It wasn’t until weeks after visiting Westminster Abbey that I realized I’d missed seeing the plaque commemorating William Tyndale. While preparing for my night class on Church History, I was reminded that it wasn’t until 400 years after his death that Tyndale was finally recognized for his achievements in the most famous of England’s burial places. “Oh well,” I sighed, “only 3,300 people are buried and commemorated there. Little wonder I missed him.”
Like so many servants of God, William Tyndale’s historical significance went largely unnoticed in his lifetime.
We have to be intentional if we want to find God’s saints because they are hidden in their humility. They don’t automatically show themselves on LinkedIn. Obscurity is both a characteristic and a liability. And that’s the way they would want it.
As I previewed my lecture notes, my thoughts floated to Mora Proctor. “Yes, a saint, indeed,” I said to myself. “Ms. Mora,” as I referred to her, had been blind from birth. Mom would periodically put a meal in my bicycle basket with instructions for delivery to Ms. Mora. Always smiling at the gift, she would pray over the meal and then literally prophesy good things into my life. Somehow, she made me feel like God had unique plans for me. Later, I discovered she did the same for others. I still have typed letters from her that she sent me through my college years, letters replete with affirming words encouraging me to stay on course.
I was still a kid, but my parents let me follow Dr. Giles Fort as he made his rounds at Sanyati Baptist Hospital in what was then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Africa. Wearing a pith helmet, Dr. Fort exuded the aura of historic explorer David Livingstone, trudging in the African bush country. I watched time after time as Dr. Fort took the sick into his arms. Sometimes, I followed him as he made his way to the hospital late at night, the sound of the bush’s crawling, creepy creatures scurrying away from our approaching footsteps. But I felt secure following behind him. He instilled in me a desire to walk through the darkness if the mission called for it.
Years later, Dr. James Hellinger also let me tag along as he visited people in abject poverty, the outcasts in Bangalore, India. “You’ll offend them if you don’t eat it,” he would say as I hesitatingly looked his way when they offered us what food they had. And then, he would look at me, gawky high school kid that I was, “Share a good word for them, David.” And I would try, thanking the Lord for a translator who gave me time to think of what to say next.
Charles Barrett would do much the same, only as a member of the Gideons International in my hometown, Altus, Oklahoma. Mr. Barrett, a friend of my parents from Church, would say to me– now older but still in high school, “David, I sure could use your help distributing Bibles.” He was referring to the Jackson County Jail. Glancing my way, then at the inmates, he would say, “Share your testimony, David.” I had no choice but to try. He trusted that I could.
I was thinking about the next “saint” in my life when I glanced at the clock: time to begin the night class.
I would tell them about William Tyndale, how he was a brilliant scholar but unpopular with the Church for, among other things, his unauthorized translation of the Bible into English. It didn’t help that he opposed King Henry VIII’s desire for an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. The King ensured that William met with an untimely death after the monarch had the upstart Bible teacher strangled and burned at the stake. (His last prayer was for the Lord to open the King of England’s eyes.) But Tyndale’s work lived on. Much of the authorized King James Translation incorporated Tyndale’s earlier work.
None of my “saints” will be buried or commemorated at Westminster Abby, but having found them, they still shine for me. Like guiding lights in a world where people forget and darkness prevails, they are ever-present pointers to another One who died in obscurity, the One who said, “Many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first.”
No wonder they chose servanthood over fame.