Recipients of the Faith

Remember all the hype around Y2K? All kinds of people thought that computer glitches would threaten civilization. My brother was locked in at LTV Steel that night to be there in case emergency measures were called for needed his engineering expertise. Or perhaps you remember when the ancient Mayan calendar ran out of numbers, briefly popularizing the idea that the end of the world was nigh. People have always been fascinated by such major calendar events. Even if you’re not a conspiracy theorist or Da Vinci Code type of kook, major anniversaries make you think.

Another such big anniversary is coming. October marks the 499th year since the traditional date for the beginning of the Reformation, when Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses (theological statements he was willing to publicly debate) in Wittenberg, Germany. That’s one short of the Big 500, but that just gives us time to really think about the significance of that time span and prepare for how we want to acknowledge it.

We are St. Paul’s Lutheran Church and School. If the people who fought and died for the right to teach salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ could leap ahead 500 years and see us today, what would they think? In what ways would they say their sacrifice was worth it, and in what ways would they expect better of us? It is an interesting thing to ponder because we have a whole year to work on it.

They fought for getting the Bible into languages the common people could read and for getting copies of the Bible into their hands. Do we view that as a precious enough birthright to actually take advantage of? Or do we treat regular Bible study in the home and in church as something we can live just as well without? They fought for the Gospel of free forgiveness proclaimed in the name of Jesus to penitent sinners. Do we treasure that Gospel or take it for granted and view it as a superfluous part of our week amid all the more important things we have going on? They viewed sound Christian teaching as something worth being martyred for. Do we hold fast to the truth, or do we treat doctrine as no big deal?

Much has changed since 1517. The Roman Catholic Church has changed greatly, adopting many of the positions enumerated in the Augsburg Confession. We don’t need our 500th anniversary to be some sort of “in-your-face” to Catholics. But we do need to dedicate ourselves to receiving and passing down the Gospel. We don’t know, of course, whether there will be another 500 years of history, but if there is, we want there to be another 500 years of people proclaiming and believing the Gospel message here at St. Paul’s, and we are a critical link in that chain.

Let the one year lead-up to the 500th anniversary of the Reformation be for you personally and for all of us at St. Paul’s a chance to think about how we can best be the faithful recipients of the of the faith once handed down and the faithful forefathers of some future people who will look back at us 500 years from now, God-willing, and thank Him that they received the faith through us.

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