I said in my last devotion that I am a debtor to so many people that God has used to carry His word and message. To those that He has provided to fill the hearts of His elect with food and gladness in times of most need. To those that in the face of true evil, God gave strength to continue to His glory. Please in this do not see the exhortation of man but the providence of God.
Small part of the life of this Martyr for God taken from Fox’s Book of Martyrs.
For these and such other considerations this good man was stirred up of God to translate the Scripture into his mother tongue, for the profit of the simple people of his country; first setting in hand with the New Testament, which came forth in print about A.D. 1525. For this act Cuthbert Tonstal, bishop of London, with Sir Thomas More, being sore aggrieved, despised how to destroy that false erroneous translation, as they called it. (In time they were able to commit the Emperor to a decree banning his text and through trickery had William Tyndale imprisoned where he remained until his martyrs death.)
Such was the power of his doctrine, and the sincerity of his life, that during the time of his imprisonment (which endured a year and a half), he converted, it is said, his keeper, the keeper's daughter, and others of his household.
At last, after much persecution and imprisonment, although he deserved no death, he was condemned by virtue of the emperor's decree, made in the assembly at Augsburg. Brought forth to the place of execution, he was tied to the stake, strangled by the hangman, and afterwards consumed with fire, at the town of Vilvorde, A.D. 1536; crying at the stake with a fervent zeal, and a loud voice, "Lord! open the king of England's eyes."
