John Knox at the Window

In the autumn of 1555, John Knox knelt by a window in Edinburgh, his forehead pressed against cold stone, and prayed words that those outside could hear through the glass. "Give me Scotland, or I die." He was not being dramatic. Scotland was tearing itself apart — corruption had hollowed out the church, political violence stained the streets, and Knox himself had spent nineteen months chained to an oar as a galley slave. He knew what ruin looked like. He had lived inside it.

What strikes historians is not just Knox's boldness but his honesty. In his private writings, he confessed that he felt utterly insufficient for what God was asking. He described himself as fearful, prone to anger, and deeply aware of his own sin. He did not storm heaven with confidence in himself. He stormed heaven because he had no confidence left in anything else.

Isaiah 64 is that same kind of prayer — raw, desperate, painfully self-aware. "We have all become like one who is unclean," the prophet writes, "and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment." And yet the very next breath dares to say, "But now, O Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are our Potter."

This is the paradox of biblical lament. We come to God not because we have cleaned ourselves up, but because only the Potter's hands can reshape what sin has ruined. Knox understood that. The Almighty answered — not on Knox's schedule, but completely.