500 th Anniversary of the Protestant Reformation

Transcription

1 500 th Anniversary of the Protestant Reformation on Sunday 29 th October 2017 in the Priory Church of Lady St Mary Church, Wareham An introduction to the Protestant Reformation We celebrate the 500 th anniversary of Martin Luther nailing his ninety-five theses to the door of Wittenburg Castle and whilst this is a seminal moment in the history of the Church, it is not necessarily the start of the Reformation as we know it. In truth there had been rumblings within the Church for more than a century before Luther s defiant stand. Much ink has been spilt on how corrupt and misguided the Roman Catholic Church was in the centuries leading up to the Reformation. There are many accounts of widespread negligence, ignorance, absenteeism, and sexual immorality amongst the clergy but just how accurate these are is much debated. The political writer, Machiavelli, said that the nearer one got to Rome the more corruption one found and Luther himself was shocked at what he saw when he visited Rome in This said, there was probably a good many upright, devout and godly clerics and lay people around Europe at that time but, like in our day, it is the bad news that grabs the headlines. As well as corruption within the Roman Church, the Reformation happened at time of great cultural change. The Renaissance (literally re-birth) had its beginnings in the fourteenth century, but really took hold and developed during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. During this time scholars revisited the classical writings and learning of the Greek and Roman civilisations (this was also known as humanism). For some this meant returning to the original manuscripts of the New Testament, and for some the Hebrew Scriptures of the Old Testament. This gave clearer insights into what the scriptures actually said, rather than what the Church taught.

2 However, there was one further invention that accelerated the process of reform and that was the printing press. Although printing from hand cut blocks of wood had been happening in Asia since the fifth century, it took until the late fifteenth century to develop in Europe. It cannot be overstated just what an important development this was and it was used greatly by scholars to help them share their newfound wisdom and insights. Returning to Martin Luther and his act of protest, the reason he wrote his 95 theses, was to object to a practice brought in to the Roman Church. It was the sale of indulgences: Christian people were taught that they would not get to heaven until they had been cleansed from every sin committed in their mortal life. Until then they would spend time in purgatory where they would be punished until all their sins were cancelled. However, the Popes and Bishops decided that if people made a payment to the Church they would reduce the time spent in purgatory this was an indulgence, and it was to this that Martin Luther objected. It is doubtful that in posting the 95 theses Luther intended to start a full blown revolution within the Church, they were simply the proposal of an earnest university professor to discuss the theology of indulgencies, in the light of errors and abuses that had grown up over centuries. (James Atkinson The History of Christianity). Luther came to see that the trade in indulgencies was wholly unwarranted by Scripture, reason or tradition. The more he was challenged, and threatened, by the Church the deeper became his conviction that salvation was (and is) entirely in the hands of God. A key scripture for Luther and the reformers was Ephesians 2:8,9 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no one can boast. From this, and other such scriptures, the reformers came to the conclusion that a sinner is justified by grace alone (sola gratia) through faith in Christ alone (sola fide), which is a truth

3 revealed to us in Scripture alone (sola Scriptura). It is these three strands that we shall explore during today s service. It was another 15 years before Reformation in England would take place, and once again the Bible was central to the movement. Here the political differences between Rome and England allowed the increasing groundswell of protestant theological teachings to come to the fore and take hold. Even then under the rule of Mary I ( ), the nation reverted back to Catholicism, before eventually becoming an established Protestant (but not reformed) nation under Queen Elizabeth I. Today we need to return to the great prayer of Jesus to his Father in John 17. Here he prays first for the Apostles and their faithfulness to his word and then for all, including us, who would come to believe through their message. His prayer was that we would be one with the apostles in holding fast to God's truth so that the world would come to believe and trust in him too. Canon Simon Everett

4 A Sermon for Reformation Sunday 2017 Celebrating 500 years since Martin Luther nailed his 95 Thesis to the door of Witttenberg Castle preached by Canon Simon Everett on Sunday 29 th October 2017 in the Priory Church of Lady St Mary Church, Wareham Hebrews 4: For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. 13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Jesus the Great High Priest 14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, [f] Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are yet he did not sin. 16 Let us then approach God s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need Sola Scriptura by Scripture Alone What is the desire of every Christian? Surely it is to draw ever closer to the heart of God. And this goes to the very heart of what the Reformers and many others at that time wanted, but they found that the Church of the day did not help. The trouble was, God had become rather lost in all the paraphernalia of the Church that had evolved throughout the middle ages.

5 Rather like the Pharisees and Religious Authorities of Jesus day, the Roman Church had become rather bogged down in traditions and religious customs, that seemed right to them, but not to others who simply wanted to meet God. Couple this with some of the Popes and Bishops who became a little too accustomed to, and corrupted by, earthly power and glory, and you had the perfect conditions for reformation. Martin Luther was no exception in wanting to get to the very heart of God, he had come to a faith during a thunder storm in 1505 when a lightning bolt struck nearby knocking him to the ground. Crying out in fear he promised that if he survived, he would dedicate his life to God. Well he did survive and the rest, as the saying goes, is history. But it is that history that we remember celebrate and learn from today. Following the storm Luther, became an Augustinian monk and sought to be the holiest of them all. He would often spend several hours a day in confession and when he wasn t in confession he would be in the chapel saying his daily offices or studying. But it wasn t enough, even going to Rome and seeing many of the sacred sites and reading some of the most sacred texts, still left him wondering, Am I really saved? How can I get closer to God and know that I am truly accepted by him? On his return Luther was posted to a small town in Saxony called Wittenberg, where he was to become the professor of Biblical Studies. This would have been a very exciting time to be in such a post because with the advent of the Renaissance there had come a desire to explore the original manuscripts of the Bible. This in turn led to the discovery that there had been some major misinterpretations in the Latin Bible that the Church had used as its standard text up until then. On discovering this, scholars such as Luther began to question long held Church doctrines. The more they did this, the greater the tensions between the papal authorities and those who wished to see reform.

6 Things came to a head on All Saints Day when he posted his 95 Thesis denouncing the practice of Indulgencies which was a way of buying time of purgatory (which was a state of torment before getting to heaven). If you like this lit the blue touch-paper that would ignite widespread reformation within the Church. Luther was labelled a heretic by the Roman Church and would have surely been murdered or burnt at the stake had he not been given protection by some influential people who were sympathetic to his cause, most notably Frederick of Saxony. Whilst under the protection of Frederick, in Witttenberg castle, Luther set about writing the Bible in native German from the Greek manuscripts available. Not only did he do this in record quick time (just 11 weeks!), he also produced a work of lasting literary importance that would have a lasting impact on the German language (rather like Tyndale s English Bible, here in the UK). The more Luther studied the Bible the more he came to see that he was not so much handling and interpreting the Scripture; but that God was handling him through Scripture. The Bible is alive, he said, it speaks to me; it has feet, it runs after me; it has hands, it lays hold of me... He went on to say, A simple layman armed with Scripture is to be believed above a pope or a cardinal without it. He, and the other Reformers came to see that word of God truly was living and active, sharper than any two edged sword. And through it God touched the hearts and lives of men and women with divine love, so that they drew ever closer to Him. They came to see that it was not through any works of their own but purely through the grace of, and by faith in, Jesus (this will be explored further during the following talks). And so the Reformers ensured that little by little the Bible was made available in the native tongue to all people, so that they could read and interpret the Bible for themselves.

7 It became the authority by which the protestant Church was governed (Sola Scriptura, by Scripture alone). It inspired preaching that changed the life of the church and those who worshipped in it. It brought spiritual liberation to those who previously had been in bondage. Primarily meant that ordinary people could understand God s ways and workings so that they learned how God wanted lives to be lived. And so it is to this day, and may it ever continue to be so. Amen. Sola Gratia by Grace Alone Stuart Cocksedge Sermon - Ephesians 2: GRACE ALONE Made Alive in Christ 2 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh [a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you

8 have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Introduction Debt is a huge problem in our society today. It is still very easy to get credit, and the messages that advertisers convey to us tell us that we can buy now, pay later, we can spend, spend, spend. And so it has become quite normal for many people to be living with large amounts of personal debt, and with little prospect of being able to pay it off. And for some, it gets very difficult, a source of great stress and worry, and pressure. So imagine if you were in that situation, and someone says to you: That debt that you owe, that you cannot repay, it has been cleared, paid in full, you no longer owe a penny. What would you think? How would you react? Relieved? Amazed? Overjoyed? That is a picture of grace. It s a picture that goes some way (not all the way) to showing us what grace is.

9 The grace that the Apostle Paul speaks of in our reading from the letter to the Ephesians. And the grace, that Martin Luther discovered (or we should say, rediscovered), and that became one of the key tenets of the Reformation: That we are saved by grace alone. Ephesians 2:1-10 But, of course, the Apostle Paul isn t talking about a monetary debt that is owed. He is talking about the problem of sin. He is talking about the ways we choose to live our lives, and the things we have all done which have separated us from God and from one another, breaking those relationships. Because of these things, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trangressions [sins] - it is by grace you have been saved (verses 3b-5) And then, in verses 8 and 9, to be absolutely clear, Paul says it again: For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast. Salvation - the forgiveness of sins - moving from death to life: This is the gift of God, which he freely, graciously gives;

10 (Through the death on the cross and resurrection to new life of his Son Jesus Christ.) And it is something that we cannot, and could never, achieve ourselves, by doing good works, by seeking to lead a good life. (We cannot buy, or work our way into heaven, as people had been led to think, before Luther s rediscovery of the truth to be found in the Bible.) This is the essence of the good news - the gospel - which Paul proclaimed, which we are called to share. And this became a source of great joy for Luther himself. No longer living in fear and anxiety about where he stood in God s sight, Luther came to know the joy and assurance of knowing he was loved and forgiven, not because of what he d done, but because God first loved him. (Now, that didn t mean things were easy for him - his life was at times pretty turbulent, and he certainly made some mistakes.) But he rediscovered the truth that we are saved by grace alone. As the author Philip Yancey puts it: Grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us more and grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us less. (from What s So Amazing About Grace ) Application Think about that for a moment. I wonder, do we really live our lives in the light of that?

11 Or, actually, do we sometimes think like this: I m doing alright, thank you very much. I m a good person really, I m doing a reasonably good job of living a reasonably good life I go to church and I do my bit But then something happens and you think: oh well I lost my temper with this person, or I lied to that person, or I ve got into a bit of a mess in this situation And I realise my need for God s help, God s grace, a bit like a top-up, to get me back on track, and then I ll be ok again, because well, I m a fairly good person really Do you ever find yourself thinking something like that? The problem is: that is not what the Bible teaches, and what Luther rediscovered. No: our reading is clear: that we were dead in our sins, and deserving of God s wrath. And that is it God alone, in his great love for us, who has saved us. It is not a case of being topped-up from time to time - it all depends on God! Sin and grace We live in a society today in which many people don t see sin as a problem, and therefore don t see their need for a Saviour, or their need for grace. This is very different to Luther s time: when sin, judgement and salvation were very real concerns for people.

12 If we are to grasp the importance of what it means to be saved by grace alone, we need to take the issue of sin seriously. And this will be offensive to some people. But to some, Jesus was offensive - the things he said and did led some to despise him and to plot to have him killed. Whilst others responded to him, to his call to repentance, and to his offer of mercy and grace to all. Just think of the sinful woman who poured precious perfume on Jesus s feet - an extravagant response to God s extravagant grace offered to her (Luke 7:36-50). How might you and I respond to God s amazing grace today? Conclusion Paul says, at the end of our reading: For we are God s handiwork (workmanship), created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (verse 10) We have been made, created, in God s image, to lead lives full of meaning and purpose, and he has a calling on each one of our lives (don t think he hasn t called you!). And the things we do, the ways we re live our lives, are not to earn his approval or our salvation, they are to be our response to all that he has already done for us. There is nothing we can do to make God love us any more and there is nothing we can do to make God love us any less. He simply loves us, and we are saved by his amazing grace. Amen.

13 SOLA FIDA by Faith Alone Jane Williams (Context: preached directly after the hymn In Christ Alone and leading straight into the Apostle s Creed. Storms and high winds earlier that week had hugely affected air travel in and out of the UK) Here in the power of Christ I ll stand what amazing words, which seem to sum up what faith is all about! In a sense you could say that this morning we have already heard the head message, sola scriptura and the heart message, sola gratia. And so, where does faith fit in? The dictionary definition of faith is complete trust or confidence in someone or something In Hebrews we read Faith is the assurance of things hoped for. Faith has two aspects, intellectual assent; believing something to be true and trust; actually relying on the fact that something is true a chair is often used as an illustration of this intellectual assent is recognising that it is designed to support a person who sits in it and trust is actually sitting on it. Just this week, on Monday I had to put my faith in an airline pilot believing he could fly the plane and trusting him to do just that. As I approached the plane via one of those temporary airport walkways I had to wait in the queue before boarding the plane and through the window I could see the pilot and co-pilot in the cockpit, getting themselves ready for the flight. They looked cheerful which I thought was a good sign, but I wasn t sure they were old enough to fly all by themselves!

14 I sat down next to a couple, in their 80s I guess and the husband was holding onto his wife s hand, she appeared quite anxious; neither of them gave me any eye contact. He held her hand for the whole flight. Maybe she d also seen how young the pilot was! And of course he flew us back to Bournemouth, he told us it wasn t going to be the easiest of flights, but do you know what, there was nothing I could do to affect the outcome, oh I had the emergency instructions which I always read and I d watched the inflight demonstration of what I d need to do, but literally all I could do was sit there relying on the pilot s skill to get me to my destination. I had paid my ticket price and off I went. It wasn t the best of journeys, there was a strong headwind, there was turbulence and by the time we landed a lot of babies were making a lot of noise and the couple next to me were still holding hands, although they had started to talk to me a little by the time they realised we were safe. Now there may be similarities with this faith, Luther was very clear that we do not need to do anything, that faith rather than works leads to salvation for the Christian believer, but I know there is a BIG difference between putting your faith in God and putting your faith in an airline pilot. For a start I d had to pay for my ticket. In contrast: God has paid the price for me, I am justified by faith alone, because even though I am a sinner Jesus Christ came into the world to die on the cross to save me from my sins He did all the work. For Martin Luther faith was to be the consolation of the people, faith strengthened by Scripture, scripture which he believed should be freely available to everyone so that they could read it for themselves. Luther firmly believed in the priesthood of all believers.

15 So when people say to you I wish I had your faith, tell them it is not about me and my faith, it is about God and what He has done for me, saving me by sending His only son to die on that cross. The message is clear Walk by faith, but don t worry about whether you have enough faith. Do not focus on the quality of your faith: focus on the object of your faith Jesus. If you have committed your life to Jesus, then think about this you are accepted, forgiven and loved by God. Let that be what influences the way you live. Amen.

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