Newsletter — October 30, 2022

I often make the dad joke — no, not often, I do it every year at Reformation time — “my thesis is that Martin Luther really nailed it, I hope you don’t find that too indulgent of me.” This joke has lost none of its charm for me. Regardless of your protestant tradition, be it Lutheran, Anglican, Baptist, Presbyterian (and more), we all share the Reformation in common as an inflection point in history that God used to shape the church. And this inflection point is marked by October 31st, 1517, when Martin Luther nailed his Ninty-five Theses to the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg. In his theses, Luther took on a believer’s life of repentance, what authority a minister has to forgive sins, indulgences, purgatory, the Roman doctrine of the treasury of merit, and more.

It was important because, as sinful and imperfect humans, we often need to be corrected and brought back to and grounded in the truth of the scripture. The Reformation was one of those times when God lit a fire that spread far and wide throughout His church and continues to have implications even today 505 years later.

It is good and right that we celebrate and mark this time in our calendars. It is also good and right that we remember that God is working among His people and continually reforming his Church. We do well to keep in mind a phrase which later came into use, and which we still use today, semper reformanda: always reforming. May God continue to grant our reform in and through our Lord Jesus Christ!