Wednesday, December 3, 2025

It is the 3rd of December 2025. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

Our memorial for today, an event in 1557 in Scotland, gives us the opportunity to check in on our Presbyterian brothers and sisters- they number some 75 million worldwide. There are some 6 million across the United States in about 40 denominations (though, like with all denominations, they will argue over who the “real ones” are).  

The story often begins with the figure of John Knox, but in 1557, he was in Geneva, having fled Scotland after the daring raid on St. Andrew’s castle. But we can go back farther. The Scottish church came out of the Celtic tradition with St. Columba, the Irish missionary who set up shop on the Island of Iona on the West Coast. Some will point to the Medieval “Culdees” as a precursor to the Reformation- a kind of monastic movement that was diffuse and not based on vows or strict hierarchies. We might see something here of the communal over the stratified, which will be a hallmark of the Presbyterians to come- but don’t push it too far.

And there are reports of “Lollards” in Scotland- those pre-Reformation followers of Wycliffe and agitators for the Bible in the vernacular.

But if anything, the Scots' relationship with the French and aversion to the English may have suggested a Catholic reformation in Scotland.  

But by the mid-1500s, there were signs of trouble. There was the internal dissent which led to the murder of Cardinal Beaton by Protestants in the aforementioned raid on St. Andrew’s Castle. Part of this was religious dissent, and others who were wary of the Queen: Mary Queen of Scots, who had been sent to France to marry the Dauphin to create a Catholic alliance. But Kings Henry and Edward gave way to the Catholic Mary Tudor in England in 1553, stoking fears of a united England and France subduing the Scots.

For whatever local and grassroots dissent there was in Scotland, the Reformation would need to be enacted, on some level, by the Scottish nobility. And that brings us to the first of a number of “solemn covenants” or “bonds” as they would call them. In fact, the early “Presbyterians” (which just means ‘ruled by Elders’) would often take the name “covenanters” as their actions would be pushed forward by covenants amongst equals rather than from above.

And it was on this, the 3rd of December in 1557, that the first of these “covenants” would be signed. It was the Earls of Argyll, Glencairn, and Morton, along with John Erskine of Dun, who made up this group originally called the “Lords of the Congregation,” who opposed Mary Queen of Scots as well as the moderate reformation being pursued by some.

Their document takes on some familiar 16th-century rhetoric: "We perceiving how Satan in his members, the Antichrists of our time, cruelly do rage, seeking to overthrow and destroy the Gospel of Christ, and his Congregation, ought, according to our bounden duty, to strive in our Master's Cause, even unto the death…”

One prominent historian of the Reformation in Scotland noted that this important meeting and document were bold, but its boldness was only matched by its initial unpopularity. But this was 1557, and things were about to change. The following year, Elizabeth would come to the English throne. Mary Queen of Scots would see the young French prince die, and she would come home to Scotland to be married to her Protestant cousin, Lord Darnley. John Knox would return from Geneva and establish St. Andrews as the center of the Scottish Reformation.

In 1560, the Scottish Parliament would formally adopt the Reformation, and the 1570s would see Andrew Melville and the adoption of the Presbyterian system- they would then enter into a 17th-century “covenant” with English Protestants, and the Scottish Presbyterians would have influence on the Westminster Confession and standards.

But it was that “covenant” by the then small number of noblemen that heralded the transition from local dissent to organized protest- their “First Covenant” signed in Edinburgh on this, the 3rd of December in 1557.  

The Last word for today comes from the daily lectionary, which has, for this beginning of Advent, a daily repetition of the Psalm number 124- a good word for Advent preparation: 

¹ Had not the Lord been on our side,
may Israel now say;

² Had not the Lord been on our side,

when men rose us to slay;

³ They had us swallow’d quick, when as

their wrath ’gainst us did flame:

⁴ Waters had cover’d us, our soul

had sunk beneath the stream.

⁵ Then had the waters, swelling high,

over our soul made way.
⁶ Bless’d be the Lord, who to their teeth

us gave not for a prey.

⁷ Our soul’s escaped, as a bird

out of the fowler’s snare;

The snare asunder broken is,

and we escaped are.

⁸ Our sure and all-sufficient help

is in JEHOVAH’s name;

His name who did the heav’n create,

and who the earth did frame.

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 3rd of December 2025, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man who realizes that “flame” and “stream” don’t rhyme with an American accent- Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man thrown off by the “snare” and “are” but still…. I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.