Part Two
October 31 st marks the 500 th anniversary of the beginning of the Protest Reformation. It was on that day in 1517 that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg, Germany.
The word sola comes from the Latin, and means only or alone.
Sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone) Sola Gratia (Grace Alone) Sola Fide (Faith Alone) Solus Christus (Christ Alone) Soli Deo Gloria (To the Glory of God Alone)
Luther, like all followers of Christ in Western Europe, was a Catholic. Luther struggled with the church s teaching on justification.
Romans 1:16-17 16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.
Luther sought to understand the true meaning of the gospel. He diligently studied the Scriptures to find his answers. Luther understood that there was no authority greater than the Bible.
Mark 7:6-9 6 And He said to them, Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: THIS PEOPLE HONORS ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEART IS FAR AWAY FROM ME. 7 BUT IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN.
8 Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men. 9 He was also saying to them, You are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition.
Only God is infallible. Therefore, His Word alone is our authority for faith and practice. The Roman Catholic Church teaches that, in his official capacity as pope, the pope is infallible on matters of faith and morals.
We trust in God s Word, and His Word alone, as our sole authority for faith and practice. For his entire life, Luther had been taught that tradition and the teachings of the church had greater authority than the Bible itself.
Romans 10:1-4 Brethren, my heart s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. 2 For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.
3 For not knowing about God s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
Salvation is about being declared righteous by God because we have placed our faith and trust in the finished work of Christ on the cross. Romans 3:26 says that God is just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
Romans 10:8-10 8 But what does it say? THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART that is, the word of faith which we are preaching, 9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;
10 for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. We have absolutely nothing to offer God, and there s no reason, within ourselves, why He should declare us righteous.
God deserves all the glory for our salvation. It s the Scriptures alone that are our authority for faith and practice. That s Sola Scriptura. The Scriptures tell us that our salvation can only come through God s grace alone.
Ephesians 2:8-9 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. That s Sola Gratia.
God s saving grace is only received by those who have faith in Jesus. That s Sola Fide.
Romans 10:9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. That s Solus Christus.
Our salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. The source of our salvation is God s grace. The means of our salvation is our faith. The basis of our salvation is Christ.
God deserves all the glory for our salvation. That s Soli Deo Gloria. We celebrate the Five Solas because they came out of God s Word and led to the Reformation that brought the church back to the teaching of Jesus and the apostles.
The Reformation wasn t born in a vacuum. God used several people to plant the seeds of reform that began to bear fruit in the 16 th century.
Peter Waldo lived France at the end of the 12 th century. After the death of a friend, Waldo began to wonder about being right before God. The answers to Waldo s questions were to be found in God s Word.
Eventually, Waldo was able to purchase a Bible. Through God s Word, Waldo was able to find the truth of salvation. Waldo wanted the Bible to be translated into his native language, French.
The French translation of the Bible was the very first translation into a modern language. The church ordered Waldo to stop preaching and threatened to burn him at the stake.
John Wycliffe was born in England, over a hundred years after the death of Waldo. He understood that salvation was a result of God s grace, rather than something that was dispensed by the church or earned by personal merit.
Wycliffe also disagreed with the pope s claim to be the ruler of the church on earth. In 1377, Wycliffe was branded a heretic. Eventually, he translated the Bible into English.
The Roman Catholic Church said that Wycliffe s effort to put the Bible into the hands of the common man was the equivalent of casting pearls before swine.
John Huss was born in Bohemia, around 1372. Eventually, someone gave Huss some of Wycliffe s writings. Like Wycliffe, Huss began to preach against the errors he saw in the church.
Huss was declared a heretic and hundreds of his books, along with Wycliffe s writings, were gathered up and burned. In 1415, Huss was burned at the stake for preaching against the Roman Catholic Church.
Before he died, Huss proclaimed, In a hundred years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed.