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Commemoration of Martin Luther: Doctor and Confessor . . . Why is Martin Luther One of the Greatest Theologians in the Church’s History?

Lutheran theologian Hermann Sasse answers the question well:

“Why is Luther the greatest in what has been a long line of teachers in the church who have proclaimed the Word of God from generation to generation? It is because none of the others understood the Word of God so profoundly. The Word of God is greater than human words, which have limitations. The time will come when nobody remembers Homer, or Shakespeare or Goethe, but the Word of God will endure forever. Human words can certainly accomplish much – the command of a powerful ruler or of a general can decide the fate of nations, but sooner or later their power ceases to be. No mere human word is almighty. But God’s Word is always living and active because it is the Word of the eternal, almighty God, the Word through which all things were created. It is the Word of the Judge of all who live. It is the Word of forgiveness, the Word of redemption, the Word which no human word can contradict. It is the Word which, as John says, has become flesh in Jesus Christ. He is himself the eternal Word of God; ‘his name’, it is written in Revelation (19:13), ‘is called the Word of God’. To proclaim the Word of God is to proclaim Jesus Christ. ‘To him all of the prophets bear witness’, according to the apostle Peter (Acts 10:43). ‘We preach Christ crucified’ says Paul in regard to the preaching of the apostles (1 Cor 1:23). He, Jesus Christ, is the content of the church’s preaching – that he is the Redeemer and the Lord is the proclamation of the teachers of the church from its very beginning. That is the message which has been handed down from one generation to another. The proclaimers come and go, but the proclamation itself remains the same: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. That and nothing else is the content of the Christian proclamation. Luther again and again reminded the church of this – a church which had forgotten it, and indeed which had almost buried the one Word of God under so many human words of religion and philosophy.

Luther is one of the great Christologists, the great witnesses to Christ in the church. Like the great theologians of the early church – an Irenaeus or an Athanasius – he stood in reverence before the great mystery of God’s revelation: ‘the Word became flesh’ (John 1:14); ‘great is the mystery of godliness, that God was manifest in the flesh (1 Tim 3:16). All of his life Luther stood prayerfully and reverently before the incomprehensible mystery of the person of Jesus Christ, ‘where God and man meet and all fullness appears’. What the Greek fathers of the 4th and 5th centuries acquired by deep study of Holy Scripture with reverent and prayerful meditation, what the ancient church confessed in her ecumenical councils and stated contrary to the reasoning of philosophy – that Jesus Christ is true God, God from God, Light from Light, very God of very God, of one being with the Father, and at the same time true man – Luther thought through these powerful truths and took them even further in his theology in connection with the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. However, he tried to speak of these things so clearly and simply that even the simplest Christian – yes, even a child – could grasp them. ‘He whom the world could not contain, lies on Mary’s lap. He who upholds all things becomes a little child’. That is the teaching of Nicea. Or we think of how Luther expressed the doctrine of Chalcedon, the teaching of the two natures of Christ, in his catechism – ‘I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the virgin Mary, is my Lord…’ This explanation of the second article of the creed has been called by some the most beautiful sentence in the German language – it is the most beautiful sentence in the German language, but not only because of its structure, which reveals a master of language, but also because of its content. Here we find the eternal Word of God, the eternal Gospel: Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.

From a sermon given on Reformation Day 1943 in Erlangen, Germany.
HT: Pastor Mark Henderson

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A Painting that Preaches Christ

To this day, the painting that stands over the altar at the St. Peter and Paul Church in Weimar, Germany, glows with a radiance that takes the viewer’s breath away. It is the most remarkable example of the uniquely Lutheran use of altar paintings to confess the Gospel rediscovery in the Sixteenth Century Reformation. Below the painting you will find an explanation, a guided-tour of the painting. 

CranachWeimarAltar

“A picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true of the centre panel of the altar painting in the church of Sts Peters and Paul, Weimar, Germany. It was begun by Lucas Cranach (1472-1553) and was completed by his son, also of the same name, in 1555. (To distinguish them, they are called Lucas Cranach the Elder and Lucas Cranach the Younger.)

The heart of the 16th century Reformation and indeed of the Christian faith, is the doctrine of justification by faith alone in Christ. This is how Luther expresses it in part 2 of the Smalcald Articles.

“The first and chief article is this, that Jesus Christ, our God and Lord, “was put to death for our trespasses and raised again for our justification” (Rom 4:25). He alone is “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). “God has laid upon him the iniquities of us all” (Isa.53:6). Moreover, “all have sinned,” and “they are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, by his blood” (Rom. 3:23-25).

Inasmuch as this must be believed and cannot be obtained or apprehended by any work, law, or merit, it is clear and certain that such faith alone justifies us, as St Paul says in Romans 3, “For we hold that a man is justified by faith apart from works of law” (Rom. 3:28), and again, “that he [God] himself is righteous and that he justifies him who has faith in Jesus” (Rom. 3:26).

If the doctrine of justification is to be properly taught, law and gospel must be properly distinguished. The Formula of Concord of 1577 says (Article 5),

“We must … observe this distinction with particular diligence lest we confuse the two doctrines and change the Gospel into law. This would darken the merit of Christ and rob disturbed consciences of the comfort which they would otherwise have in the holy Gospel …”

That Lucas Cranach clearly understood the central teaching of the Lutheran reformation and the proper distinction between Law and Gospel is illustrated by his altar painting at Weimar.

In the centre background, Moses is shown teaching the ten commandments to the Old Testament prophets. They are standing on a circle of barren path, along with a figure representative of all human beings who are under the law’s condemnation. Man is shown here being chased into the fires of hell by death (pictured as a skeleton holding a spear) and the devil (in the form of a monster wielding a club). The prophets taught, as did Moses, “Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them” (Deut. 27:26 ESV, compare Jer. 11:13). Yet it’s not only our actual sins that condemn us, but also the prior sin that we inherit from our parents (original sin). To quote the Smalcald Articles once again,

“Here we must confess what St Paul says in Rom. 5:12, namely, that sin had its origin in one man, Adam, through whose disobedience all men were made sinners and became subject to death and the devil. … The fruits of this sin are all the subsequent evil deeds which are forbidden in the Ten Commandments …”

The good news is that God in mercy and compassion saves all who put their trust in His Son. When the people of Israel in the wilderness sinned and were bitten by snakes, God provided a way of escape that prefigured His Son’s death on a cross. All the Israelites had to do to be saved was look at the snake mounted on a pole (Num. 21:4-9). In Cranach’s painting, this is shown in the background on the painting’s left.

Directly in front, Martin Luther is standing with open Bible in hand. His feet and hands are positioned like those of Moses. His message, however, is one of gospel, not law. On his face is a look of steadfastness and serene confidence. He stands on lush grass in which flowers grow, unlike the bare, stony ground on which Moses stands. Of three passages written in German on the open Bible, the third one reads, “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so also must the Son of man be lifted up, so that all [who believe] in [him may have eternal life]” (Jn 3:14).

Dominating the painting is Christ on a cross. The amazing message of the Gospel is that by his death, Christ takes away the world’s sin. The message written in Latin on the transparent banner held by the lamb in the centre foreground declares that Jesus is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (Jn 1:29). His outstretched arms and generous loincloth are also reminders that He is the world’s Saviour. This was John the Baptist’s message, and John is shown standing underneath the crucified Christ on His left side. With right hand pointing up at Christ on the cross and left hand pointing at the lamb, John is shown proclaiming the meaning of Jesus’ death to Lucas Cranach, the painter. Cranach represents all who believe. A stream of blood from Christ’s pierced side splashes on to this head. It is as the first verse on Luther’s Bible says, “The blood of Jesus Christ purifies us from all sin” (1 Jn 1:7). Therefore like Luther, Cranach also stands confidently.

There is another verse on the open Bible, to which Luther’s finger points directly. It reads, “Therefore let us approach the seat of grace with joyousness, so that we may receive mercy within and find grace in the time when help is needed” (Heb. 4:16). Such approach is possible because Jesus is our victorious high priest. Having paid for sin, He has defeated death and the devil and now lives to intercede for us. Jesus is shown on the painting’s right as the risen One, youthful and full of life, standing on death and the devil, with the staff of his victory flag pushed in the monster’s throat. His gold-edged cloak flows toward the lamb’s banner and the cross. As a result it’s actually both banner and cloak that bear the words, “the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”.

“Believe in God; believe also in me,” the Lord says (Jn 14:1). From this painting His eyes meet ours, inviting us to believe in Him. The other set of eyes that meet ours belong to Cranach, the painter. His feet face in the direction of Christ. But he has turned from his adoration of Christ to look at us also, inviting us to believe and be saved along with him.

Article 4 of the Augsburg Confession expresses the heart of Lutheran teaching this way:

“[W]e receive forgiveness of sin and become righteous before God by grace, for Christ’s sake, through faith, when we believe that Christ suffered for us and that for his sake our sin is forgiven and righteousness and eternal life are given to us.”

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). This, in summary, is the message of the Lutheran reformation and of its foremost artists, Lucas Cranach the Elder and the Younger.

–Pastor David Buck

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Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel

A friend of mine recently pointed out a book to me that I’d been meaning to acquire for a long time: Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel. It was first published in the Library of Christian Classics series. It is now reprinted by Regent College. I managed to snag a first edition from a used book site. What is it? A collection of letters by Martin Luther, many of which were never translated before. It is edited and translated by Theodore Tappert and was done before the American Edition of Luther’s Works project got underway. There is quite a lot here in English that is available nowhere else.

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A Diet of Worms

Earthworms

New weight-loss program? Another weird Guinness Book of World Records attempt? Nope. Today is the day that Emperor Charles V opened a meeting of the Holy Roman Empire, in 1521, some time later a certain monk showed up and was told to recant his writings, or else! Some of our Wisconsin Synod fellow Lutheran blogging pastors, have a nice blog site with good information on Luther’s appearance before the Diet of Worms.

So, while Luther may have, in effect, told them to go eat worms, to my knowledge there was no intentional worm eating taking place there. Truth be told, Worms, pronounced in German as “Woorms” is actually a city, and the word “Diet” means “A formal general assembly of the princes or estates of the Holy Roman Empire.”

Link: Preach. Teach. Confess.: On this date in history.

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Christmas and Vocation

I believe my friend, Dr. Gene Edward Veith, will appreciate how Luther uses the narrative of our Lord’s birth to make good points about the doctrine of vocation. I found this quote and its accompanying footnote in an article by Professor John Pless. Here is what Luther had to say:

Here is another excellent and helpful lesson, namely, that after the shepherds have been enlightened and have come to a true knowledge of Christ, they do not run out into the desert-which is what the crazy monks and nuns in the cloisters did! No the shepherds continue in their vocation, and in the process they also serve their fellow men. For true faith does not create people who abandon their secular vocation and begin a totally different kind of living, a way of life which the totally irrational monks considered essential to being saved, even though it was only an externally different way of existence. [Klug, Luther’s House Postils, Vol. 1:48]

Professor Pless comments:

In Luther’s homiletical treatment of the shepherds, we are given an excellent window into his doctrine of vocation-a doctrine that contemporary Lutheranism desperately needs to recover in light of the “neomonasticism” of contemporary American Evangelicalism. One may see Harold Senkbeil, Sanctification: Christ in Action (Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 1989), 12-15. In his treatise of 1520, “On the Freedom of a Christian,” Luther writes (LW 31:371): “We conclude, therefore, that a Christian lives not in Himself, but in Christ and in the neighbor. Otherwise he is not a Christian. He lives in Christ through faith, in his neighbor through love. By faith he is caught up beyond himself into God. By love he descends beneath himself into his neighbor.” This is expressed liturgically in the Post-Communion Collect “We give thanks to you, almighty God, that you have refreshed us through this salutary gift, and we implore you that of your mercy you would strengthen us through the same in faith toward you and in fervent love toward one another. . .” Homiletically, Luther gives expression to this in his Christmas sermons. For example in a 1521 Christmas sermon Luther says (Lenker, 146): “These are the two things in which a Christian is to exercise himself, the one that he draws Christ into himself, and that by faith he makes him his own, appropriates to himself the treasures of Christ and confidently builds upon them; the other that he condescends to his neighbor and lets him share in that which he has received, even as he shares in the treasures of Christ.” Contra Richard Caemmerer’s distinction of “faith-goal sermons” from “life-goal sermons” (Preaching for the Church [St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 19591,179-190), Luther preaches faith which is active in love.

Source:
John T. Pless, “Learning to Preach from Luther in Advent and Christmas,” Concordia Theological Quarterly, Fort Wayne: Indiana, Volume 62, No. 4, October 1998, pg.

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The Devil Hates to Hear This

Christ_birth_1

Today is the Fourth Sunday in Advent and in many congregations of our church, the Annunciation will be read as the Gospel lesson. Here is a beautiful quote from one of Martin Luther’s sermons on the Annunciation:

“Our Lord Jesus Christ is true God and true man in one person conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of a virgin. It is an article of faith that provides unique comfort against the devil, yes, even over against all angels, as is stated in Hebrews 2:16: ‘For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.’ He did not become God and an angel, but God and man. He does not assume the nature of angels, but that of Abraham’s seed, a human being, flesh and blood. That is why he is called Immanuel, God with us; not just because he is around and with us, living among us and helping us. That would be well and good, but he became like us , of our nature. He assumed flesh and blood and bone like us, yet without sin, which is our lot.

“The devil hates to hear this joyful tiding, that our flesh and blood is God’s Son, yes, God himself, who reigns in heaven over everything. Formerly, each Sunday, when we sang Nicea’s confession of faith, formulated at the Council of Nicea, at the word Et homo factus est, that is, “And He became man,” everyone fell to his knees. That was an excellent commendable custom and it would be a good thing for us to still practice this, so that we might thank God from the heart that Christ assumed human nature and bestowed such great and high honor on us, allowing his son to become man. It almost seems as though God is at enmity with the world.

“Present conditions are so shameful all around us in the world, as God allows murderous mobs and rabble, so much violence and so much misfortune to prevail, so that we might think God is only Lord and God of the angels and that he has forgotten about mankind. But here in our text we see that he befriends us humans like no other creatures, in the very closest relationship, and, in turn, we humans have a closer relationship with God than with any creature. Sun and moon are not as close to us as is God, for he comes to us in our own flesh and blood. God not only rules over us, not only lives in us, but personally became a human being. This is the grace which we celebrate today, thanking God that he has cleansed our sinful conception and birth through his holy conception and birth, and removed the curse from us and blessed us. By nature our conception and birth are flawed and laden with sin. In contrast, Christ’s conception and birth were holy and pure. Through his holy conception and birth our sinful nature, flesh, and blood are blessed and made holy. It is on this basis that we are baptized, so that by means of God’s Word, the sacraments, and the Holy Spirit we might have the fruit of his holy conception and birth. May we always thank him for his grace and never become weary or surfeited in hearing and learning this. Unfortunately, most people in the world think they know it all, after they have heard it once.”

Source:

Luther’s House Postils
The Day of the Annunciation to Mary
First Sermon
Baker Book House: Grand Rapids, Michigan, pg. 292-293.

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“I have no sympathy with the iconoclasts” Martin Luther on Iconoclasm

Giotto_crucifix

Iconoclasm comes from the Greek language and means, literally, “image smashers.” At the time of the Reformation Zwingli, Calvin and their followers thought the way to rid the church of the worship of images was to destroy them. Here is what Martin Luther had to say about iconoclasm.

“Images, bells, eucharistic vestments, church ornaments, altar
lights, and the like I regard as things indifferent. Anyone who wishes
may omit them. Images or pictures taken from the Scriptures and from
good histories, however, I consider very useful yet indifferent and
optional. I have no sympathy with the iconoclasts”  [Luther’s Works,
American Edition, Fortress, vol. 37, p. 371].

And…

I have myself seen and heard the iconoclasts read out of my German
Bible. I know that they have it and read out of it, as one can easily
determine from the words they use. Now there are a great many pictures
in those books, both of God, the angels, men and animals, especially in
the Revelation of John and in Moses and Joshua. So now we would kindly
beg them to permit us to do what they themselves do. Pictures contained
in these books we would paint on walls for the sake of remembrance and
better understanding, since they do no more harm on walls than in
books. It is to be sure better to paint pictures on walls of how God
created the world, how Noah built the ark, and whatever other good
stories there may be, than to paint shameless worldly things. Yes,
would to God that I could persuade the rich and the mighty that they
would permit the whole Bible to be painted on houses, on the inside and
outside, so that all can see it. That would be a Christian work.

Of this I am certain, that God desires to have his works heard and
read, especially the passion of our Lord. But it is impossible for me
to hear and bear it in mind without forming mental images of it in my
heart. For whether I will or not, when I hear of Christ, an image of a
man hanging on a cross takes form in my heart, just as the reflection
of my face naturally appears in the water when I [Vol. 40, Page 100]
look into it. If it is not a sin but good to have the image of Christ
in my heart, why should it be a sin to have it in my eyes? This is
especially true since the heart is more important than the eyes, and
should be less stained by sin because it is the true abode and dwelling
place of God.

Luther, M. (1999, c1958). Vol. 40: Luther’s works, vol. 40 : Church
and Ministry II (J. J. Pelikan, H. C. Oswald & H. T. Lehmann, Ed.).
Luther’s Works. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.