Martin Luther (1483-1546)
We remember Martin Luther, born in 1483, nine years before Columbus
discovered America. He studied law at the age of 21; became a priest at 23
and a doctor of theology at 28; wrote and nailed the 95 thesis at age 33 and
34; was ex-communicated and became a fugitive at 38; translated the Bible
into German at 40; and died from a stroke at the age of 63, an
internationally admired leader. His teachings stressed justification by
faith, universal priesthood of believers; and supremacy of scripture which
form the cornerstone of Protestantism. [Please wear red on this Sunday.]
Martin Luther was eight years old when Christopher Columbus set sail from Europe and landed in
the Western Hemisphere. Luther was a young monk and priest when Michelangelo was painting
the Sistine Chapel in Rome. A few years later, he was a junior faculty member at a new university
in small-town Germany, intently studying the Scriptures, “captivated with an extraordinary ardor
for understanding Paul in the Epistle to the Romans.”
In these days Luther was tormented by the demand for righteousness before God. “I did not love,
yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners, and secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly
murmuring greatly, I was angry with God.” Then, in the midst of that struggle with God, the
message of the Scriptures became clear, like a long-shut door opening wide. When he realized that
a “merciful God justifies us by faith … I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered
paradise itself through open gates.”
What Luther discovered is the freedom of Christians trusting God’s mercy in Christ. As he later
wrote, “Faith is God’s work in us. It changes us and makes us to be born anew of God. This faith is
a living, busy, active, mighty thing. It is impossible for it not to be doing good works incessantly.
Faith is a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that believers would stake
their lives on it a thousand times.”
This discovery set Luther’s life on a new course —both his own life and his public service as a
preacher and teacher. When a church-endorsed sales team came to the Wittenberg area in October,
1517, Luther was concerned that the promotion and sale of indulgences undermined the promise of
God’s unreserved mercy in Jesus and the faith that trusts that promise. His 95
Theses or Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences became the first of a life-long
stream of books, sermons, letters, essays, even hymns in which he expressed his confidence in this
life-giving promise from God, the Gospel, and its liberating implications for all of life in church
and society. [Please wear red on October 26, Reformation Sunday.]
