The Sovereign Son

Reformation Day, reflecting, of course, the Reformation, it raises the question, what was the fundamental issue that fueled the Protestant Reformation? It was not the sale of indulgences.

That was what the 95 Theses were written in terms of Martin Luther protesting Rome, literally selling forgiveness in order to fundraise for some building projects back in the Vatican.

But that's not the primary issue that fueled the Reformation.

And in fact, the Reformation would recover key doctrines, doctrines like justification by faith alone, sola fide, and doctrines like a commitment to translating the Word of God, the Scriptures, into the common language.

And yet, even as important as those doctrinal commitments are, those convictions are, of course, very important, but they're not the fundamental issue that actually fueled the Protestant Reformation.

Now, I would argue that the fundamental issue that motivated the Reformers was a commitment to the Lordship of Christ as the head of the church.

It really was the issue of spiritual authority.

You see, in the medieval Roman Catholic system, the pope was regarded as the head of the church.

In fact, Martin Luther, I believe it was in one of his table talks, said that the chief reason, the chief cause for which he fell out with the pope was that the pope regarded himself as the head of the church.

But the Reformers rightly understood that Christ alone is the head of the church.

And even in the centuries prior to the Reformation, long before Luther, during the lifetimes of groups that we would refer to as the pre-Reformers or the forerunners to the Reformation, it was the issue of spiritual authority that motivated them to take a stand.

Going all the way back to the 12th century, the middle of the 1100s, there was a merchant from Lyon in modern-day France, a man named Peter Valdo.

He was converted and then became convinced of the need to preach the Word of God in the common language.

And when Roman Catholic authorities told him to stop preaching when they refused to give him permission to preach, he defied those authorities and famously quoted from Acts 5.29 the words of the Apostle Peter, "'We must obey God rather than men.'" A couple centuries later, in the 1300s, John Wycliffe, a scholar at Oxford, he was actually one who helped translate the Bible from the Latin Vulgate into English.

Wycliffe actually called the Pope the Antichrist.

And he used that label because he was indicating that although the Pope and the leadership of the Roman Catholic system claimed to represent Christ, claimed to be the vicar of Christ, in reality they were opposed to what Christ truly taught and what that which honors Christ includes.

It was one of Wycliffe's students a generation later, someone influenced by Wycliffe's writings and teachings in Bohemia, a man named John Hus or Jan Hus, who preached at the church there, the Bethlehem Chapel in Prague, also taught at the University of Prague, who held those same convictions that Christ is the head of the church.

He wrote a book called De Ecclesia, means On the Church.

And in that book, he articulated what at that time was a radical concept.

He had the audacity to say that Christ alone is the head of the church, not the pope.

And because of that view, he was summoned to appear at a council called the Council of Constance.

He arrived in the year 1414, and the following year was put on trial in 1415 and burned at the stake.

So the issue that motivated the Reformers, as Luther and others like him, John Calvin, John Knox, and all the rest, inherited this from those like Hus and Wycliffe and Waldo, The primary issue that was at stake was the issue of the authority of Christ.

You see, if the pope and the magisterium, the cardinals, the bishops, the priest, if the Roman Catholic Church, if the papacy is the authority for the church, then that means that Roman Catholic tradition is binding and the gospel is a gospel of sacramental self-righteousness.

But as the Reformers pointed out, if Christ is the head of the church, if he is the Lord over the church, then his word alone is the authority for the church.