The Red Cross Knight: A Reformation Story of Grace

“Is not he just, that all this doth behold?” the wrinkled figure interrogates the knight. “Is not his law, let every sinner die?” 1  At every word, the Red Cross Knight is driven closer to the edge of guilty despair. The spell is sealed; the knight turns his blade towards his own heart.

Despair appears to have won, until, Una, his royal lady, encourages him.

The knight arises, turns from misshapen Despair, and emerges from the gloomy cave. Grace, not the law, has gained the last word over the Red Cross Knight and all Christians who would stumble into Despair’s den after him. The story is from Edmund Spenser and his epic, The Faerie Queene. Though his work is forgotten today, the truths in them remain relevant.

My Own Descent Into Despair

Throughout my own life, my anxiety often drew me into Despair’s den with its doubts and condemnation. The alarm in my mind became a Siren, crying out that something in my life was horribly and unbearably wrong.

When I came to understand the Gospel and believe, the Siren left at first, only to come back, this time to attack my faith. For years I was hounded by unwanted blasphemous thoughts, the weight of my sins, and a lack of assurance.

Baptism and the Lord’s Supper became further sources of anxiety; I worried whether my baptism was “true” because I doubted my conversion at the time and, as I approached the Lord’s table, I often found myself trembling at my own unworthiness and lack of deep feelings.

Like David’s enemies, my own mind had revolted against me and spoken, “There is no salvation for him in God” (Psalm 3:2).

Led Into Reformed Theology

Amidst this battle, the Lord was mercifully revealing more of himself to me. Through the ministry of men like John MacArthur and Paul Washer, I came to understand Calvinism, which eventually led me to embrace Reformed theology through R.C. Sproul.

I soon found that the fullness of the theology I embraced was contained not so much in libraries and dissertations, but rather in a regular participation in worship, word, and sacrament.

This I found in 2022 at a little church in Portland, Oregon called Grace United Reformed Church. It introduced me into not only a welcoming community, but a ministry of word and sacrament that grounded me despite the Siren’s screams. I found a liturgy that became my life, because, in it, I found Jesus.

That is not to say that my Baptist upbringing lacked Jesus. I am so thankful for the churches I was raised in, and I am still thankful for the ministry and love for Christ that so many non-denominational and Baptist churches have. It was in a non-denominational church that I came to saving faith, and, for that, I am forever thankful.

What I found in the Reformed Church was not a rejection of my upbringing, but a deeper understanding of the Christian truths I had been taught.

The Power of Worship and the Word

As I visited, the worship was new to me, and yet I was struck by its power. I was used to services comprised of a couple songs with a band and a sermon. Here, the performance was replaced with an ordinary preacher who continually read God’s word of calling, law, and Gospel.

And, in response, the people and the pastor sang, confessed, prayed, and praised God, ending with the Lord’s Supper and a benediction.

It was there, for the first time, I heard the assurance of pardon, where the pastor declared to me and the whole congregation that, for Jesus’ sake, my sins were forgiven.

When I heard it that morning from Pastor Oeverman, I almost wept. I knew and believed the Gospel, but, while the Siren and old Despair shouted, it took hearing this truth from someone else for me to truly grasp in that moment that the Gospel was for me and that Christ had forgiven me.

Even when the assurance of pardon ended, I found that the ministry of the Gospel did not, and in hearing I continually found strength to fight my doubts. Yet hearing was not the only means God used to strengthen my faith.

Baptized into Christ

“For as many of you as were baptized into Christ,” the Scriptures say, “have put on Christ…and if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise” (Galatians 3:27, 29).

In reading these passages and joining a Reformed Church in Santa Clarita, California where I was taught about baptism, I came to realize that baptism was not so much a law for me to fulfill, as a promise for me to embrace.

My baptism was not first about me or my faith, but rather about God’s visible Gospel promise to me that I was Christ’s; I did not belong to the Siren or Despair.

In one sense, I could have doubted whether the pastor’s Gospel preaching was for me, but I could not doubt that the promise was for me when, before God and his Church, I had felt the water of baptism and heard his name placed upon, not others, but me.

During my darkest doubts, my baptism was not a law for me to fulfill but an identity for me to embrace. I was baptized into Christ. God’s oath was unbreakable, and I clung to it.

The Lord’s Supper as Manna

As I came to recognize the truth of my baptism, I now found the Lord’s Supper to be God’s manna to me in the wilderness.

The liturgy at my new church was not what I had grown up with. It was far less focused on me and my own personal reflection, centering on the word and promise of God to believing sinners.

In the liturgy, I was not tasked with conjuring up enough faith and feelings to approach God, but I was given good news that all I had to do was believe enough to take and eat.

The pastor reminded us every week as we came to the Table that the Supper was for weak, hungry, and sinful people who had nothing to cling to but the suffering of Christ given for them.

Though the bread and wine did not change, by God’s promise and the mystery of the Spirit’s work we were receiving nothing less than Christ’s body and blood to eternal life, for Christ’s promise is not empty (John 6:54-55; Matthew 26:26-28).

In that weekly life of receiving the sacrament in faith, I found the simple truth that I had nothing to bring, but everything to receive.

Where Christ Makes Himself Known

In all these things, I did not find a full cure for my anxieties, but, over time, I can look back and see that by God’s grace, attending to the ministry of word and sacrament has brought Christ to me and healed me in a way that I would have never expected five years ago.

It is not that I have found something outside of Christ, but that I have found the place where Christ makes himself fully known.

Like the Red Cross Knight, we often need another voice outside of us to speak the Gospel into our darkest moments.

The Church as the Voice of Grace

For Spenser, that voice, the voice of Una, represents none other than the voice of the Church itself.

She is the one who preaches the Gospel to us, reminding us, amidst all our doubts, “In heavenly mercies hast thou not a part?”

She is the one who administers the sacrament of baptism and raises us to know what that baptism means: that the accursed handwriting of our condemnation is defaced.

She is the one who gives the Lord’s Supper to us and tells us that Christ is for us, and that where our sins abound, his grace abounds even more.

And in all of this, she does not point to herself, but Christ, her husband, Lord, and Savior.

A Call to the Struggling Believer

Therefore, struggling believer, attend to the means of grace. Hear the word, remember your baptism, and taste and see that the Lord is good.

Though ordinary, these means carry Christ’s promise, and his promise to us is sure.

He does not call you to come sinless, polished, and full; he calls you to come to him with your brokenness and receive, again and again, the assurance and joy of the death and resurrection of the Son of God.

So come, believing sinners, and lift up your hearts, for our God has given a promise by word, water, bread, and wine that triumphs over death, sin, and even our own hearts.