Don’t Give Them A Reason
“and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame. For it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong.” (1 Peter 3:16–17, NASB95)
I was just finishing my Bible reading and prayer time this morning. I had been stewing about some things in life that are not as I wish they were. I had been whining to God in prayer about all the terrible things going on personally in my life and in the world, then I read the following story:
David Hackston was a “Scottish Worthy”—one of those stalwart Calvinists who suffered terribly for his beliefs between the restoration of Charles II and the reign of William III.
Hackston was a well-off gentlemen who, wandering among the Scottish hills one day, heard some of the outlawed Presbyterian preachers. He returned home a new man in Christ. His life was immediately in jeopardy, and he became a fugitive, running from house and home, taking up arms against the crown.
At length, he was captured, stripped (“not even having shoes on his feet”), and set backwards on a barebacked horse. His hands were tied behind him, and his feet were fastened under the horse’s belly. Arriving in Edinburgh, he stood trial and gave this defense: Now I stand here before you as a prisoner of Jesus Christ for adhering to his cause and interest, which has been sealed with the blood of many worthies who have suffered in these lands. I do own all the testimonies given by them, and desire to put in my mite among theirs, and am not only willing to seal it with my blood, but also to seal it with the sharpest tortures you can imagine.
They took him at his word.
He was condemned on June 29, 1662, and the next day taken to an execution site.
His right hand was stretched out and hacked off. The executioner took so long to do it that Hackston asked if the left hand could be severed at the joint. This was done. He was then pulled to the top of the gallows, allowed to choke awhile, then dropped with his whole weight. This was repeated twice. Then the hangman with a sharp knife sliced open his chest and pulled out his heart, still beating. It fell on the scaffold, and the hangman picked it up on the point of his knife and said, “Here is the heart of a traitor.” Witnesses claim that it fluttered on the knife. Hackston’s body was disemboweled, drawn, quartered, and burned. His head and hands were nailed to the top of a nearby bridge.
After reading that story, I had to pray and ask God for forgiveness for my attitude. I had not been killed. I had been physically harmed.
Things were difficult, but I was not dead. I thanked God that He had kept me from giving people a reason to criticize me and denigrate my Lord. I thanked Him that I did not lash out in person or on social media for the whole world to see so they could accuse me. I thanked God for the correction so it did not fester in my heart and cause me to behave badly. People are going to hate me. I hate that, but it is true. I just be need to be careful that I don’t give them a reason to.
Robert J. Morgan, On This Day: 365 Amazing and Inspiring Stories about Saints, Martyrs & Heroes, electronic ed. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1997).