October 31st: The Birth of Protestantism

Post tenebras lux (after darkness, light). These words were taken up as one of the mottos of the Reformation. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Holy Catholic Church found herself victim of a series of scandals and abuses. One needs only to google the name of Pope Alexander VI or Pope Leo X to discover the controversies in which the church was involved. But something was stirring in a small German town in the Fall of 1517. A young radical monk was about to launch one of the greatest and most influential movements the world had ever seen. Light was about to shine in the darkness.

There are always dangers when leaders within the church or outside the church reason apart from the plain teaching of Scripture. With the practice of prioritizing the interpretive authority of the papacy along with placing tradition over or alongside Scripture, doctrines, like indulgences, were introduced and in turn clouded the very message of the gospel. Indulgences was a practice that the Catholic Church introduced as a way to grant remission of temporal sins for their parishioners. People who were financially able could buy an indulgence and pull from the excess merit of past saints to cover a variety of sins. As the buying and selling of indulgences spread, the popular slogan, “A coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs,” began. It was quickly becoming possible for people to buy their way into heaven. 

With the backdrop of these events, a young and restless monk was beginning to wrestle with who God was and who he was himself. Martin Luther was intelligent and zealous, but he was also deeply conflicted. He would spend hours a day in confession, telling his priest of all the sins that he had committed. Over time, a sense of immense guilt dominated Luther’s life. At one point, Luther even confessed to struggling with disbelief. He stated, “I did not believe in Christ: I regarded Him only as a severe and terrible Judge portrayed as seated on a rainbow,” (Martin Luther: Rebel in an Age of Upheaval). Luther’s works granted him no assurance of salvation. 

After years of concentrated effort in maintaining his salvation, Luther began lecturing through the book of Romans. Through his study, God began to open his eyes to the wonderful grace that was offered through Christ. A great burden was being lifted from Luther’s shoulders. While reading and studying Romans 1:17, he read these words, “For in it [the gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” (Romans 1:17). Luther was beginning to realize that it was not his deeds that justified him before the holiness of God, it was faith. This put him in direct opposition to the doctrine and practices of the Catholic Church, which understood justification as conditioned upon human obedience rather than the obedience of the righteousness of Christ alone. Luther, as with the Reformers, saw the life of sanctification (works) as the fruit of justification by faith and not intermingled as did Rome.

Martin Luther began to draft counterpoints to the works-based theology of the Church, hoping to start a discussion that would lead to reformation and not separation. Little did he know, he was about to start a much larger movement. On October 31st, 1517, Luther posted his 95 Theses on the door of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. A spark was ignited, and the Reformation began. 

As his Theses were distributed, much debate began, and Luther became labeled as an enemy of the Church. His thoughts would become more developed, more robust, and he would have great influence on young Christian men and women who would follow after his example. Because Luther protested the practice of indulgences and its underlying errors of conditional salvation and the authority of the papacy (and tradition), the Protestant tradition of Christianity began to take shape. Zwingli, Bucer, Melancthon, and Simmons would carry the momentum, and second-generation Reformers like Calvin and Peter Martyr Vermigli (among others) would strengthen the heart of the Reformation.

But why does any of this matter? Why should we care about a monk who vandalized a church door 500 years ago with his so-called radical ideas? Why does the Reformation matter?

The Reformation matters because God’s Word matters. Put another way, truth matters.. Out of the Reformation came the unhindered truth about God’s redemptive plan, and particularly the truth that man is saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, in accordance with Scripture alone, to the glory of God alone. These points are known as the pillars of the Reformation or the Five Solas (Solae) of the Reformation. 

Many of us still live as though we save ourselves. Some of us seek to do everything to the very letter of the law, becoming perfectionists, and seeking to prove to God that we are worth saving. Some of us, on the other hand, despair and think that God’s grace is incapable of saving us. At the heart of both forms of thinking and practice is the denial of salvation by grace through faith. What was recovered during the Reformation is the truth that we are justified before God by the gift of His grace in Christ Jesus alone. Paul writes in Ephesians, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9). Like Luther, this truth can set us free. 

The very fact that each of us can sit down and pick up the English translation of the Bible is also a direct result of the Reformation. Because men like Luther, Huss, and Wycliffe honored Scripture’s testimony concerning the priesthood of believers and the sole authority of Scripture, they began to write the Bible in the language of the people. Let us say with Luther, “My conscience is captive to the word of God,” and may we not forget the blessing it is to have the Scriptures in our own language. 

With the ability to read the word for ourselves, we can behold the beauty of Christ for ourselves. We began to see verses in their context and see that Christ is the only mediator between us and God. Through the Bible, we see Christ for who he is: Creator and Redeemer. We have a perfect mediator who paid our debt and is able to understand what we are going through. He is far superior to any earthly priest or confessor. We trust in Christ alone, the author and perfecter of our faith. 

As we approach October 31st, let us seek to conform our lives to the Word of God. May we rest in the finished work of Christ alone. May we trust that our justification before God is through grace alone, by faith alone. I pray that we would all continue in the spirit of Reformation, seeking to live lives that are informed by Scripture. May we always be reforming. “Semper Reformanda.” 

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