Coming out of the reformation in the 1560s, Scotland had a long and hard struggle with England.
Covenanters were Scottish patriots and believers of the 1500s and 1600s. They entered into covenants (agreements) with one another to resist being forced into other forms of worship and church government. Admittedly, some issues were political and nationalistic, but there were also issues that touched foundation truths of Christianity.
1) Was the King of England the earthly head of the church, or was Jesus Christ her head? The covenanters would not say the word’s “God save the King” in their meetings, lest that be interpreted as giving allegiance to the king as the head of the Church. They saw that the church of England had openly divested the Son of God of His headship. A small thing? Men went to the flames over these words.
2) They would not submit to using the Church of England’s prayer book. Certain doctrines that smelled like Romanism could be found in that book.
When Charles I tried to force the Episcopalian prayer book and the English clergy on the Scots, they drew up the National Covenant of 1638, pledging to keep the Church of Scotland separate from the State.
In 1643, the Church of Scotland and the English Parliament signed The Solemn League and Covenant, establishing religious freedom in Scotland, England, and Ireland. However, persecutions followed. Finally, in 1690, King William III brought freedom of conscience to Scotland.
Some covenanters felt justified in bearing arms in those grim days. But not all did. It is noteworthy that despite the boasted courage of those who took up the sword, the Covenanters never enjoyed any significant military victory. But if we are tempted to belittle these sturdy men who responded militantly, we should consider how the modern church would react to such persecution. In that small land, 672 Scots covenanters suffered martyrdom.
They lived unknown
Till persecution dragged them into fame,
And chased them up to heaven.
At prayer meetings, we occasionally hear the odd romanticist pleading with God to send persecution to the church. Such people evidently have not experienced much persecution. They certainly didn’t learn to pray for persecutions by reading the Bible. The Bible records saints praying for deliverance from persecution, and praying for strength to endure persecution, but are we ever enjoined to ask God that our assembly elders be rounded up and thrown into prison, or that public hangings of ministers of the gospel increase? We can earnestly thank God that the Holy Spirit intercepts certain foolish petitions before they reach heaven.
During his lifetime, Alexander Peden (1626-1686) became legendary among his brethren, and feared by his enemies. This strange man lived out Paul’s words, “The spiritual man discerns all things, yet he himself is discerned of no man.”
Peden aspired to be a preacher of the gospel. But before he entered the ministry, he was accused by a young woman of fathering her illegitimate child. How could he prove his innocence? Humiliated and confused, Peden cloistered himself in a spot in the woods where he prayed for 24 hours, seeking guidance. Not long after, he was cleared by the confession of the real father. The woman later took her own life in the very same spot where Peden had gone to pray.
Once vindicated, he preached in Galloway for about three years until the “Drunken Act of Glasgow.” It was a sad Sunday in 1662 when nearly four hundred preachers were expelled from their pulpits (Peden among them) and so gave farewell messages to their congregations. His weeping audience begged him to continue speaking; he preached for eight hours. In closing, he told them, “Ye’ll see and hear nae mair o’ puir Sandy Peden after this day’s wark is owre.” Closing the door to the pulpit, he pounded his Bible on it, saying, “I arrest thee, in my Master’s name, that none ever enter by thee but such as enter as I have done, by the door!” Years passed, and no attempt was made to fill that pulpit until after the Revolution, when a preacher who shared Peden’s convictions opened it.
He preached on the hillsides, and lived as a wanderer. He was afraid to sleep in the homes offered to him, for he knew the Privy Council craved his blood, and to be found in a house was to condemn it. For 23 years, the mountains and moors were his haunts.
Peden’s escapes appear magical. Once, fleeing from soldiers on horseback, he was obliged to cross a swift running stream. After he got out, he called back, “Lads, do not follow, for I assure you, ye want my boat, and so will drown.; and consider where your landing will be.” The pursuers were so stunned, not one could gather enough courage to enter the water. At another time, being chased, he was forced to enter a bog. One agressive soldier galloped in after him, from which he and the horse never returned.
The Privy Council, unable to capture him, issued a proclamation, charging him with holding conventicles at various places and baptizing at Ralstoun, in Kilmarnock, and at Castlehill, in Cragie Parish. He was ordered to surrender himself unconditionally.
Instead of surrender, he joined the men implicated in the Pentland rising at Lanark. He quickly sized up the situation.”Ye are not ready for resistance,” he told them, “and your present venture will end in defeat and worse persecution.” With that, he left them. The Covenanters remembered his words when they were scattered by the Royalist troops. However, as he had joined the Pentland insurgents, Peden was included in the indictment issued against them. He again refused to appear before the Privy Council, and so was declared to be an outlaw, and his property was confiscated.
Once en route to a meeting with friends, Mr. Welch and the Laird of Glenover, he met a party of soldiers in search of a fugitive named Alexander Peden. He casually rode up to them, saying to his friends, “Keep up your courage and confidence, for God hath laid an arrest on these men that they shall do us no harm.”
The soldiers inquired the road to a certain town, and so Peden offered to show them the best place to ford the river. They were courtesy itself, and thanked the stranger profusely.
While hiding in Glendyne, he left his shelter and made for a cottage in the moors, where he knew a godly man lived. He reached it safely, and was heartily welcomed by the old man. He held devotions at that house, and as sunset came, he returned to his cave. On the path, he spied a company of soldiers. He fled across the moor, and passing one of the mountain burns, he dived under an overhanging piece of bank. He waited breathlessly for the oncoming troopers. As the horses came galloping, they leaped the burn. The hoof of one of the horses pressed through the bank and grazed Peden’s head. Praising God for his escape, he came out of his hiding place, and continued to his cave.
When holding a conventicle at Auchengrouch, Peden preached in his usual lengthy manner. Then watchmen noticed a group of soldiers spread themselves over the hillside, determined to capture them all. Escape seemed impossible. All eyes looked to Peden. They heard him beseech the protection of God. After prayer he said, “Friends, the bitterest of this blast is over; we will be no more troubled with them this day.”
Unconvinced, they begged Peden to hide. He countered by this prayer. “Lord, we are ever needing at Thy hand, and if we had not Thy command to call upon Thee in the day of trouble, and Thy promise of answering us in the day of our distress, we wot not what would become of us. If Thou have any more work for us in Thy world, twine them about the hill, Lord, and cast the lap of Thy cloak over poor old Sandy and these people, and we will keep it in remembrance, and tell it to the commendation of Thy goodness, pity, and compassion, what Thou didst for us at such a time.”
Dense clouds of mist rose from the hillside and enveloped the soldiers and Covenanters alike. As the latter saw the position of the soldiers and knew the hillside well, they slipped home through the mist. The soldiers were more afraid than anyone. This incident raised Peden to a unique place in the hearts of the Covenanters, they called him “Peden, the Prophet.”
The hunt after him became so keen that he crossed over to Ireland, and there was arrested in the house of Hugh Ferguson of Knockdow in June of 1673. He was brought before the Privy Council and consigned to the Bass Rock. This prison was in a bleak castle on a forlorn rock off the coast of Scotland. The sufferings of that period were recorded in “Martyrs of the Bass.”
There is a letter of Peden’s, in which he thanks some friends for a contribution they had sent him.
“We are close shut up in our chambers; not permitted to converse, diet, or worship together; but conducted out by two at once in the day, to breathe in the open air–envying the birds their freedom, provoking and calling on us to bless Him for the most common mercies. Again, we are close shut up day and night, to hear only the sighs and groans of our fellow prisoners.”
He was there for fifty-one months; followed by fifteen more at the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. In December of 1678, he was sentenced to banishment in America. But he assured his brothers that “the ship was not built that would bear them over the sea to any of the plantations; lift up your hearts, for the day of your redemption draweth near.” It turned out that in London they were all released and the trip to America never materialized. He gradually made his way back to Scotland in 1679, and for the seven years of conflict that remained, he divided his ministry between his native country and the north of Ireland.
In 1682, Peden performed the wedding of John Brown, at his house in Priesthill, to Isabel Weir. After marriage, he said to Isabel, “You have got a good man to be your husband, but you will not enjoy him long; prize his company, and keep linen by you to be his winding sheet, for you will need it when ye are not looking for it.” In May of 1685, Graham of Claverhouse apprehended the couple. While Isabel watched helplessly, Claverhouse aimed his musket and shot off part of John Brown’s skull. Turning to Isabel, Bloody Graham asked, “What do you think of your fine husband now?” She answered, “I ever thought much good of him, and more than ever now.”
At sixty years of age, he knew his race was run. He returned to his old home at Auchencloich, to find the soldiers searching for him. He lived, therefore, in a cave, and spent his days in prayer. While some 672 others sealed their testimonies with their blood, Peden somehow eluded the hangman, and died in his bed. This was not due to any mercy from his enemies. To the hour of his death they hunted him.
“It is a praying Church we need today. I am done with preaching. Carry me to Ayr’s Moss, and bury me beside Ritchie, that I may have rest in my grave, for I have had little in my life. Na, na; bother not where ye lay me, for my body will be lifted again.”
This was soon verified. He came from his cave to his brother’s home. The soldiers were hovering about, and his sister-in-law feared they would find him.
“They will not find me alive though they search twenty times this house,” he said. The next day he was dead.
The Boswells of Auchinleck interred Peden’s remains in their private vault, to save his body from insult. But the soldiers heard where Peden was buried, and broke into the grave. His body was carried to Cumnock, and hung on the gibbet in chains. The Countess of Dumfries interceded with the Council, and Peden’s body was buried at the foot of the gibbet.
In 1682, four years before his death, Peden had held secret meetings with his old congregation at Glen Luce. Here is a line from one of these sermons.
“For you, the poor, brokenhearted followers of Christ, to whom He hath given grace to follow Him in the storm, I tell you, grace is your glory. At your first conversion, our Lord gives you the one end of the line but He keeps the other end in glory with Himself. But, sirs, He will have you all there at length.”
Much of the material for this article came from the following:
Defoe, Daniel.. Memoirs of the Church of Scotland.
Gilfillan, George. Martyrs and Heroes of the Scottish Covenant.
Howie, John. The Scots Worthies.
Johnston, John C. Alexander Peden: Prophet of the Covenant.
Smellie, Alexander. Men of the Covenant.
Thomson, J. H. [Ed} A Cloud of Witnesses.
Walker, Patrick. Six Saints of the Covenants, 2 vols.
M’Gavin, William. The Dying Testimonies of Scots Worthies
Purves, Jock. Fair Sunshine.