Here I Stand

Five hundred years ago next month, Martin Luther faced powerful and angry accusers. By whose authority, Luther, do you dare to teach this? And Luther said, By the authority of the Scripture. Yes, I may be in disagreement with the pope or with the church council, but show me that I'm disobeying the Scripture, and I'll change in a heartbeat. With the threat of excommunication, exile, even death hanging over him, Luther had to make a decision to cave to extraordinary pressure or stand firm to his conscience bound by Scripture. Welcome to Renewing Your Mind.

I'm Lee Webb, and today Dr. R.C. Sproul shows us Luther's courage and conviction in a message titled, Here I Stand. When we think of the Protestant Reformation and the role that was played by Martin Luther, most of us are at least aware of the historic significance of the so-called 95 Theses that Luther nailed to the church door at Wittenberg. Luther, by tacking up the 95 Theses, had no intention whatsoever to create some kind of national and international controversy. He was not acting as a protestor or as a Protestant in this particular endeavor.

In fact, he was careful in his draft of the 95 Theses to write them in Latin, which was the language of the academic world. And he was really inviting the faculty there to discuss some of the issues that were related to a controversy that was brewing there in Saxony. And that controversy had to do with the sale of indulgences. Now, at this time in the 16th century, the church was engaged in a massive building program, the building of St. Peter's Basilica.

And in order to build St. Peter's, an enormous amount of capital was needed, and the church simply had to raise money. One of the ideas that came out of Rome for increasing the revenue of the church was a special papal indulgence that would be made available for people who made contributions to this building program. And so the pope authorized the sale of papal indulgences for this particular purpose.

But now let's be very careful at this point. To understand that, let's not think of it in terms of a crass money-making scheme like one might associate with modern televangelists or something, but the Roman Catholic Church had for centuries been deeply involved in their sacramental system, among which sacraments included the sacrament of penance. When a person committed sin and went to the confessional and so on, when he went through all of those steps that were involved in the sacrament, the final step was to perform certain works of penance, which included not just saying, so many Our Fathers, or so many Hail Marys, or making pilgrimages, but one of the things that a penitent could do in order to be restored to grace was to give alms. And the whole idea of almsgiving had a long history in the Christian community going back to the first century as a great Christian virtue, to give alms to the poor, or to charity, or to the church, or whatever, unselfishly. But the church made it very clear that the only almsgiving that was any value to the soul of the person giving the alms was the almsgiving that was motivated by a truly contrite and humble heart. And when the pope authorized the sale of indulgences for Saint Peter, he made that abundantly clear that this was not an endorsement of a crass sale of indulgences, but rather it was giving people who were genuinely repenting of their sins an opportunity to fulfill the terms of penance by giving alms.

And on this occasion, there would be a special benefit that would be derived from the giving of alms for the building of Saint Peter, namely a papal indulgence. Well, what was a papal indulgence? The Roman Catholic Church believes that in the New Testament, Christ gave what's called the power of the keys. You've heard the phrase, the keys of the kingdom? The power of the keys refers to Jesus' statement to His disciples, whatsoever sins you remit on earth shall be remitted in heaven, and whatsoever things you bind on earth will be bound in heaven. And Rome has understood that in a way that Christ has delegated authority for the forgiveness of sins, at least with respect to temporal guilt, to the church. And it was given primarily to Peter, whom Rome believes was the first pope and was the rock upon which Christ would build his church.

And so sometimes this is called the keys of Saint Peter because the pope follows as Peter's successor from the original position of the apostles. And so the giving of indulgences, as understood by Rome, was the manifestation of the power of the keys, the power of the church to bind and loose, to forgive sins, to grant an indulgence. Okay, so what happened was that throughout the whole empire, delegates were commissioned by the church to represent Rome in proclaiming and announcing this new special papal dispensation, this new indulgence thing. Now what happened in Germany was a particular representative of the church who was unscrupulous, gathered all kinds of attention because what he did in kind of a slick Madison Avenue way was that he was running around to the peasants, convincing them that if they would give liberally and generously to this building program, that they could automatically free their relatives from purgatory. And this man's name was William Tetzel. And Tetzel did not give the standard caveats and say, now you have to really be sincere and you have to really be penitent. And he just was a huckster who was peddling the church's forgiveness, and really in an outrageous way. The phrase that he used for his marketing slogan in German, if we translated it into English, would go something like this, every time a coin in the coffer or in the kettle rings, a soul from purgatory springs.

That was the sales pitch that Tetzel was using. Now, fascinating to me is that in the early stages of this indulgence thing, Luther himself was very excited about the prospect of this new release of papal indulgences. And at one point, he commented that he was disappointed, in a certain sense, that his mother and father, whom he dearly loved, were still alive. Not that he wanted them to die, but he was sad that they were alive at this moment in history because had they been dead, he could have secured their salvation for them by getting indulgences to get them out of purgatory into heaven. So Luther himself went and gave alms and purchased these indulgences in behalf of his grandparents.

It's a strange quirk of history there. But as he did this, more and more reports were coming back of the unscrupulous tactics of William Tetzel. And so Luther wrote the Ninety-Five Theses not to attack indulgences, not to attack the penitential system, not to attack the Roman Catholic doctrine of justification, but to attack what he believed were gross and scandalous abuses. He at this point was still a loyal son of the church, and he was trying to stop this Tetzel fellow from casting a blemish on the church itself. However, in the midst of his study and treatment and preparation for this correction of abuse, Luther began to re-evaluate the entire system of indulgences and was wondering how he could square this concept of merit with the doctrine of justification by faith he read in the New Testament. And he began to have serious doubts about the whole sacramental system that people were relying upon for their own salvation. I mean, Luther loved the sacraments.

Don't misunderstand me. But he was seeing abuses that he was deeply concerned about, and with his keen and acute theological mind, the more he analyzed the outward edges of the abuses, the more his mind began to penetrate from the edge more and more into the substance, into the very core of the doctrines that were part of this whole system, and the more alarmed he became about the practice and the theology that led to this lay behind the very giving of indulgences. And of course, once the Ninety-Five Theses, which expressed some of his major concerns, got loose throughout the land, the matter escalated fast and hard and furious.

And what often happens in theological controversy is that the two sides dig in and it gets deeper and deeper and deeper. But again, Luther was not trying to upset the church. He was honestly trying to purify the church from this abuse, and he begged to have the opportunity to discuss these matters not only with his own faculty at the Augustinian University there in Wittenberg, but also with representatives from Rome herself. And two very important meetings took place, one in Leipzig and one in Augsburg, where Luther entered into debates with two of the most important persons for the church in that period.

One was Martin Eck and the other one was Cardinal Cajetan, who were two of certainly two out of the top three theologians of the sixteenth century for the Roman Catholic Church. And in those debates, both Eck and Cajetan tried in their debate with Luther to show Luther that the views that he was taking now on the doctrine of justification went against some of the teaching of the church in previous church councils. And Luther was forced on one of these occasions to admit that his view did in fact differ from the teaching of the church.

And so now the question was, well, if your views differ from the teaching of the church, you must be wrong and you must submit to the authority of the church. And Luther refused to do it and was therefore branded a Hussite, reminiscent of John Huss, the Bohemian reformer from Czechoslovakia who had been burned at the stake a hundred years earlier for similar controversy. And now it was just almost a death knell to Luther to be identified with John Huss. But as the debates got deeper, then it was shown to Luther that not only was he going against certain teachings of church tradition, but he was also going against the teachings of the pope himself. And when Luther was confronted with that, he acknowledged that in his opinion, even the pope could make a mistake. And so it was demonstrated that Luther was standing against both church councils and against the supreme authority of the pontiff of the church. And once these representatives of the church demonstrated that Luther was taking this kind of a hard-line position, they reported back to the pope, and as a result, Luther was placed under a papal ban. And the ban of excommunication, the papal bull that condemned Luther's position, was called ex sergei domine.

Now if you are familiar with the pattern of papal encyclicals, you know that the titles of the encyclicals are taken from the opening words of whatever the encyclical is about. So in this case, ex sergei domine is the first two words of this papal encyclical that condemned Luther, and the words are, rise up, O Lord. It was a plea by the pope for Christ to intervene and save the church from the scandalous influence of Martin Luther. He went on to say this, rise up, O Lord.

A wild boar is loose in your vineyard. And so Luther was condemned as a wild boar, a wild animal, who was disrupting the vineyard of God with his stubborn insistence on his doctrine of justification by faith. Now do you see that in those debates and in those discussions, the question that people kept hammering Luther was, who do you think you are?

Who are you? I know you're a doctor of the church and all of that, you're no stupid dummy here, but who are you to challenge this ecclesiastical authority? Often when we look at the Reformation, we say there were two chief causes of the Reformation, and historians will distinguish between the material cause and the formal cause, and we'll usually write in shorthand with the Latin slogans two words to capture that. The word sola fide, which most of us have heard, which means by faith alone, refers to the debate over justification, and the other word sola scriptura, which means by the Scriptures alone. And the debate over church authority, what is the ultimate authority that binds the conscience of the Christian? Is it the Scripture and the teaching of the church?

Is it just the teaching of the church, or is it just the teaching of Scripture? Well, Rome said that both the Scripture and the church tradition were binding upon the conscience of the believer. Luther was saying, no, only the Word of God has that supreme authority to bind the conscience of the Scripture. And so much of this debate got off the center of justification when they couldn't resolve that issue, and they began to say, okay, by whose authority, Luther, do you dare to teach this? And Luther said, by the authority of the Scripture. Yes, I may be in disagreement with a pope or with the church council, but show me that I'm disobeying the Scripture and I'll change in a heartbeat. But again, Luther was daring to understand the Scripture and interpret the Scripture in a way that was different from how the church had interpreted the Scripture. And so he was in deep weeds for challenging the church authority. And again, that's what Eck and Cajetan were emphasizing in these discussions and had reported back to Rome that Luther is not humbling himself before the tribunal of the church. And so finally, the crisis ends in this great tribunal at Worms. Luther again was asking, he says, how often has my trembling heart palpitated?

Am I the only wise one? He spoke openly to Philip Melanchthon, who was his chief student and friend and comrade. He said this, I shall enter Worms under my captain, Christ, despite the gates of hell. And he said to his friend Spallatin, I come, my Spallatin, and we shall enter Worms despite the gates of hell and the powers of the air. In later reflection about what happened when he arrived in the city, Luther said, in fact, the condemnation had already been published in every town, so that the herald himself asked me whether I still intended to go to Worms. Though in truth I was physically afraid and trembling, I replied to him, I will repair thither, though I should find there as many devils as there are tows on the housetops.

Have you ever been to a German town? You know how many tows there are in the housetops. I mean, Luther was very bombastic. He said, I'm going to go there no matter how many, if there are more devils there than there are tows on the roof. But he said, inwardly, I was trembling.

He was physically weak, not sure he would be up to the task. The following day, the 17th, the first hearing took place. It was held in what is called the Bishop's Court. And there in the presence of the emperor himself, all of the princes, princes both of the church and of the state, Luther was asked two questions. Do you, Martin Luther, recognize the books published under your name as your own?

That was the first question. Secondly, are you prepared to recant what you have written in these books? Now, we've seen the movie versions of this.

The movie versions has Luther standing there in this great hall where all the officials are seated round about him. He's under this close scrutiny, and he's commanded to recant. And he stands up and with his fist in the air, he says, and lest I am convinced by sacred Scripture or by evident reason, I cannot recant, for my conscience is held captive by the Word of God, and to act against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand. God help me.

I can do no other. And then he rushes out and jumps on his white horse and rides off and creates the Reformation. That's not what happened. On the 17th of April, when he is called before the tribunal and asked to recant, he answered the question, and they couldn't even hear him. And they asked him to speak up, and he said, can I have some time to consider this?

He faltered, and the court gave him 24 hours to think it over. And so Luther retired then to his cell there in the city, and he spent the night in prayer. And the record of that prayer, I think, is one of the most moving things I've ever read. It reveals the soul of a terrified man, a man who was desperately seeking assurance and courage to do the right thing.

For Luther, it was a private Gethsemane, and listen to the words, some of the words of his prayer. He prayed like this, O God, Almighty God everlasting, how dreadful is the world! Behold how its mouth opens to swallow me up, and how small is my faith in Thee! O the weakness of the flesh and the power of Satan! If I am to depend upon any strength of this world, all is over.

The knell is struck, sentence is gone forth. O God, O God, O Thou my God, help me against all the wisdom of this world. Do this, I beseech Thee. Thou shouldest do this by Thine own mighty power, because the work is not mine, it is Thine.

I have no business here. I have nothing to contend for with these great men of the world. I would gladly pass my days in happiness and peace, but the cause is Thine, and I am Thine, and it is righteous and everlasting. O Lord, help me. My God, my God, dost Thou not hear? My God, art Thou no longer living? Nay, Thou canst not die. Thou dost but hide Thyself, and Thou has chosen me for this work.

I know it. Therefore, O God, accomplish Your own will. Forsake me not for the sake of the well-beloved Son Jesus Christ, my defense, my buckler, and my stronghold. My soul belongs to Thee, and I will abide with Thee forever. Amen.

O God, send help. Amen. And on the morrow, he came back to the hall, and again, the question was placed to him, and there the famous speech was made where Luther said, if you want me to respond clearly, plainly, without horns, non conutum, then here is my answer. Unless I am convinced by sacred Scripture or by evident reason, I cannot recant, for my conscience is held captive by the Word of God, and to act against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand. I can do no other.

God help me. And a furor broke out in the hall. Luther, as he left the hall, was surreptitiously kidnapped by his friends and whisked away to Wartburg, to the castle, where he stayed in disguise as a knight, Sir Georgi, in which he undertook the work of translating the Bible into German. In the meantime, the emperor was furious and put a price on his head, and now the die was cast, and there was nothing that would stop the juggernaut of the Reformation. What do you think of Luther's stand at Worms? Was it heroic, or was it diabolical? I believe it was one of the most courageous and heroic stands for the gospel that's ever been taken. It was taken by a man who really was terrified, but he was more frightened of God than he was of men. He knew what Galatians said.

He wrote two commentaries on Galatians, one of them soon after this, his most important one. He knew that his task was not to please men, but to please God. And the principle that he evoked in that event was important to Christians then and now. To act against conscience is neither right nor safe. Now, it's true that we can have a misguided conscience and be convicted of things that are not appropriate, but once the conviction is there, and we really believe that a certain action is the right action, we must take it. But the key to Luther was this when he said, my conscience is held captive by the Word of God. I'm a prisoner to the authority of the Word of God, to the authority of the Scriptures, and I can't compromise that. That is the foundation of the Protestant Reformation. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind on this Thursday. We're glad you've joined us.

Dr. R.C. Sproul knew the importance of church history. That's why he included it as one of the five categories of study we have emphasized since R.C. founded Ligonier Ministries 50 years ago. The four other categories are theology, Christian living, worldview and culture, and of course, the Bible.

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You can find us online at renewingyourmind.org, or you can call us at 800-435-4343. Well, tomorrow we'll wrap up our series of messages featuring R.C. through the decades with passion and biblical precision. R.C. will remind us of the power and glory of God. We hope you'll join us Friday for Renewing Your Mind.