There was a certain day in May 2003 that I made my way across London. I had some very important business to do. One was a proposal of marriage to my now wife Abigail. We took a stroll up Primrose Hill in London. It was a lovely sunny afternoon and I popped the question and thankfully she said yes. But before that, in the morning, I had another important piece of business to do, and that was to go to the British Library in King's Cross to purchase a copy, a paperback copy of Tyndale's New Testament. This isn't the one. The one I got was much smaller than this. But some years before, the British Library in England had purchased one of the only two remaining original copies of Tyndale's New Testament for the princely sum of £1.3 million. That's about $2 million. The museum's director said it was the most important acquisition in our history. Now some people today hearing that might raise their eyebrows. Some people today in England would probably question that. There are people in England today who probably can't even remember or don't know anything about who William Tyndale was. But the truth of the matter is that the museum director was right. Tyndale's New Testament is one of the most important books in the history of Britain and indeed the world. This was a book that really lit the touch paper for the Reformation, and it was a translation that became largely the basis for the King James Version. The New Testament portion of the King James is 85-90% straight from William Tyndale. And the King James Version, of course, became the Bible of so many of the Puritans, and then the Bible of men like Edwards and George Whitefield in the Great Awakening, William Carey and the missionary movement. And so really it's true, isn't it? The work of William Tyndale has been used of God to transform whole nations, and especially it's been used to shape the lives of God's people, especially in Protestant and Reformed communities for many centuries now. So this morning I thought we'd do a little refresher class on the life of William Tyndale. I know many of you here, you know a lot about him already, but his life is such an inspirational one. I think it would be good for us just to look at it again, look at God's work in him and through him. I'm leaning upon two or three works here. One is David Daniel's book, William Tyndale, A Biography. Daniel is seen as the premier authority on the life of Tyndale. Also, some notes from a lecture given by my seminary professor, Michael Hakin, and a paper that was given by Phil Arthur at the Westminster Conference 2006 on Tyndale and the English Bible. So, let's begin the time of his birth. That was 1490s. We're not exactly sure the exact year. Probably 1494, the scholars think. He was born somewhere near the town of Stinchcombe. in Gloucestershire, which, as you can see there, is in the south-west of England. It's not far from the Cotswolds, which is a very picturesque part of the country. We don't know that much about his family background. It seems that he came from a fairly well-to-do farming community, because when he was 12 years of age, they sent him to Magdalene School, which was part of Magdalene College. Students would go to Magdalene School, first of all, it was like a grammar school, and then if they got their grades, they'd then move on from there to Magdalene College. which is what Tyndale did. He got his bachelor's degree in 1512 before being ordained as a priest. He then did something which was quite unusual in those days, quite unusual today as well. He went to both Oxford and Cambridge. Those are the two big prestigious universities in England. Usually you go to one or the other, but Tyndale actually ended up going to both. He did his bachelor's at Oxford and then eventually he went to Cambridge to do his master's. Now, around the time of his arrival in Cambridge, probably about 1520, this is when the works of Martin Luther were starting to come into England. And there was great excitement, especially amongst teachers and students, especially on a campus like Cambridge. There were discussions together about these new theological ideas. the White Horse Inn. Perhaps you've heard of that. I think there's a theological forum discussion group called the White Horse Inn. And based on this, it was a pub on the campus in Cambridge where students would come together and discuss these new theological ideas. You had some of the leaders of the Reformation in years to come would be at that pub discussing theology. Thomas Cranmer, Miles Coverdale, Matthew Parker, Hugh Latimer would meet together to discuss the burning issues of the day. Now, was Tyndale ever there in those gatherings at the White Horse Inn? We don't know for sure, but it seems certain that it's within that atmosphere of theological excitement and fervor that Tyndale himself comes to embrace the central themes and truths of the evangelical faith. Now by 1521, Tyndale decides to move away from the environs of academia, away from Cambridge, and he heads back to Gloucestershire. He wants to spend some time meditating and thinking through these new truths that he has discovered. So he goes back to Gloucestershire, he goes to Little Sodbury, and to work as a tutor for a man called John Walsh. The house is still there today. I think you can actually go to the room and see where he lived and where he studied. And he goes there as a tutor. His duties weren't that demanding. Both of his students were two little boys, seven years of age, so he had time to make forays into the surrounding community, to the towns and villages where he would preach the gospel. And the thing that struck him most was the spiritual ignorance that prevailed across the land. He said, there are three million people in England who have no other knowledge except that the oil favored them. By that he means the ritual oil of the Roman Catholic Church. They knew nothing of the truth. They knew nothing of the true gospel way of salvation. And this was something which began to weigh very heavily upon his heart, as well as the deepening conviction that neither could they know the truth unless they had a Bible in their own language. The Bible in the country at the time was in Latin. Latin was the language of the church. But how could the people come to know the truth except it was translated for them into English? This is what Tyndale came more and more to see, that it was, a quote from Tyndale, it was impossible to establish the lay people in any truth except the scripture were laid before their eyes in their mother tongue. They must have the Bible in their own language. That was his burning conviction. And this began to deepen all the more so as he read his own Greek New Testament. This had been produced about six years before by Erasmus, the Dutch theologian who had produced his own Greek translation. It was the first from a non-Latin Vulgate text. That would have been the text used by the Roman Catholics. He used his own more reliable Greek manuscripts. And this has a tremendous impact for the advance of the Protestant Reformation. Not that that was his intention, because he himself was a Roman Catholic, but in many ways he is like to Tyndale. They have the same kind of convictions. Listen to what Erasmus says in the preface to his New Testament. Christ wishes his mysteries to be published as widely as possible. I would wish even all women to read the gospel and the epistles of Paul, and I wish they were translated to all languages of all Christian people, that they might be read and known, not merely by the Scots and the Irish, but even by the Turks and the Saracens. I wish that the husbandman may sing parts of them at his plough, and the weaver may warble them at his shuttle, that the traveler may, with their narratives, beguile the weariness of the way. And of course Tyndale, reading this, he becomes gripped by that same kind of idea. The truths that burned in his life and transformed his life, he wants those truths to transform the lives of his countrymen as well. But how can that happen unless they have the Bible in their own language? Tyndale realizes how favored he is in his own country. To be able to read and write makes him one of only 15 to 20 percent of the country. To be able to actually read Greek makes him one of 0.5 percent of the country. But if this book is going to change the lives of others, it can't remain in Greek. It has to be in English. And so the conviction he has burning in his heart is that it's God who's called him to translate this for his country. Perhaps the best-known example of this is when he was staying at the home of John Walsh. He was this landowner, a very wealthy man, and if you go to manor houses in those days, if you went to one, you'd find in the dining room would be a very large dining table so that the guests who were staying there would come down and they'd all eat around the same table. It was also a place where travellers, especially clergymen, could come and expect to find lodgings and hospitality for the night. Well, on one occasion, quite a high-ranking cleric is passing through Little Sodbury, and he calls in at the home of John Walsh, and he stays for dinner that night, and as was the case at John Walsh's home, it wasn't long before theology was the topic of discussion. Tyndale is there, he begins to hold forth on the problems of the church, the impositions of the Pope upon the church, and the cleric listens to this, and eventually, at the end of it, the cleric declares, we would be better off without God's law than the Pope's law. Tyndale was astonished to hear such a thing coming from a churchman, to which he then replied, in his well-known words, "'I defy the Pope and all his laws. If God spare my life ere many years, I will cause a boy that drives the plough to know more of the Scripture than you do.'" Probably a bit of a conversation stopper at the dinner table. But you can see what's going on in his heart here, this desire he has. It's much like that of Erasmus, that the Bible should no longer just be the preserve of the priests and the prelates. This book must get into the hands of the ordinary people. The weaver, the plowboy, you see Tyndale and Erasmus both using the same kind of language. But also you can see the battle lines are already being drawn. You've got the conviction of Tyndale on the one hand, the Bible in English for the ordinary people, and on the other you've got the hostility, the resentment, the animosity of the church. The Bible in English, why ever would you want to put the Bible into English for ordinary people? In England at that time basically had three languages. You had French, which was the language of the court, Latin was the language of the church, and you had English, which was the language of the ordinary people. And so why would you want to put the Bible into the language of the hoi polloi, ordinary people? They've got priests, let the priests teach them. Let them receive from the priests. Why do they need to know it for themselves? Of course, underlying this was the fear that if they did begin to know the Bible for themselves, they would begin to understand or see the corruption, the spiritual bankruptcy that ran right through the established church. and practices like the priesthood and purgatory and penance and all of these other things which had no foundation whatsoever in the Word of God. And so the church had no interest in getting the Bible into the language of the common people. In fact, since the days of Wycliffe and the Lollards, who'd also sought to do the same thing, a law was passed, 1401, called de heretico comburendo, the burning of heretics, which made not only the translation of scripture to be an offence, but even the possession of scriptures in a vernacular language to be a capital offence. So there are stories of, for example, a woman and six shoemakers who were all burned at the stake because they were seeking to teach their children the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed. A boy of nine years of age was burned at the stake for owning a scrap of paper on which was written the Lord's Prayer. So you can see, to put the Bible into the common language of the people in those days, it was a very risky venture that Tyndale was undertaking. And he knew that, and he realized then that he would need some kind of help, he would need some kind of backing, someone with authority to undertake this project for him. So, in 1523, he travelled to London. He met with the Bishop of London, Cuthbert Tunstall, a man who's known as a friend of scholars, especially Erasmus. So, he thought that he may be sympathetic to his project, but he was wrong. Tunstall wanted nothing to do with it. His view was very much in line with that of the established church. Why give the Bible to the ordinary people? He had heard what happened in Germany when the Germans got Luther's Bible. There was uprising. Give him the Bible here, we'll have the same thing. So he gave Tyndale short shrift. Tyndale comes to realize that if ever his godly ambition is to be achieved, it won't be in his own country. He will have to set sail, he will have to go to the continent of Europe. So that's what he did. April 1524, 30 years of age, Tyndale set sail from England for the last time. He would never come back. The remaining 12 years of his life he really would be a fugitive. He would be a man on the run, playing this game of hide and seek around Europe as he does all he can to elude the grasp of King Henry and the established church. May 7, 1524, he comes at last to Wittenberg, the home of the great German reformer, Martin Luther. And Tyndale was one of many young men who came to Wittenberg at that time. They came to sit at the feet of the great German doctor to learn about the gospel for themselves. Now, whether Tyndale ever actually had a meeting with Luther, we don't know. There is apparently an interesting entry in the register of the Wittenberg University at that time, a man by the name of Wilhelmus Daltici. And it was not uncommon for English refugees fleeing from persecution in their own country to go to Europe and to use a false name to cover their tracks. And so scholars are wondering about this entry, Wilhelmus William Dal Tichy. You swap that around, Tyndale, You know, it's a bit of a stretch. Phil Arthur says this, This may be a reference to Tyndale if two assumptions are both correct. The first is that he was sufficiently safety conscious to want to register his name as Daltene, and the second is that a bored, deaf, or incompetent clerk transcribed it as Daltici. So we don't really know for sure. But one thing we do know for sure is that while he was there during that time in Wittenberg, he was able to learn the Hebrew language. There was no one in England at that time who could have taught him Hebrew. It wasn't being taught in any of the universities until the time of Elizabeth I in the 1560s. But here in the providence of God, Tyndale, by coming to Wittenberg, is able to learn Hebrew now for himself. So again, you can see the providence of God guiding him, shaping him, preparing him for the translation work that he's going to do in years to come. August 1525, he travels to Cologne. Now why would he go to Cologne? Why would he leave Wittenberg? It was the home of Luther. It was the home of this growing Reformation movement. It was a safe place. Why go to Cologne? Germany in those days was divided up into different duchies and states. Not all of them had declared independence from Rome. Some of them were still in the bosom of Rome. And so to go to Cologne, which was still in a Roman Catholic city, this was a very dangerous thing to do, going right into the camp of his enemies. Why would he want to go there? Probably, it seems most likely, because of transport. Transportation reasons. In those days, the fastest, smoothest way to get around was by river. And Tyndale knows that eventually he wants to get his translation back to England. He'll have to do that by boat. He's going to need river access. He didn't have that in Wittenberg, so then he moves to Cologne, where he can be by the river. But, of course, it's a risky venture. It's a Roman Catholic city. If anyone discovers what he's doing, his life is on the line. He could be executed for that. But, undeterred, Tyndale goes to Cologne. He found a printer called Peter Quentel, a man who, for the right price and without asking too many questions, would be willing to translate his work. And so the presses begin to roll. The first 11 pages of Matthew's Gospel come off the press when one morning into the shop comes a man called John Cocleus. He was a bitter opponent of the Reformation. And he came into the shop. He was going to have lunch with some of the print workers. He took them out. A few German beers later, the print workers are all talking about what they're doing in the shop, printing this Gospel. And, of course, Cocleus becomes alarmed. He then alerts the authorities and they storm the shop to try and seize the manuscript. Tyndale has been forewarned by the printer. Tyndale got to the shop, grabbed his manuscript and ran and fled from the city of Cologne. He headed up the line of the river Rhine until he comes to the city of Worms. That's actually spelt Worms, but it's pronounced Worms. And there he found another printer called Peter, Peter Schieffer this time, who agrees to complete the printing of Tyndale's work. And this is 1526, the first run of Tyndale's New Testament is completed, 6,000 copies. of the New Testament in English. So this is a great moment in the history of the church. The first portion of the Bible ever to be translated and printed in English from the Greek in just two years. This is just two years since he set sail from England. He didn't have all the linguistic tools we have today. He worked in very difficult, dangerous circumstances with limited resources, yet in two years he's completed the New Testament. Amazing achievement under God. In February of that same year, 1526, the first copies were loaded onto merchant ships and smuggled into England. Again, you can see the amazing providence of God. 1526, there is a failed harvest in England, crippling food shortages, no wheat, also no cloth. The Germans had offered to supply Henry with all the wheat and cloth that he needed. They then became the transport vessels. German ships sailing into England with wheat and cloth and also stowed away in the bales and barrels, Tyndale's New Testament translation. Unloaded by German merchants on the waterfront in London. So by spring of 1526, these copies of Tyndale's New Testament are available on the streets of London. You could buy a bound copy for two shillings and eight pence, an unbound copy for one shilling and eight pence. I know that doesn't mean very much to you here, but those are not large sums. What that means is that you don't have to have a vast income to be able to afford one. Or, if you were very poor, you could perhaps club together with some friends. There were stories of this kind of thing happening. Perhaps one person who knew how to read and write, he would be reading aloud a copy of Tyndale's New Testament to others who'd helped him to pay for it. There are other stories of choir boys, as well, sitting behind the altar in a Roman church, and one of them has got Tyndale's New Testament. He's reading it aloud to the others. Tyndale's dream is coming true. The Bible is now getting into the hands of weavers, and builders, and iron mongers, and fish mongers. People are coming to faith in Christ. The Bible says that, doesn't it? The Scriptures are able to make you wise unto salvation. People are reading the Bible. They're seeing the errors of the Roman Church. They're seeing the truth. Salvation. Not by works, by faith. Faith alone in Jesus Christ. Alone. This is just what Tyndale had longed for and prayed for. In the preface to his New Testament, he says, this is to the reader, Give diligence, reader, I exhort thee, that thou come with a pure mind, and as the scripture saith, with a single eye unto the words of health and of eternal life, by the which, if we repent and believe them, we are born anew, created afresh, and enjoy the fruits of the blood of Christ. So there you get something of a flavor of the evangelical faith that Tyndale himself had in his heart. That then leads us on to say something about Tyndale as a translator, the way he came to the scriptures. Tyndale, as you can see, had a prodigious gift with languages. He was proficient in seven of them, Italian, Spanish, French, and German, as well, of course, as the ancient languages of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. And so it was to the ancient text of Scripture that he applied his brilliant linguistic mind. Wescott, a 19th century textual critic, said of Tyndale, So he was a phenomenally gifted translator, and what made him so gifted was not just his ability in the ancient languages, but, you know, we sometimes forget this, it was his amazing ability in his own language. That's what makes a really good translator. You've not only got to be able to translate, to understand the language you're translating from, but to have a really good translation, you need to have a translator who's got something of a flair for his own language. And that's certainly what Tyndale had. He was a genius with the English language. You know, there were times when he would come across a word or a phrase and there would be no direct equivalent in the English. And so what he would do, he would make one up. So you have words like peacemaker, long-suffering, atonement, at-one-ment, scapegoat. All of these words we owe to William Tyndale. He also had the ability to capture the meaning in ways that are very striking and varied and memorable. Phil Arthur says, you know, Tyndale always seemed to have the plowboy on his mind. As much as he could, he would write with monosyllables. For example, the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. Phil Arthur makes this point. If you wanted to be more fancy, you could say something like, the impecunious, the disfigured, the limping, the sightless. But it just doesn't run off the tongue in the same way. It doesn't have the same impact. Or, let not your heart be troubled. I mean, that's still used today. There's a radio show host who uses that all the time. It's not contemporary speech, but it registers. It lodges itself in your mind. There's a more modern translation that has, do not be worried or upset. But it's not the same, is it? It doesn't strike you as, let not your heart be troubled. And Tyndale, he laboured for this, he painstakingly wrestled with the original and with his own language to get a translation like this. Because he wanted this book to be read, and to be read well, privately and publicly. And so he worked at this, spent a lot of time at this, to attain this simplicity and this beauty and majesty in the text. So much so that even the King James Version's translators, with all of their linguistic and theological literary skill, when they came to the New Testament, as I said at the beginning, 85-90% of it is straight from Tinder. They didn't do very much to it at all. And so, even today, of course, you think about it, no matter what translation you use today, it's really, it's Tyndale's English, which has woven itself into the fabric of our thinking and our speaking and our praying. Let me just give you some examples here. Let there be light. It's Tyndale. Am I my brother's keeper? The Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and be merciful unto thee. The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. In English, that's Tyndale. That's a beautiful translation. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. This is all Tyndale. Also, Matthew's Gospel. He went out and wept bitterly. Now, those two words are still used in almost every modern translation. Wept bitterly. It hasn't been changed for 400, 500 years. One newer translation tried it. He cried hard. But it just doesn't do it, does it? He wept bitterly. The emotion, the pathos there. And of course, because of this, so much of it has now passed into the English language. Even if you're not a Christian, people would say things like, sign of the times, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, a law unto themselves, he is the apple of her eye. Again, this is all Tyndale's English. According to Daniel in his biography, he says, the list of such near-proverbial phrases is endless. 500 years after his great work, newspaper headlines still quote Tyndale, though unknowingly, and he has reached more people than even Shakespeare. In fact, it's Daniel's contention that if you didn't have William Tyndale, you wouldn't have William Shakespeare. And there are whole dissertations that have been written on that subject as well. And so that helps to explain something of the popularity of Tyndale's New Testament, its accuracy, and its beauty, its simplicity. And so, of course, it wasn't long before it was on sale in London, Oxford, and Cambridge. It's even got as far north as Scotland. You didn't have to have a vast income to be able to possess your own copy of the New Testament. So there's a tremendous breakthrough for the cause of the Reformation. And of course, as you can imagine, it was one that was met with great and fierce displeasure by the established church. Phil Arthur says, it wasn't long before both Testaments and those who bought them were being committed to the flames. Bible burning. That begins October 1526. The Bishop of London himself, Cuthbert Tunsell, is throwing copies of Tyndale's New Testament into the fire. Along with that, the distribution, purchase or possession of a copy of Tyndale's Bible was a very serious crime. Many of Tyndale's closest friends and associates were burned at the stake. Thomas Hitton, first Protestant martyr. Thomas Bilney, Richard Bayfield, the man who's running the ships, bringing the Bible into the country. John Frith, his closest friend, was arrested and burnt alive in 1531. James Bainham, he stood up at a mass in St. Augustine's Church in London and held up a copy of Tyndale's New Testament and he urged the people to die rather than deny the Word of God. he was sent to the flames, April 1532. So these men along with many other women lost their lives all for the sake of Tyndale's New Testament. And Tyndale over in Europe hearing this news, he's grieving very bitterly about the sufferings of his friends. And also he's becoming increasingly aware that it wouldn't be long before he himself would meet with the same fate. The net is closing in upon Tyndale now. King Henry has got four agents scouring Europe looking for this man. He really is God's outlaw. He is a man on the run. Moving between some of the big cities of Belgium and Germany, He went to Marburg, to Antwerp. 1529 he comes to Hamburg. There he completes his translation of the Pentateuch into English. That's stowed away on a ship and smuggled into England. Henry, by this time, is willing to do whatever it takes to get his man. He's got a bounty placed on Tyndale's head, a huge reward for anyone who can supply information that would lead to his capture. 1835, you've got Henry Phillips, an Englishman who turns up in Antwerp. Now, by this time Tyndale himself is living in Antwerp. He is living in the English Quarter in the home of a merchant, Thomas Poyntz. Danielle describes him as a good shrewd friend and a loyal sympathizer. So he provides a safe house for Tyndale and also he gave him a stipend so he could carry on his work of translating and during this time he's able to finish up parts of the Old Testament. He's done the Pentateuch, he now does Joshua through to 2 Chronicles. But, as we say, 1835, this man, Henry Phillips, comes into town. He's an easy-going, personable, young fellow. He comes on the pretense of having been converted through Tyndale's writings. And he says he wants to spend time with Tyndale so that he can teach him more of the evangelical faith. Well, Thomas Points was suspicious about this young fellow immediately. He didn't like him from the off. But Tyndale was a much more open-hearted, trusting fellow and so he took this young man in and they struck up a friendship. And one day, 21st of May, 1535, Phillips had arranged to meet Tyndale for lunch. but it was a ploy. Phillips had told the authorities what was going to happen, an ambush was set and so as they were walking through the narrow streets of Antwerp on their way to the inn, much like Judas all those years before, Phillips gives the signal and out come the soldiers and they fall upon Tyndale and he's captured. The great Bible translator is captured and he's spirited away to a castle in Vilvoorde near Brussels in Belgium. He was in prison for over a year. Again, we don't know that much about what happened to him during that time. There was, in the 19th century, a letter was discovered in the archives of a library in that part of Belgium and it was written in Latin and it was signed by William Tyndale. And this was a letter written by him to the governor of the prison making certain requests. that winter was coming and it was getting very cold and damp. Could he have his cap and his leggings and also a candle that he could use at night? And also he said this, most of all I beg and beseech you that you will kindly permit me to have the Hebrew Bible, Hebrew grammar and Hebrew dictionary that I may pass the time in study. So he's studying the scriptures even to the end. It reminds you of the Apostle Paul, doesn't it? In 2 Timothy chapter 4, he's there in that cold, damp prison cell, and he writes and asks Timothy for the cloak they left in Troas, and the parchments especially. Send me the parchments. Well, August 1536, Tyndale stood trial on charge of being a heretic. He was found guilty, sentenced to death by burning. October 6, 1536, he was led out to the stake. A metal chain was placed around his neck. It was seen as an act of mercy to strangle the individual before they were burned. And then he was engulfed in the flames. 42 years of age, never married, never buried. His ashes were cast into the river. John Fox says that a bystander heard the final words from his mouth. Famous words, I'm sure many of you here, you know them. Oh Lord, open the King of England's eyes. prayer for King Henry VIII, King of England. And a prayer that in some way was really was answered in an abundant way. Because even before the year was out, King Henry VIII would be breaking with Rome. Theologically, he was a Roman Catholic himself, but because he wanted to divorce his wife, he broke with Rome, and because of the influence of his next wife, Anne Boleyn, he softens up to the idea of the common people having a Bible in their own language. Miles Coverdale, then using Tyndale's New Testament and portions of the Old Testament, which Tyndale had translated, he produces a full English version of the Bible. It was called Matthew's Bible. It was presented to King Henry VIII. September 1538, Henry himself gives the order, one book of the whole Bible of largest volume in English is to be displayed in every parish church. It became known as the Great Bible. Tyndale's prayer was answered. His holy ambition then had been realized. In fact, in the year of his death, Bishop Fox, who was the Bishop of Hereford, was heard to grumble to a colleague that the lay people do know more of the Holy Scriptures than we do. How would that come about? That was due in large measure, under God, to the courageous, tireless labours of William Tyndale. Okay, a couple of applications. Treasure your Bibles. Treasure your Bibles. What riches we have in our own language, don't we? We have Bibles, so many Bibles, study Bibles and online Bibles and iPhone Bibles and Bible works and so many Bibles and so many gifts in terms of books and commentaries and we have so much, don't we? How thankful we should be. for our Bibles and thankful to God for the men who gave their lives so that we can have the Bible in our own language. We should treasure our Bibles. The psalmist says, the law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver. Holy Bible, book divine, precious treasure, thou art mine. We should love our Bibles. And we should pray for Bible translators. Pray for men and women, like our own Katie Hugahyde, studying down there in Dallas. Pray for Bible translators, devoting their lives to this work of translating the Scriptures into the languages of the ordinary people. And with that, I just want to close up by showing you a clip. I showed this at our small groups a couple of weeks ago. It was something that came to my attention from Johnny Farese. a while back. It's about the Kimyao people in Papua, Indonesia. And if you're watching on streaming at home, you can find this on YouTube. If you go on YouTube and you put in Kimyao, K-I-M-Y-A-L, Bible 10 minutes. Put that in YouTube, you should be able to find this. This really sums up what Tinder was all about. God's word in the language of the ordinary people. And I think watching this brings to mind perhaps some of the scenes that were to be found in London all those years ago when those New Testaments were being unpacked. So let's watch this and enjoy this and also keep in your mind those words of Tyndale, it's impossible to establish the lay people in any truth except the scripture were laid before their eyes in their mother tongue. Traffic advisory, Mike Alpha Delta from Centani to Corfu. Now crossing the ridge just above Sela. Maintaining one two thousand. There'll be a big party when we land. There'll be dancing and singing and it'll be pretty amazing. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. We don't know what happened. Might follow Mike Alpha down the landing corridor. Might follow Mike Alpha down down the ground. The one pastor had said, it says in the Gospel of John that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And Jesus is that Word, and Jesus is coming, and we need to be there to meet Him. It just blew me out of the water. I thought, Lord, this is how we know that it's you doing something here. What are you doing? What are you doing? We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. We are the people of this land. And then they handed it off to the older believers and one of the ladies just spontaneously, I don't think they had planned for her to say anything, but she just said, we have taken God's Word, we've accepted it, we've put it into our hearts and now we're going to give it to you young people who need to also take it and accept it and walk with God as he teaches in this Bible. So they handed it off to the younger believers and the crying and the sobbing that took place there was just It was something totally unexpected to me, because I knew they would be happy. But the emotion that came out was just so overwhelming to me, I thought... We have no idea. You know, we have had the Word of God for so long. We have taken it for granted. We have resources. We have translations. We have, you know, all these different things. And we don't cherish it. We don't realize what a precious gift we have and hold in our hands. And these guys were realizing that and saying, God, you've come to us through the Word. Yeah. The Kimyals always had a love for the word. They had prepared this ark sort of thing for the Bibles to be put in. They know the word. They can quote the word. They're very good at memorizing. I mean, we've had one lady that has memorized whole books, and she'll sit there, and as she talks with you, she will, well, it's just like it says in Ephesians, and she'll quote three or four or five verses at a time. And so they love the word of God, and just to see them with it, My name is Puluwa Nene. I was born here. I was born here. I was born here. I was born here. I was born here. I was born here. I was born here. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living here for a long time. We have been living We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We have no money to buy food. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to do. Well, I think Tinder would have rejoiced to see a video like that. Time's gone, let's close. Bob, could you close for us and could you also pray for Katie and her translation work? Past hour and a reminder of how blessed we are to have our Bibles. And we pray that as a family we would not forsake them. And we pray that you would boldly write your word upon our hearts and the hearts of the children meeting for Sunday school class even over the past hour. We pray for your blessing here. We thank you for reminders of heroes like Tyndale. We pray that you would give us hearts that have the same fire that his heart had for seeing those around him lost in need of the gospel. We pray that we would be bold in sharing the gospel with those we come across with. And then we do pray for Katie, studying in Texas and preparing to go abroad. We pray that her efforts would not be in vain, but that they would be owned by you, that you would guard her and keep her safe and use her in a mighty way, that we might see future videos of other tribes that have been blessed to receive your word. So be with her and with this mission group that she is a part of, we pray for them and for their efforts to go out to the ends of the earth. And then again, we thank you for the Lord's Day, a day that we can meditate on your word and hear it preached. We pray that this day would be owned by you and that it would do all of our hearts and souls much good. Thank you again for this time, and it's in Christ's name that we pray, amen.