The Times They Are A-changin'

Text: Readings for Reformation Sunday

In 1454 the invention of printing using movable type came to Europe. It was a technology whose time had come. Within thirty years, there were printing presses throughout Europe, and especially in northern Italy and central Europe.

In 1492, Columbus came upon a world across the western ocean. Vast lands and cultures that until then were completely unknown to Europeans suddenly appeared. It was amazing and disconcerting.

In the centuries just before, the temperature in Europe increased, the summers were longer and the winters more mild. As a result, crop harvests increased, and people ate better and had more free time. Fewer people were needed on the land, and more people congregated in cites. Political power began to fragment just a bit.

At the same time the Church of Rome, having abused its power, was increasingly the target of complaints and protests. There were calls—quashed by the Church—for reform.

Into this time of adventure, discontent, and sense of new possibility stepped Martin Luther. Unhappy law student turned monk and teacher, Luther was the right man at the right time. On the eve of All Saints Day—that is, on Halloween—he wrote a letter to the bishop titled “Disputation of Martin Luther on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences.” In it were ninety-five statements and questions—the Ninety-five Theses—arguing against the church’s abusive and wicked sale of indulgences, which were a kind of relief connected to penance. This document is surprisingly dull, but contains gems like “the treasures of the Gospel are nets with which [the church] formerly [fished] for men of riches. The treasures of the indulgences are nets with which they now fish for the riches of men.” And you can detect in this document the clarity, power, and heedlessness of Luther’s thinking.

The document was said to have been posted on the doors of All Saint’s Church in Wittenburg. That would have been the end of the story in a different time. But in these agitated times, it was not. The document was, first, translated into German—the language of the people—from Latin—the language of the clergy. And second, it was printed on those printing presses.

The press was the internet of its day, and worked in many of the same ways, only a lot slower. Each town had a press. A document like Luther’s would be printed in one town; a copy would be sent to the next town, where the printer would re-set the type and print out another run, some copies of which would go to other towns, where the process would repeat. For the first time in history, there was a way to disseminate a lot of copies of a document quickly and, more important, without approval by a central controlling authority. It turned out that Luther was both a beneficiary and a master of this technology. A man like Luther in a time like his in a political and technological environment like that—it was a great recipe for the upheaval and change that was the Reformation.

Today is Reformation Sunday, always the Sunday before Halloween. It is Reformation Sunday, not Martin Luther Sunday. And for Luther, it was never about Luther. Well, that is not quite right—Luther was bombastic, earthy, impulsive, courageous, and prolific. He had a lot to say and did not hesitate to say it. Often. Nonetheless, there were two results of his actions and words that he would not have wanted to happen. First, he did not want or expect the church to split into two churches (and eventually into many). He wanted to reform the church, not break it. And second, he did not see himself as the hero of a moment. That there is now a worldwide denomination called Lutheran would have not have pleased him.

There were a lot of theological implications of the Reformation. The arguments fought and the positions defended then have become dogma now. The insights have become mottos. Faith apart from works. Sola scriptura. The infinite contained in the finite. Saints and sinners both. This is a good thing, not to be mocked. What was argued so forcibly then have by now become the foundations for a clear way—and being Lutherans, we think a better way—of being with God.

And the social implications of the theology fit with the changing culture. A more dispersed division of power (but not yet very democratic). Worship (and scripture) for the first time in many centuries in the language of people. Holy Communion for lay people. A new kind of accountability.

But even so, these were more a part of a bigger move toward a re-vitalized church. A church that does not change risks ignoring the call of God inviting it into the future. When a church thinks about preserving what has been accomplished and defending itself, and discarding what it sees as enemies within, it shows an arrogance that denies the ongoing work of God in the world. Something for sure was happening in Europe at the time. Just like now. We need, as Luther was fond of repeating, to be watchful for the work of the devil. But not so watchful that we cannot see the work of God.

The readings for Reformation Sunday (and they are always these same readings every year) could be seen as campaign buttons for Christian Protestantism. But it is more helpful if we see them not as about the church and church-going and more about God’s presence here with us in this world. What they, the readings, have in common is a sense of intimacy with God and closeness even in the face of God’s hugeness in space and time. This realization was not new to Christians, but maybe it had been pushed into the corner a bit. The Reformation took it out of the corner and put it in a place of honor in the middle of the room. God is not far off. God does not need to speak to us or we to God through attorneys secular or religious, or with special words or in special postures.

God is in the midst of the city. God abides in us and we in God. God is here. Here in the community of faith, here in the world, here in our day to day life, abiding here in our hearts.

We Lutherans need to remember that the Reformation did not create or even discover new doctrine. That’s why it is called the Reformation and not the Revolution. Instead, it restored to us a way of seeing God; it gave us new eyes. Or opened the ones we already had, perhaps. It helped us to see God in the events of the times, in the people, in changing politics. And in our own experiences. To see the hand of God as always meddling—in a good way. And encouraged us to keep our eyes open for God here and now.

There is a danger of successful movements as the church has been to become stiff and creaky and curmudgeonly. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But first, it is almost always broken some way. And more important, it is not up to us to preserve the church. The church is God’s. And if the Reformation demonstrated anything at all, it is that God it still engaged in its future. Maybe more than we are.