Revival - Part 3: John Wycliffe and the Lollards

Christianity was introduced into Britain some time in the second century and maintained an attitude of robust independence toward the Roman Church. In 596 Augustine was sent from Rome together with 40 monks to convert the Anglo Saxons and to establish the authority of the Catholic Church. For almost a thousand years the gloom of the Dark Ages spread over Britain.
In about 1320 John Wycliffe was born in Yorkshire and became a popular teacher in Oxford. Having been introduced to the teachings of the Waldensians he set about correcting the abuses that he saw all around him in the church. He was a prolific writer and early on his denunciation of the role of the church as a temporal power made him powerful friends among the nobility. When Wycliffe proposed that the Church would be better off without pope or bishops his friends were able to protect him from the church who tried to bring him to trial as a heretic.
His early writings were in Latin which was normal for that time, but after about 1380 he began to write tracts in English for use among the common people. He then translated the Latin Bible into English for the first time and organised a body of preachers to travel the country with their hand written Bibles carrying the Gospel to the people. These" poor preachers" were scornfully derided as the Lollards – a Dutch term for mumblers.
In spite of persecution from the Church the work of the Lollards continued and true religion was revived in our land so that the country was prepared for the coming of the Reformation. The reading of the Bible in English was to arouse a longing among the people to possess a copy of the Scriptures in their own language. This became possible with the invention of the printing press, and when the New Testament, translated by William Tyndale, was printed in 1526, in spite of being banned, it sold in its thousands to rich and poor alike.
It is so difficult for us to imagine what life was like in the days of Wycliffe. Church services were conducted in Latin which was understood only by the well educated people. The Bible was not available in English and its possession was limited to the clergy. It was thought to be too dangerous to be read by ordinary people. Worship consisted of little more than attending the mass conducted in Latin.
Do we really appreciate our Bibles as much as we should? Its preservation down through the centuries, in spite of the efforts of men to suppress it or tamper with it, is an instance of God's providential goodness. It cost many good men their lives to bring us the Scriptures and we should remember them and thank God for them. I wonder how many of us would be prepared to die because we own a Bible.
If we in our day neglect God's word we will return to another dark age and how dark will that darkness be.