Sermon Tone Analysis

We discussed last week that Luther had joined the Augustinian order as a monk because he was taught that God was pleased by those who lived religious lives and did religious acts regularly.

So for a whole year, as a Monk Initiate, Luther lived in a 3 meter by 3 meter room, didn’t have private conversations, prayed 7 times a day, fasted often, and daily confessed his sins to a superior in the monastery.

A part of Martin's study and religious devotion over that first year was to consider this question: "How does one find a gracious God?"

This became a real struggle for him.

He was taught that he was to please God with his actions and then God would then be gracious to him.

But Martin knew, as he confessed often, hours at a time remember, just how sinful he was.

How many actions, thoughts, heart intentions, etc. were not pleasing to God.

How could God ever be gracious to him?

So Martin after the first year is over and he is accepted as a monk, he is quickly set on the path to now become a priest.

So Luther began to study and prepare for that.

He was reading the writings of theologians a lot now, studying the art of being a priest in the Roman church.

One of the things he looked at, and struggled with, was the concept of the Mass and this struggle comes out in his ordination service in a profound and public way.

To understand the significance, let's step back again and understand that:

Rome is a Sacramental System.

Sacraments:

The Roman Catholic system is based on Sacraments (or ordinances).

These are acts that, they claim, earn favor with God, acts that are necessary for the Christian to do.

They are, as the Reformers point out in critiquing Roman teaching here, works that are added to faith in order to please God.

This sacramentalism is what the Reformers rejected when they declared that salvation was by Sola Fide - Faith Alone.

Again, turning to the Catholic church for their own definition, they write: "The life of the Catholic Church revolves around the Eucharistic sacrifice [The Mass] and the sacraments.

There are seven sacraments in the church: baptism, confirmation, eucharist, penance, anointing of the sick, matrimony, and holy orders."

There are Seven Sacraments in Roman Theology.

As Protestants, we believe in Two.

The Sacraments of Roman Catholicism are:

Baptism (Infant)

Confirmation

Eucharist (Mass)

Penance

Anointing of the Sick

Marriage

Holy Orders (Priesthood/Monastic Life)

The Catholic church clearly states: "They are necessary for salvation."

The first is Baptism.

Baptism is done primarily for infants, though adults are of course required to be baptized as well if they convert later in life.

The Catholic church states that baptism incorporates you into the church, is the foundational gateway into all the other sacraments, and that it actually purifies you of original sin.

This is why Roman Catholic babies are baptized as soon as possible.

They need their sin, the sinfulness they are born with, to be removed.

Catholic children in the time of Luther are baptized as soon as physically possible because they often died in infancy.

Without baptism, the Roman Church taught that they would be damned.

With baptism, a baby’s original sin is forgiven and they can go to purgatory or heaven if they die young.

The second is Confirmation.

Confirmation is the result of training in the beliefs of the Catholic church.

Confirmation classes would be regularly held and the children in particular are taught what the church says is true.

At the end of the classes, rather than just a simple graduation occuring, being confirmed into the church is said to give the Spirit to the person being confirmed.

They literally claim they are "enriching the baptized with the Holy Spirit, binding them more perfectly to the church."

This a significant ceremony for a Catholic.

The third is the Mass.

The Catholic Church says "The Eucharist is the most august sacrament, in which Christ himself is contained, offered and received"

This is a crucial point for us to understand.

What the Roman Church teaches here is the important to understand and I will come back to it in detail, with the verses and the arguments from each side.

We will also see how this particular belief greatly impacted Martin Luther and the other Reformers.

The forth is Penance.

This is another of the crucial points with Rome.

Listen to how Rome describes Penance: "Through penance, the faithful receive pardon through God's mercy for the sins they have committed.

At the same time, they are reconciled with the Church community.

The confession, or disclosure, of sins frees us and facilitates our reconciliation with others."

Penance is the result of the translation (mistranslation actually) of the Gospels into Latin.

Where you and I would read "Repent" in our English Bibles today, Jerome had translated it "Do Penance."

So an entire system of confession and works related to confession evolved in Roman Catholicism.

To be forgiven of a sin, you had to confess it to a priest, do the work assigned to you (give money, say certain prayers, do a pilgrimage, etc) which is the act of Penance, and then the priest could absolve you of your sin.

We will study this belief in more detail soon as well.

The fifth is Anointing of the Sick.

Rome defines the anointing of the sick as a special rite.

A special dispensation of grace is given when a sick person is anointed and blessed by the priest.

This is one of the three sacraments given to a person near death, what the church calls the "Last Rites."

Penance, Anointing, and then a final Mass are seen as the best of the final acts that one can end life with.

It puts you in God's favor more than simply dying with faith in Christ would.

The sixth is Marriage.

Rome says "The matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership for the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring."

This is actually a good statement, but then Rome goes further in saying just that.

Rome placed marriage as a sacrament in order to encourage the growth of Catholic families.

In terms of holy living, in Roman Catholic theology, marriage is not nearly as good as living a life of perpetual virginity or celibacy (as those in the priesthood are supposed to).

But for those outside the religious life this was a special sacrament they could earn extra grace from, mainly through an emphasis on procreation as you might be familiar with what Rome has historically taught in that area.

The seventh is Holy Orders.

This is the idea of religious life I mentioned before.

Living the life of a monk, priest, bishop, or nun was taught to be the best way to earn extra favor and grace from God. Entering a Holy Order was itself a special rite and those who lived in this lifestyle pleased God more than common people, according to Rome.

Protestantism Differs:

With all of those things in mind, you and I affirm only Two of those to be sacraments: Baptism and Communion.

And we differ from Rome greatly on our understanding of both.

Baptism in the New Testament sense is not the thing that Rome understands or practices.

I just talked about that this morning as we celebrated EIGHT baptisms and the theological understanding I presented is not at all what Rome would teach.

Likewise, the Mass is not the same as Communion, or the Lord’s Supper, that we celebrate in our church.

We will talk more about this in a minute.

Martin Luther - Path to Priesthood

So we left off with Martin Luther having completed his first year at the Monastery in Erfurt, Germany.

He has become a monk of the Augustinian Order and is now on the track toward Priesthood.

So let's turn our focus back to Luther for a few moments and then tackle the next of the key themes.

So Luther is studying to take his ordination vows, to become a priest in the Roman Catholic church.

For Luther, this is a big deal.

Priests are holy men, men who are invested with divine power from God to enact the Sacraments.

A priest is able to Baptize an infant or new convert.

As we noted briefly, Rome teaches that the first step or the means by which Justification happens is by Baptism.

This means salvation comes through Baptism initially, so this is a crucial part of the Catholic faith.

A person must be baptized and so the work of the priest, the person authorized to do baptism, is incredibly important.

The priest can also lead someone in the Confirmation of their faith.

This is significant as well, it's a solidifying or joining of the person into the body of the church more fully and gives them special grace.

This is a big moment for families that have children reach the age of being able to be confirmed, since as I mention, the mortality rate was incredibly high at this point in time still.

Then of course the priest is able to Anoint the Sick and perform Marriages.

But the biggest things that the priest is able to do, the most significant things, are take Confessions and assign Penance, and most central to the faith, perform the Mass.

Luther is studying all of these things as he prepares to become a priest.