Category Archives: Martin Luther

What Luther learned about understanding the Bible

04 Tuesday Jun 2019

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I am currently reading Herman Selderhuis, Martin Luther: A Spiritual Biography. I have found book repeatedly informative. I don’t know if it would be a good first biography for one to read in Luther, because it does concern itself primarily with Luther’s spiritual development.

When Luther became a doctor of theology his primary job was to teach the Bible. His teaching combined elements of the cloister and the university:

What made Luther’s teaching style unique was his combination of scholarship and devotion: he explained the Bible texts carefully using the most recent scholarly insights and then applied these to faith life. 5 During the Middle Ages, people had felt that academic theology was sterile and of little practical use. Monastic theology countered this sterility with an emphasis on the practice of a godly lifestyle. Luther’s exegesis merged these two traditions of university and monastery; this was novel but eagerly accepted by the students. It was also attributed to Luther’s success as professor that from 1515 to 1520 the number of students in Wittenberg doubled.

Luther has special Bibles printed which left spaces between the lines and had wide margins so his students could take notes (the original journaling Bible).

Luther also learned to teach the students to understand the Bible from their own reading:

Luther learned things that he in turn could also pass on to others: one becomes a theologian through oratio, meditatio, and tentatio—prayer, meditation, and trial.

For Luther, reflection was not a vague or woolly feeling about a text. Rather, it meant weighing the Word while listening in prayer, thinking deeply about the meaning of a Hebrew concept or a Greek term. According to Luther, it concerned the “rechewing” of the text8 until it opened up, as it were, and revealed the content. 9 As a result of engaging with the Word of God in this way, Luther became increasingly convinced that people have no inherent means by which they can access God. Man does not only sin; he is a sinner. Before God he stands only as a sinner, and if he denies that, then he makes God into a liar. 10 Every attempt to make oneself right before God—whether in consciousness of guilt, knowledge of sin, distress of the conscience, or remorse—is senseless. God’s grace only gets its due and honor when a person acknowledges that he or she is a sinner.lp

Nothing is so powerful against the devil

16 Tuesday Apr 2019

Posted by in Martin Luther, Sanctification, Uncategorized

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Nothing is so powerfully effective against the devil, the world, the flesh, and all evil thoughts as to occupy one’s self with God’s word, to speak about it and meditate42 on it, in the way that Psalm 1[:2] calls those blessed who “meditate on God’s law day and night.” Without doubt, you will offer up no more powerful incense or savor against the devil than to occupy yourself with God’s commandments and words and to speak, sing, or think about them. Indeed, this is the true holy water and sign that scares the devil to run away.43

42 Luther’s word translates as “thinking,” without necessarily implying a methodological contemplative prayer-reflection used in monastic life or specific spiritual practices. Here Luther presents an invitation for the ordinary Christian to learn a habit of prayer and in faith engage the word as the compass in one’s life.

43 In Luther’s medieval world, it was common to use “holy water,” das rechte Weihwasser (Ger.), aqua illa sancificat (Lat.), or “sanctified water/water that sanctifies” in, e.g., exorcisms to drive away evil spirits.

 Kirsi I. Stjerna, “The Large Catechism of Dr. Martin Luther,” in Word and Faith, ed. Hans J. Hillerbrand, Kirsi I. Stjerna, and Timothy J. Wengert, vol. 2, The Annotated Luther (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2015), 292.

27 Saturday May 2017

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All the more are human works mortal sins when they are done without fear and in unadulterated, evil self-security.

The inevitable deduction from the preceding thesis is clear. For where there is no fear there is no humility. Where there is no humility there is pride, and where there is pride there are the wrath and judgment of God, for God opposes the haughty. Indeed, if pride would cease there would be no sin anywhere. 

The Annotated Luther, vol. 1, The Roots of Reform, Heidleberg Disputation 1518, no. 8
https://ref.ly/o/annotlutv1/462431?length=418

Luther on Idolatry

11 Thursday May 2017

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, Martin Luther, Theology of Biblical Counseling, Uncategorized

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Idolatry does not consist merely of erecting an image and praying to it, but it is primarily a matter of the heart, which fixes its gaze upon other things and seeks help and consolation from creatures, saints, or devils. It neither cares for God nor expects good things from God sufficiently to trust that God wants to help, nor does it believe that whatever good it encounters comes from God.

Kirsi I. Stjerna, “The Large Catechism of Dr. Martin Luther,” in Word and Faith, ed. Hans J. Hillerbrand, Kirsi I. Stjerna, and Timothy J. Wengert, vol. 2, The Annotated Luther (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2015), 302–303.

How Indulgences Relate to Penance

29 Saturday Oct 2016

Posted by in Church History, Martin Luther, Uncategorized

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Since the 499th anniversary of Luther’s 95 Theses will be upon us, here is an explanation of how the sale of indulgences relate to the doctrine of penance (the following is a mere section from a longer discussion of the complex doctrine. This volume of Luther’s works has very useful notes. I am no Luther scholar, and I have these notes of great value in understand the context for Luther’s actions and writings):

Meanwhile the Sacrament of Penance had become an integral part of the Roman sacramental system, and had replaced the earlier penitential discipline as the means by which the Church granted Christians forgiveness for sins committed after baptism. The scholastic theologians had busied themselves with the theory of this Sacrament. They distinguished between its “material,” its “form” and its “effect.” The “form” of the Sacrament was the absolution; its “effect,” the forgiveness of sins; its “material,” three acts of the penitent: “confession,” “contrition,” and “satisfaction.” “Confession” must be by word of mouth, and must include all the sins which the sinner could remember to have committed; “contrition” must be sincere sorrow of the heart, and must include the purpose henceforth to avoid sin; “satisfaction” must be made by works prescribed by the priest who heard confession. In the administration of the Sacrament, however, the absolution preceded “satisfaction” instead of following it, as it had done in the discipline of the early Church. To justify this apparent inconsistency, the Doctors further distinguished between the “guilt” and the “penalty” of sin….

It was at this point that the practice of indulgences united with the theory of the Sacrament of Penance. The indulgences had to do with the “satisfaction.” They might be “partial,” remitting only a portion of the penalties, measured by days or years of purgatory; or they might be “plenary,” remitting all penalties due in this world or the next. In theory, however, no indulgence could remit the guilt or the eternal penalty of sin,5 and the purchaser of an indulgence was not only expected to confess and be absolved, but he was also supposed to be corde contritus, i. e., “truly penitent.”A rigid insistence on the fulfilment of these conditions would have greatly restricted the value of the indulgences as a means of gain, for the right to hear confession and grant absolution belonged to the parish-priests. Consequently, it became the custom to endow the indulgence-venders with extraordinary powers. They were given the authority to hear confession and grant absolution wherever they might be, and to absolve even from the sins which were normally “reserved” for the absolution of the higher Church authorities….

Charles M. Jacobs, “A Disputation of Doctor Martin Luther on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences (The Ninety-Five Theses) 1517,” in Works of Martin Luther with Introductions and Notes, vol. I (Philadelphia: A. J. Holman Company, 1915), 18–19.

What is the human self?

23 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, John Calvin, Martin Luther, Psychology, Uncategorized

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All counseling is ultimately theological: The method and end of counseling are based upon one’s psychology. Psychology derives from certain theological considerations: What is a human being? When one considers just some contemporary answers to the question of self, you will quickly see that the “simple question” what is a human being cannot be easily answered.

Calvin begins the Institutes with the argument that no human being can rightly know himself without first knowing who is before God. Indeed, it is a fundamental proposition of Christianity that everything is ultimately unintelligible without knowing first who we are with respect to God:

Romans 1:21–23 (ESV)

21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

The reason for such divergent understandings of the human being is that human beings simply are in no position to answer to the question without “outside” help:

In spite of the multiplication of academic disciplines in the twentieth century that focus on the biological, social, psychological, and evolutionary understanding of the human creature, these modern approaches provide a very limited perspective from which the human person can understand the human condition. The sixteenth-century Reformers recognized that it was not enough for human beings to study themselves. That provided too limited a horizon. They could not stand outside themselves to gain the necessary perspective from which they could comprehend the totality of their being and existence. Because we are creatures, what it means to be fully human simply lies beyond the grasp of the human mind. Creatures cannot, by the very definition of what it means to be a creature, comprehend and understand everything about their Creator, and because their relationship with their Creator stands at the heart of their existence, they cannot grasp everything about themselves. Lacking the ability to step outside of themselves, human beings take on a sense of self-exalted importance or find themselves struggling with a sense of insignificance and helplessness within the universe.[1]

[1] Kolb, Robert; Arand, Charles P. (2008-02-01). Genius of Luther’s Theology, The: A Wittenberg Way of Thinking for the Contemporary Church (p. 24). Baker Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

 

We Need Poets

27 Tuesday May 2014

Posted by in Isaac Watts, Literature, Martin Luther, Music

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First, we need Watts’ poetry in our lives. Our world clambers after the latest thing, and as we wear ourselves out in the process, great poets such as Watts often get put in a box on the curb for the thrift store pickup. How could a gawky, male poet, living and writing three hundred years ago, be relevant today? Our postmodern, post-Christian, post-biblical culture has almost totally dismissed what was called poetry in Watts’ day. Few deny it: ours is a post-poetry culture. Martin Luther insisted that in a reformation, “We need poets.” [Here I Stand]  However, Christians often accept the decline of poetry without a whimper. Won’t the machinations of society carry on just fine without poetry? Won’t the church do just fine without it? It’s not like poetry contributes anything vital. You can’t eat it. So thought Hanoverian King George II: “I hate all poets!” he declared. But are Christians to stand deferentially aside as culture pitches poetry —the highest form— into the lowest circle of hell?

 

Bond; Douglas (2013-10-29). The Poetic Wonder of Isaac Watts (A Long Line of Godly Men Profiles) (Kindle Locations 167-170). Reformation Trust Publishing. Kindle Edition.

We Must Travel Further

07 Sunday Jul 2013

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“For your possessions lie not upon the earth, but in heaven; and though you have already lost all temporal good, you still have Christ, who is more than all else. The devil is the prince of this world and rules it; his citizens are the people of this world; therefore, since you are not of the world, act as a stranger in an inn, who has not his possessions with him, but procures food, and gives his gold for it. For here it is only a sojourning, where we cannot tarry, but must travel further. Therefore we should use worldly blessings no more than is needful for health and appetite, and therewith leave and go to another land. We are citizens in heaven; on earth we are pilgrims and guests.”

Martin Luther “The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude Preached and Explained.”

Definition of the Church

12 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by in Church History, Ecclesiology, John Calvin, Martin Luther

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How does a church differ from a group of Christians?

Definition of the Church:

At the Council of Constantinople of 381, the Fathers referred to the “one, holy, universal, apostolic church”. This is sometimes referred to as the Four Marks of the Church. Dever discusses these in The Church, chapter 2.

Lutherans define the church as follows in the Augsburg Confession, article 7:

The Church is the congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered.

Calvin defines the church as follows:

Hence the form of the Church appears and stands forth conspicuous to our view. Wherever we see the word of God sincerely preached and heard, wherever we see the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there we cannot have any doubt that the Church of God has some existence.

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 4.1.9.

Dever sees two basic marks of the church:

These two marks are right preaching of the Word of God and the right administration of the baptism and the Lord’s Supper….The first mark is the fountain of God’s truth that gives life to his people, and the second is the lovely vessel to contain and display this glorious work. The church is generated by the right preaching of the Word. The church is distinguished and contained by the right administration of baptism and the Lord’s Supper (21).