In understanding the confessions, it is important to have a picture of what was going on historically at the time they were written. The Scots Confession is certainly a point in case!
Europe in the Sixteenth Century was a continent in great political and religious ferment. Power was shifting from nation to nation and faith to faith. Unlikely alliances were formed in attempts to create stability. A tinderbox atmosphere prevailed.
Catholic v Protestant
In Spain, Catholic King Phillip II is a formidable power. In England, the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I comes to the throne, the child of Henry IV’s wife Anne Boleyn. The Catholic sympathizers in England do not recognize her leadership. Following Elizabeth’s predecessor’s actions, Mary Tudor, who had burnt at the stake Protestants Nicholas Ridley, Hugh Latimer and Thomas Crammer, sympathies lay more with the Protestants than the Catholics.
In Scotland power is in the hands of Mary of Guise, a Catholic with strong links to France where reigns Catholic Catherine da Medici, struggling herself in the midst of a struggle between the French Guise and Bourbon families.
The Scottish church, Roman Catholic through and through, is not in good shape Illiteracy and adultery is prevalent; amongst the clergy. Ecclesiastical positions are doled out to the idle in exchange for money and power.
But on the continent a new wind had begun to blow. The Reformation was taking place. Information about the Reformation movement began to seep through from the ports and over the border from England …and dissatisfaction with Catholicism began to grow.
One of the first to express this dissatisfaction is Patrick Hamilton who begins to preach Reformation principles in opposition to Catholicism. In 1528 he is summoned to the castle at St Andrews to ‘debate’ his views with Cardinal David Beaton. The debate turns out to be a trial and Hamilton is burnt at the stake for heresy.
His death inflames another protestant, George Wishart. He travels to Geneva and studies under Calvin, returning to Scotland where he preaches uncompromisingly regarding Reformation principles. Cardinal Beaton decrees that this must stop and sends an army of 500 soldiers to capture him.
Knox turns to Prorestantism
Before his inevitable capture, Wishart comes into contact with a young tutor by the name of John Knox, who takes to heart Wishart’s message. Wishart is captured, tried by a jury hand picked by Cardinal Beaton and burnt at the stake in St Andrews castle whilst the Cardinal is alleged to have enjoyed he spectacle whilst reclining on cushions on the castle ramparts.
This act triggers armed resistance by a small band of Protestants under the leadership of John Lesslie. Amongst them, as a chaplain, is John Knox. They storm the castle and seize it, dispensing of cardinal Beaton in the process.
Knox becomes a galley slave, is educated under Calvin and returns to Scotland
Mary of Guise, the ruling lady in Scotland, appeals to Catherine de Medici for help and a fleet of warships blockades the harbor eventually recapturing St Andrews from the protestant vigilantes. John Knox is captured and for nineteen months becomes a galley slave, chained to the oars of a French warship. Intervention by the English government, who favor his protestant principles, secured his release in 1549, whereupon Knox returned to preaching; a message characterized by opposition to the Mass and the ‘harlot’ of the Roman Church.
Such principles went further than the English Reformers were prepared to reach, so in January 1554 he went to Geneva and studied under John Calvin. He made a number of excursions back to Scotland, even on one accessions appealing directly to Mary of Guise, the ruler of Scotland, to embrace the Protestant cause. Her response was to order him tried for heresy and ceremonially burning his effigy.
In 1557 he wrote in Geneva a book on Predestination and another about “The monstrous Regiment of Women” which initially offended England’s protestant Queen Elizabeth to such an extent that he lost her sympathies and was no longer guaranteed a safe passage though England. He won back her favor by comparing her to “Deborah’ the most fearless of the Old Testament prophetic dynasty.
Knox returned to Scotland on May 2, 1559, the same day as the catholic clergy of Edinburgh were holding a conference that called for implementing certain reforms to pacify increasingly restless parishioners. Specifically, that any priest caught in adultery would automatically lose a third of his income at first offence. (Cardinal Beaton before his demise had fathered at least eight illegitimate offspring – a fact not mentioned at the conference!)
Knox had been in the country just 10 days when Mary of Guise ordered that every Protestant preacher must stand before her in Stirling. Knox replied that he would willing do so, along with his whole congregation, and every man of them would be bearing arms.
Mary appealed to France to send troops. Quickly!
The stage was set for revolution. Scottish rebels, supplemented by English troops dispatched by Elizabeth laid siege to French strongholds, in particular the town of Leith. On June 11th, 1560 Mary of Guise died, and with her the Catholic cause. On July 6th a treaty signed with France that she would never again interfere with Scottish interests.
The revolution had succeeded but only with England’s help. Knox wanted more. He sought complete Scottish independence. He urged the Scottish Parliament to adopt a confession of faith that would unite the nation both politically and ecclesiastically.
On August 17th, 1560, John Knox spoke to the Scottish Parliament:
“Long have we thirsted, dear brethren, to make known to the world the sum of that doctrine which we profess and for which we have sustained infamy and danger. But such has been the rage of Satan against us, and against Jesus Christ’s eternal verity, lately now born again among us, that to this day no time has been granted to us to clear our consciences, as most gladly would have done. For how we have been tossed until now the most part of Europe, we suppose, understands.”
He then delivered to them a confession, hastily produced in four days by him and five others; the adoption of which he hoped would bring formal recognition of the doctrinal standards of Geneva.
Central to the confession were two teachings that broke away from Catholicism, firstly Election, secondly the Church.
ELECTION
In 1546 the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent declared that redemption came not only through the remission of sins, but also through the sanctification of the inner being by supernatural love. This second spiritual necessity was only achievable by observing the Mass. Faith alone was not enough. The Mass had to be administered and received, as it was the central sacrificial act, in which the bread and wine became the body and blood of Christ through which the recipient attained salvation.
Knox declared such a view false. Only God, not any ritual could save people. In God’s great mercy, God elected – chose – people for salvation. It was not a process that could be manipulated by church or priest, nor dependant on human initiative.
Example: CHAPTER 8 – Election
That same eternal God and Father, who by grace alone chose us in his Son Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world was laid, appointed him to be our head, our brother, our pastor, and the great bishop of our souls. But since the opposition between the justice of God and our sins was such that no flesh by itself could or might have attained unto God, it behooved the Son of God to descend unto us and take himself a body of our body, flesh of our flesh, and bone of our bone, and so become the Mediator between God and man, giving power to as many as believe in him to be the sons of God; as he himself says, "I ascend to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God." By this most holy brotherhood whatever we have lost in Adam is restored to us again.
Therefore we are not afraid to call God our Father, not so much because he has created us, which we have in common with the reprobate, as because he has given unto us his only Son to be our brother, and given us grace to acknowledge and embrace him as our only Mediator. Further, it behooved the Messiah and Redeemer to be true God and true man, because he was able to undergo the punishment of our transgressions and to present himself in the presence of his Father's judgment, as in our stead, to suffer for our transgression and disobedience, and by death to overcome him that was the author of death.
But because the Godhead alone could not suffer death, and neither could manhood overcome death, he joined both together in one person, that the weakness of one should suffer and be subject to death--which we had deserved--and the infinite and invincible power of the other, that is, of the Godhead, should triumph, and purchase for us life, liberty, and perpetual victory. So, we confess, and most undoubtedly believe.
Election is the Reformed way of saying “Grace Alone”. The stress is upon the gracious act of God that prompts our act, rather than the other way around. It places the responsibility upon us to respond to that which God has already declared, and suggests that even that response is somehow a response to divine initiative.
THE CHURCH
Chapter 18 designates the three marks of a true church:
• True preaching of the Word
• Right administration of the Sacraments
• Upright administration of church Discipline
Chapters 5 and 16 talk of the invisible church that began in Adam. Chapter 25 clarifies the situation by stating that in identifying geographical churches “we do not mean that every individual person in that company is a chosen member of Christ Jesus. The whole body of all those who truly believe, makes up the invisible church and this church is known only to God. The visible church is made known by the 3-fold pattern of a true church.
Such were principles held in common with many protestant churches. But in Scotland, Knox's actions led to the Presbyterian Church becoming "THE Church of Scotland", while to this day 'The Church of England' is the domain of the Anglican/Episcopalian church.
Many Presbyterian Churches in the USA hold “Scottish Sunday” services, acknowledging the influence of the Presbyterian of Scotland and of John Knox, in defining their faith today. For that reason “The Sots Confession’ remains as an important document among the collected Confessional works!