Martin Luther and the Reformation, Part 2

The first post (part 1) ended with Luther burning the Papal Bull, in which the Pope gave Luther 60 days to repent at the threat of excommunication. Luther never repented, and he faced the consequences. 

 The Diet of Worms

Luther was excommunicated in January of 1521, shortly after receiving—and subsequently burning—the papal bull. However, the story doesn’t end there. Two months later, Luther was summoned by the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, to the Diet of Worms. Diet is the Latin word for imperial meeting, and Worms is a city in Germany where this diet was held. Taken together, Luther was summoned to an imperial meeting in the city of Worms—Diet of Worms.

The emperor promised Luther “safe conduct,” but if history repeats itself, that is not an assuring promise. A century earlier, Jan Hus (mentioned earlier as a precursor of the Protestant Reformation) was also promised safe conduct, but he was burned at the stake. No doubt, Luther was aware of that and expected a similar fate.

Supposing that he would have a chance to explain his positions at the Diet, Luther departed for Worms. The Diet began in April of 1521. The assembly of people at the Diet comprised of many important figures of the time: The Holy Roman Emperor, bishops, princes, knights, barons, cardinals, and the like.[1] Before them was a pile of books, and they asked Luther if he wrote those books and if he would recant.[2]

The next day, Luther replied them. Although there is some uncertainty as to the exact words Luther used, it is generally quoted as:

“Unless I am convicted of error by the testimony of Scripture or—since I put no trust in the unsupported authority of Pope or Church Councils, since it is plain that they have often erred and often contradicted themselves—or by manifest reasoning, I stand convicted by the Scriptures to which I have appealed, and to act against our conscience is neither safe for us nor open to us. On this I take my stand. I can do no other. God help me! Amen.”[3]

Luther probably would have met the same end as Hus had he not been kidnapped. As he left Worms, Luther was kidnapped by the Elector of Saxony in an effort to protect him. He was kept in the castle of Wartburg for ten months.[4] This is the place that inspired him to write the famous hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God.”[5]

Luther’s life didn’t end here, but we must conclude our story for now.

Conclusion: sola Scriptura

I already mentioned where the term “Protestant” came from. The other word, “Reformation,” in Protestant Reformation, conveys the idea of “reforming.” In simple terms, everything God made was good, but through false teaching and traditions, man corrupted and deformed it. The Reformers (Luther, Calvin, and many more) simply went back to the Bible, to God’s Word, and allowed the Bible to form doctrine. By going back to God’s Word, they reformed what was deformed. They didn’t create anything new. They simply went back to what was given originally by God.

Out of the Reformation came the five solas, one of which is sola Scriptura, which means the authority of Scripture alone. Scripture alone is the foundation of our theology. Scripture alone forms our doctrine. Scripture alone informs us how to live. This is evident in Luther’s life. Time and again, we see that Luther fought the Catholic Church with the authority of the Word of God. His devotion and conviction to the Word of God gave him the boldness to stand against the behemoth that is the Catholic Church. In the face of death, his conviction to the Word of God prompted him to say, “On this I take my stand. I can do no other. God help me!”[6]

In the modern context, to be Reformed simply means to be biblical. We, too, base our theology, doctrine, and practice in the Scripture alone. Sadly, all too many people say that the Bible is their sole authority, yet not many people know what the Bible actually says. Ligonier Ministries found that biblical illiteracy prevails among professing Christians. Furthermore, they say this is fueled by the “stunning lack of biblical preaching in the evangelical church. Funny stories, self-help programs, entertaining stunts, and slick talks from self-appointed gurus have taken the place of the teaching of God’s Word in too many churches.”[7]

 If we learn from history, one of the lessons of the Reformation surely must be sola Scriptura. Instead of “how we feel” or “what we think” about Scripture, we must always go back to “what does the Bible actually say?”

Luther’s life was changed when he discovered the meaning of Romans 1:17. He didn’t lean on how he felt about that text—for he hated the notion of the righteousness of God. He didn’t rely on what he thought about the text or what the pope and the Catholic Church thought about that text. He examined the Scriptures. It is also important that we base all our theology, doctrine, and practice in the Scriptures, and we cannot do that unless we read and study it diligently. We must be like the Bereans, who were commended for receiving “the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so” (Acts 17:11).

Endnotes

[1] Steven J. Lawson, “A Mighty Fortress is Our God: Luther as a Man of Conflict (1521),” in The Legacy of Luther, ed. R. C. Sproul and Stephen J. Nichols (Sanford, FL: Reformation Trust, 2016), 37.

[2] Timothy Jones, Christian History Made Easy (Torrance, CA: Rose Publishing, 2009), 108.

[3] Christopher Catherwood, Church History (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2007), 99.

[4] Jones, 109.

[5] Catherwood, 100.

[6] Catherwood, 99.

[7] Ligonier letter dated September 30, 2019.