimento integram institui posse restitutionem. eventus enim multis locis docuit, plus esse difficultatis postea in tollendis reliquiis, quam fuerit initio in tollendis praecipuis erroribus: ut quum eo veniendum est praestet multo, eadem opera omnia corrigere.” Iacobo Acontio [Jacobus Acontius], Stratagematum satanae libri 8 (Amstelaedami: Apud Ioannem Ravesteynium, 1652), 330. See also E. H. Broadbent, The Pilgrim Church (Basingstoke, Hants, UK: Pickering & Inglis, 1985), 245–46.