Martin Luther and the Baptists of Baltimore
As we approach what will surely be one of the more unusual Halloweens this Saturday, it is perhaps as good a time as any to recall to mind another, more significant, event that shares the day with Halloween, this being Reformation Day.
I assume most of you haven’t paid this day much thought, even if you grew up in a Protestant church, as did I. But if you’ve ever wondered--or now have a sense of wonder in your head Inception-style--as to why there exists Catholics and non-Catholics (known as Protestants going forward), then keep reading. Reformation Day may just be for you.
In short, Reformation Day celebrates the actions of one Martin Luther, hitherto a monk carrying out his duties in relative obscurity (like monks most often do). His actions went something likes this: on October 31st of 1517, instead of dressing up as a monk and knocking on the neighbor’s door in search of candy, Luther dressed up as a monk and nailed a list of grievances he had with the Catholic Church, known as the 95 Theses, to the doors of local churches in Wittenberg, Germany.
Presumably he left without any candy in hand that night (the historical record is a little light on this point). But in his listed protest of Catholic practices and teachings, so began the Protestant Reformation. In terms of what this all actually means...
Reform what and for whom?
Great questions. Martin Luther’s theses were designed to re-form a church that had strayed from many biblical doctrines and precepts, not start something completely new. Throughout the Early and High Medieval periods, the Catholic Church (Catholic here meaning ‘whole’ or ‘universal’) was the only church and had been since the adoption of the Nicene Creed in 325 A.D (the same creed we recite together in our gatherings).
Despite an earlier schism, whereby the Eastern Catholic Church broke away in 1054 A.D. and became the Eastern Orthodox Church in Eastern Europe, Western Europe remained almost entirely Catholic until Luther’s actions incidentally brought about another schism.
As aforementioned, Luther’s intent was not revolution but rather a call for churches and their scholars and clergy to return to biblical teaching and not erroneous papal decree. At the time of his 95 Theses, Luther’s primary complaint against the Catholic Church was the sale of indulgences, a practice that substituted true forgiveness sought from Christ with the monetary purchase of forgiveness for personal or familial sins.
Soon to follow in 1517 and thereafter, Luther would take serious issue with the Catholic understanding of justification on the basis of works, pointing instead to the scriptures which reject works and posit faith alone as the human component in justification (for more on this error and others, a link is provided below for further reading).
Luther had not discovered anything new; rather he rediscovered and proceeded to proclaim the true teachings of the scriptures that the early Church had already held hundreds of years prior.
So why did this rediscovery take so long?
Since the waning days of the Roman Empire, Latin had been the only language church gatherings were allowed to use. A Latin Bible was also the only officially approved translation for use. After the fall of Rome and into the Dark Ages, Latin as the common vernacular fell away to other languages, though the Catholic Church continued to use it as the ‘official’ language of the scriptures and liturgy used by the clergy. Few if any believers in Luther’s day understood Latin.
Martin Luther, himself a member of the clergy and fluent in Latin, was burdened by this disconnect and went about translating the scriptures into German so that others in the church could recognize for themselves the errors and falsehoods of Catholic teaching and practice.
This was also Luther’s way of expressing what is called the ‘priesthood of believers,’ the belief as described in 1 Peter 2 that those in the household of God should long for the “pure milk of the word” because they are a “holy priesthood” able to understand it by the Spirit without need for an intermediary.
To be able to understand scripture in our common vernacular and without mediating human authority is a primary contribution of Luther’s reform. In terms of transmission...
From Wittenberg to Baltimore?
Yes, with a lot of stops along the way. At Redemption City Church, we are nothing less than heirs of Luther’s words and work in a 500-year-old chain of events. The very word ‘evangelical’, which our church would use as a descriptor, was a direct product of Luther’s Reformation and its emphasis on the free, unmerited, and unmitigated grace of the Gospel.
As a result of Luther’s reformative, evangelical efforts in Germany, other reformative movements sprang up across Europe, notably so in France, Switzerland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, England, and Scotland.
In several of these countries, people like John Calvin, John Knox, and Huldrych Zwingli followed Luther's protesting steps in bringing about reformation apart from a hostile Roman Catholic Church which led to a revival in understanding the Gospel and true biblical beliefs and practices.
As many Protestants fled from Catholic theocracies and attendant persecution (and even at times from other Protestants) across Europe, the evangelical movement made its way to the fledgling United States where the Lord administered the Church’s succession on the backs of faithful brothers and sisters, shaping our faith and conviction in the 21st century much in the likeness of Luther’s in the 16th century.
In the turbulence of our current age, a knowledge of our history and the faith and perseverance of our forebears should shape in us gratitude for their works and a hopeful vision for our own, that “we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Gospel” (1 Thess. 2:4).
As we call to mind the Reformation this Saturday, it is an invitation to give thanks for Martin Luther and much more to Martin Luther’s God, whom we call Father as well. He is still drawing people to His unchanging Gospel some 500 years later. We in Christ are the evidence.
Happy Reformation Day Y’all,
Tyler M.
***For reference on the exact nature of Roman Catholic beliefs and practices and how they have historically erred from biblical teaching, apologist Matt Slick over at carm.org has a very helpful catalog: Roman Catholicism
P.S. If this pithy article has aroused in you any desire to study some of the topics covered, look no further than below for a few resources!
The Reformation: A Very Short Introduction
Peter Marshall
The Baptist Story: From English Sect to Global Revolution
Anthony Chute and Nathan Finn
The Heroic Boldness of Martin Luther
Steven J. Lawson
Martin Luther: The Man Who Rediscovered God and Changed the World
Eric Metaxas
https://www.amazon.com/Martin-Luther-Rediscovered-Changed-World/dp/110198001X
John Calvin: For a New Reformation
Derek Thomas and John Tweeddale
The Reformation
Steve Nichols
https://www.ligonier.org/store/the-reformation-paperback/
John Knox and the Reformation
D. Martin Lloyd-Jones and Iain Murray