Its amazing how many truths Martin Luther struggled over and it even kept the Reformation from uniting into one church. Martin Luther continued to hold to many beliefs he got as a priest including Transubstantiation, that the bread and the wine used in the sacrament of the Eucharist become, not merely as by a sign or a figure, but also in actual reality the body and blood of Christ. The leading Protestant reformers Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingli clashed over this at meeting with many leaders of the reformers in Germany in order to develop a unified Protestant theology. Luther actually because of the differences refused initially to acknowledge Zwingli and his followers as Christians, imagine that.
The two prominent reformers, Luther and Zwingli, found a consensus on fourteen points, but they kept differing on the last one pertaining to the Eucharist. On this issue they parted without having reached an agreement.
Then look at this from the lesson this week:
Ellen G. White, The Story of Redemption, pp. 353,354. Chapter 49—Failure to Advance
The Reformation did not, as many suppose, end with Luther. It is to be continued to the close of this world’s history. Luther had a great work to do in reflecting to others the light which God had permitted to shine upon him; yet he did not receive all the light which was to be given to the world. From that time to this, new light has been continually shining upon the Scriptures, and new truths have been constantly unfolding.
Luther and his co-laborers accomplished a noble work for God; but, coming as they did from the Roman Church, having themselves believed and advocated her doctrines, it was not to be expected that they would discern all these errors. It was their work to break the fetters of Rome and to give the Bible to the world; yet there were important truths which they failed to discover, and grave errors which they did not renounce. Most of them continued to observe the Sunday with other papal festivals. They did not, indeed, regard it as possessing divine authority, but believed that it should be observed as a generally accepted day of worship. There were some among them, however, who honored the Sabbath of the fourth commandment. Among the reformers of the church an honorable place should be given to those who stood in vindication of a truth generally ignored, Reformation swept back the darkness that had rested down on all Christendom, Sabbathkeepers were brought to light in many lands.
Those who received the great blessings of the Reformation did not go forward in the path so nobly entered upon by Luther. A few faithful men arose from time to time to proclaim new truth and expose long-cherished error, but the majority, like the Jews in Christ’s day, or the papists in the time of Luther, were content to believe as their fathers believed, and to live as they lived. Therefore religion again degenerated into formalism; and errors and superstitions which would have been cast aside had the church continued to walk in the light of God’s Word, were retained and cherished. Thus the spirit inspired by the Reformation gradually died out, until there was almost as great need of reform in the Protestant churches as in the Roman Church in the time of Luther. There was the same spiritual stupor, the same respect for the opinions of men, the same spirit of worldliness, the same substitution of human theories for the teachings of God’s Word. Pride and extravagance were fostered under the guise of religion. The churches became corrupted by allying themselves with the world. Thus were degraded the great principles for which Luther and his fellow laborers had done and suffered so much.
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Topic: Why the Protestant Reformation did not unite. (Read 12591 times)
