Do you recall a time when you did noble job which was misinterpreted and resulted to misjudgment? As Archbishop of All Nations, I have had several incidents where this has happened. One was at the Memorial Service of my mother. My younger brother who is a bishop and elder brother who is a canon had decided that I will be the preacher. Before we had to go to the sanctuary, the Diocesan bishop popped in. When he was informed that I was to be the preacher, his quick reaction was: “He cannot preach. This is the time when I give directives in my Diocese.” With a sharp pain in my umbilical cord, I remembered the philosophy of my mother. She used to advise us: “The way you deal with an insecure person is to edge through. She used a Kikuyu word: gwicekehia meaning “Shrink yourself that you may enter” So I immediately told the Diocesan: “I will give the tribute to my mother.” He agreed. When the time came for the tribute I took a Bible with me and preached for thirty minutes. And then before I sat down I asked my wife to give her tribute which she did for thirty minutes.

This painful experience does not compare with what William Tyndale went through while implementing his fervent hope of translating the Bible into English so that every Englishman may read the Bible for himself. At Oxford, as a student, and at Cambridge as a teacher, he had found great truth and guidance for his life from the scriptures, which were then available only to those who could read Latin. As he once said to a prominent Churchman: “If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more scripture than thou doest.”

In spite of Tyndale’s piety, scholarship, and good intentions, his hard work brought nothing but wrath from the English authorities. He was captured, tried as a heretic and schismatic, strangled and publically burned in 1536.

So whatever you are going through immerse yourself in God’s word. As the Bible tells us: “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way to escape, that you may be able to bear it.” 1Corinthians 10:13

As we remember this great scholar and translator of the Bible, let us form the habit of reading the Bible every day. Let us also be bold in responding to God’s call to do whatever he has called us to do regardless of the cost. Those of you who are called to be a deacon, a priest or a bishop, you need to set a time for study of theology. If you have not registered in our seminary, you need to register today. Visit >www.anaseminary.org> and fill in the registration card.

With love

Patriarch John