This Changed Everything

Before Luther

What were some of the issues that were happening in the church at the time before and leading to Luther’s reformation movement?

indulgences‌

illiterate believers

controlling of scripture

Politics and wealth granted to positions within the church

Luther’s Beginning

What was Luther’s father financially supporting Luther to become?

a lawyer

Luther changed career paths when he became frightened during a thunderstorm. He promised to become a monk if St. Anne would save him.

Luther entered an Augustinian monastery and could frequently be found running back and forth from the confession box becuase he felt he was in a constant state of sin.

Luther the Teacher

In 1508 Luther was appointed as a professor at the newly opened University at Wittenburg where he eventually taught New Testament.

In studying the New Testament he came across Romans 1:17

Romans 1:17 CEB

17 God’s righteousness is being revealed in the gospel, from faithfulness for faith, as it is written, The righteous person will live by faith.

Here Luther discovers that, "You mean, here Paul is not talking about the righteousness by which God Himself is righteous, but a righteousness that God gives freely by His grace to people who don't have righteousness of their own."

Luther’s world is flipped upside down with this understanding that righteousness does not belong to Luther or anyone else.

And Luther said, "When I discovered that, I was born again of the Holy Ghost. And the doors of paradise swung open, and I walked through."

Transformation and Reformation

In 1517 Luther posted the 95 theses on the Church doors of Castle Wittenburg.

These topics covered indulgences, church policy, worship etc. It was a common practice to post items to have discussion and debate but it was the topics that made these much more controversial and sparked the reformation.

Another reformation that took place almost 100 years earlier was the invention of Gutteburg’s printing press

The reason why this is so significant is that the amount of time that this was invented before Luther allowed the printing press to become established in all major city centers across Europe. So Luther’s and other’s writings were virtually impossible to silence, which included the 95 theses that sparked a reformation the church had never seen before.

As Luther gained momentum from supporters and his own study of scripture he began expanding the kinds of things he wanted to reform and change about the church.

Luther believed a sacrament had to come from what Jesus asked us to do. Therefore out of the 7 sacraments Luther only found 2 that were found in scripture: Baptism and Communion

Luther also believed that everyone should be able to read the Bible in their own language which is why he translated it into German. This allowed people to discover the wonders that he discovered about God’s love and grace. It would also allow people to see what wasn’t in the Bible like indulgences and other teachings.

An indulgence was a piece of paper signed by Pope Leo X along with his seal to forgive someone of their sins and to lessen or remove someone from purgatory.

Luther had many choice words to say about this to both the Pope and Johann Tetzel who was the main seller of indulgences in Germany.

All of this change transformed not just the church but also the political sphere as well. Germany and other countries had various reasons for following Luther. Some understood and believed in his reform, while others wanted to escape the financial and political hold the Holy Roman Empire had on them. By siding with Luther they could break free from this.

More Reform

Luther saw that scripture did not forbid marriage so he allowed priests to marry and even smuggled nuns out of convents. Even though Luther supported and encourage priests, monks, and nuns to marry he felt that he himself was not meant to be married. One smuggling run took place by placing nuns in giant wooden beer barrels. All of the nuns eventually married except for one.

Katarina von Bora was the last nun and Luther’s friends and colleagues eventually convinced him to take her as his wife.

While not as theologically deep, one of Luther’s most well-known and influential works was his Small Catechism.

The Large Catechism was aimed at training and assisting pastors in their teaching, worship, and preaching, the Small Catechism was aimed at bringing faith home to the kitchen table so that even children could learn about faith in Jesus Christ.

The Small Catechism includes teaching topics on:

Ten Commandments

Apostle’s Creed

Lord’s Prayer

Baptism

Confession

Communion

Additional Insights

Luther never wanted to break from the Catholic church, he always advocated for reform. However, he would not change his stance or his mind on the reform that needed to happen so a break was inevitable.

The name Lutheran was a derogatory term from the Catholics. The people liked it, but Luther wanted to call it something else - the people won the vote.

Luther held table talks where people were welcome to his home to have conversations about faith. Katarina served beer to everyone. These talks were called Table Talks and were written down by his students. Luther is even recorded as saying that Katie could say whatever she wanted if she wanted to contribute to the conversations.