490 years ago, on October 31, 1517, Martin Luther nailed the 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenburg church. The Reformation was born! My friend Rodney Tolleson and I celebrated Reformation Day by meeting for lunch and reading from Luther and Calvin together (he's reading through some of Luther's sermons, while I'm working through Calvin's Institutes).Ligonier Ministries celebrated Reformation Day by offering the excellent ESV Reformation Study Bible for $15.17.
Last Sunday evening, I shared with our congregation a lecture on The Life and Legacy of Martin Luther to celebrate Reformation Sunday.
Even if you are not strictly "Reformed" (i.e. Calvinistic) in your theology, if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, this is a day worth celebrating. Martin Luther's bold stand against Medieval Roman Catholicism led to the translation of the Bible in the language of the people (Luther translated the entire Bible into German; William Tyndale did the same in English only years later), and the recovery of the gospel of justification by faith alone in Christ alone. Arminians, Calvinists, Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Anglicans, Brethren, and Independents of all stripes have roots in the Reformation.
What are you doing to celebrate today?
2 comments:
How did we celebrate Reformation day?
From the looks of things around town we weren't celebrating the Reformation, but returning to some strange medieval celebration.
I had a little cookie monster and a little pumkin running around eating too much sugar.
I used to be really big onto Luther until I read his statements on Jews and Jewish synagogues. If you profile Luther and Paul from their writings, they are miles apart. Luther appears to have bouts of bi-polar with his rage fits about the pope and Jews.
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