Reforming the Church

Reforming the Church

On October 31, 1517 — often called Reformation Day — Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the church door at Wittenberg. But the theological core of the Reformation preceded the theses by weeks: Luther had read Romans 1:17 and the phrase 'righteousness of God' had transformed in his understanding. He had always feared the righteousness of God as His punishing demand. Then he saw that 'the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel' was not a threat but a gift — the righteousness that God gives, not demands. 'I felt myself to be reborn,' he wrote, 'and to have gone through open doors into paradise.' The Reformation began in a monk's heart before it appeared on a church door.

Romans 1:17 quotes Habakkuk 2:4: 'the righteous will live by faith.' This was Paul's summary of the gospel and Luther's rediscovery: the sinner is made righteous by faith in Christ, not by human achievement. The repetition — 'from first to last' (literally, 'from faith to faith') — suggests that faith is not only the entry point but the entire walk. We begin by faith and continue by faith. There is no level of Christian maturity where we graduate from dependence on grace to self-sufficiency. The righteous person — the one right with God — lives by faith from first to last. Every moment, every day, every year: by faith.