Reformed by the Good News

Sunday, October 27, 2024 – Reformation Sunday

The dialogue below has been adapted from “A Visit with Martin Luther,” written by Rev. Drue Warner of Good News Church in Suwanee, GA and “A Visit with Katie Luther,” written by Hilda Demuth-Lutze, author of Kingdom of the Birds. I delivered this by playing both parts.

 

Today is Reformation Sunday, the day we commemorate the courage of a man named Martin Luther who on October 31, 1517, pounded a nail into the door of a church with a force that was heard around the world. But rather than my telling you the story, I thought I’d invite Martin and his wife Katherina von Bora Luther to share a little bit of their own perspectives. Martin, why don’t you begin?

[Martin] Thank you, I’m pleased to be able to do so. I was born in Eisleban, Saxony on Nov. 10, 1483, and I am a monk in the Augustinian order in Erfurt, Germany. More than five hundred years ago, I unwittingly started one of the greatest movements in human history – the Protestant Reformation – by nailing 95 “theses” or statements of objection on the front door of the church in Wittenburg.

The church door was like the community bulletin board, and I wanted to start a conversation. The result completely surprised me, but it was desperately needed. You see, after twelve years of being a faithful monk, doing everything I could to please God (such as praying from 4am until late into the evenings, confessing my sins for six hours at a time, and following all the strict rules of my order), I grew exasperated, exhausted, and became very angry with God. I viewed God as a tyrant because he demanded what I could not give.

But everything changed for me the day that I was reading the book of Romans and came to verse 17 in chapter 1. When I read that “the just shall live by faith,” it changed my life! I love the Church, but the more I studied the scriptures, the more I became incensed at the ways the Church had become corrupted by greed. It was selling indulgences to the common people to purchase their own salvation with money that they didn’t have!
Their message was a false gospel of “Confess your sins and WORK to earn favor with God!” But I discovered in the book of Romans that the true gospel message is, “Confess your sins and REST in the finished work of Christ on our behalf!”

My dear wife, Katie, would not be surprised at my diligent study of the scriptures. In fact, she’s a learned woman too, aren’t you, dear?

[Katie] Yes, that is the truth. My training in the convent served me surprisingly well. Unlike most other women, I can read and write. It gladdens my scholarly husband’s heart that I can read the Scriptures and teach our children. And when he is away from Wittenburg, he writes wonderful letters home. But do you have any idea how difficult it is to live with a writer?

The chairs, the window ledges, and the floor of that study are littered with letters and manuscripts and books. Before we married, Doctor Luther was here alone, a bachelor with no sense of how to keep house. As he wrote to a friend, all he brought into our marriage was “old books and smelly clothes!”

[Martin] Ah, that is the truth, I must confess. Now where was I? Oh yes, the book of Romans and its dramatic effect on me. After reading that text, I could no longer keep silent about this good news that we do not obtain our salvation by our own works, but by FAITH ALONE. But the Roman Church was not at all happy with what I had to say.

They declared me a heretic and excommunicated me from the church. I thought I might be burned at the stake. Especially when they demanded I recant. I refused, but before they could imprison me, my princely friend, Friedrich the Wise, had me kidnapped and hidden in the Wartburg Castle. It was there that I translated the New Testament from Greek into German, a version still used today, I might add.

As this Reformation movement began to spread throughout Germany and Europe, believers were liberated, and monks and nuns began to marry and start families. I actually helped twelve nuns escape from their convent, including one named Katherina von Bora. I’ll let her tell you about that herself.

[Katie] Very well. I was 24 years old when the twelve of us determined we would leave the convent, which was against the law of course. We wrote secretly to Martin Luther, who made plans with a supplier to smuggle us out in a covered wagon, huddled among the barrels. Years later and a whiff of herring on a spring night reminds me of that Easter eve. [wrinkles nose] In Wittenburg, Doctor Luther found places for us to stay until we could find husbands or return to our families.

[Martin] I was able to reunite all of them with their families or marry them off to other monks. All of them except for one, Katherina von Bora. To my stubborn eyes, she was the least desirable of the nuns. I did not find her attractive and she was VERY opinionated. After trying to find her a husband with no success, I decided just to marry her myself!

[Katie] I remember it a bit differently, my dear Martin.

You see, I’d made up my mind that I would have a husband of my own choosing or no husband at all. I told Luther’s friend Nicholas Amsdorf that I would only marry him or Herr Doktor Luther himself. Poor Amsdorf hoped I was joking! Maybe I was, but still, I was happy that joke got passed along to Martin. When he came to the Cranach home to propose marriage to me, our conversation must have sounded like a business deal.

I was not “in love” with Martin, and he had his own misgivings. But a few weeks after our wedding, he reported to a friend that “Katie, by the grace of God, is in all things more compliant, obedient, and obliging than I dared hope.” Little did he know how much strength I had! Fifteen years later, he would never describe me like that. We’ve had our squabbles. We are both quick to express opinions, and both slow to let go of ideas. But I can say without hesitation that I dearly love Martin, and I know he loves me.

[Martin] Yes, she quickly became my cherished Katie. She is a wonderful mother, an excellent cook, an impressive manager of our household and boarding house, as well as our farm in the country. And she makes the best beer in Wittenburg!

[Katie] How I wish I could convince that man to spend more time in the country. There he could read and write without constant interruptions from all the students and complete strangers who demand his time. All those years of overworking have affected his physical health, and he suffers from bouts of melancholy. I do my best to coax him out of his dark moods.

[Martin] Yes, I am prone to dark moods, and sometimes I am led to dark words about other people. That is why it is even more astonishing to me that God has seen fit to use me to reform the Church.

While I have shared many ideas – and even have written many hymns – the most important thing I have taught is that we do not earn our salvation, but it is given to us by God’s grace alone through the selfless work of Christ. I come from a long line of men and women who have kept this great good news of the gospel alive for the past 2,000 years.

Today, it is your turn to keep the gospel alive, to share the good news with the people around you that the righteous shall live by faith in Jesus Christ alone, not by works, so that no one may boast. Our salvation is his work because of his love and all for his glory. Even the faith that saves us comes from him! Best of all, we are no longer slaves to sin, but beloved children of the living God. Is there any better news than that? I think not! Right Katie?

[Katie] Yes, Martin, there is no better news than that.

Amen!