“What we can do in the classroom is, roughly what Fish says we can (and should) attempt; impart knowledge and develop skills needed to analyze ideas. We can give training in critical reflection about how different individuals and traditions have proposed that we should live. We can, on our good days or good semesters, produce students who think more clearly, critically, and reflectively about such questions. And, if we’ve really done well, we may even produce students who realize that critical thought is by no means the whole of moral life. It is what can be done in the classroom, what a college professor might be trained to do if he attempts not to save the world but to do his job. . . . .
“Moments of grace, divine dispensations, cannot be programmed or delivered according to any method within our control. The result of what we do in the classroom, whether we produce students who are creative or virtuous, is, as Fish says several times, a wholly contingent matter.
“It ought to be Christians–and, probably, religious believers of other stripes–who know this. We know that we cannot program grace and that a moment of felicity will be required if what we do in the classroom turns out to shape the character of our students in desirable ways. So we should sharpen the intellect as best we can; we should pursue truth in matters we teach; we should transmit knowledge and the skills required to gain and extend that knowledge–but we should not try to produce or control what must be contingent and felicitous.”
*First Things (November, 2008), 35, 36.
How long can you maintain the fervor of newly discovered faith? How long did it take Israel before the excitement of arriving in Canaan deteriorated into doing what the Canaanites did? Or the Christians in Corinth or Rome? Enthusiasm for the faith once for all delivered to the saints has never been without its challenges.
Reformations have occurred with some regularity. In the days of the Judges God sent his servants to provide rest for a repentant people and King Josiah renewed temple worship in ancient Israel, only years before the exile. Reforms emerged in 10th century Cluny and later in 16th century Western Europe. These were followed by the Second Reformation of the 17th century and beyond, and the reforming “schisms” of the 19th and 20th centuries. Reformation is what the church does when it acknowledges it has followed other than the “old, old story.”
How long do the effects of any reformation last? Josiah’s reformation was doomed to failure because of Manasseh who came before him (2 Kings 23:25-26). Several small, Reformed Churches still drink at the well of the Second Reformation. But what of the larger, Presbyterian and Reformed, churches? So much has changed since the 16th century Reformation. Few today would despise Roman Catholics; that would be too insensitive. Doctrinal disputes about the nature of justification, election and reprobation not only diminish the participants, but overlook the problem with truth. How do we today know they were right then? Then there is the increasing ennui with our 16th and 17th century confessions. Some are suggesting they were useful for their time, not so much for us today.
What has changed enormously compared to the time of the Reformation is the culture in which the contemporary church finds itself. The 16th century Reformation occurred in a Christian Church and state culture. The magistrate was encouraged to promote Christianity and not other religions. Reasons for reformation then emerged from concerns about the free communication of God’s grace in preaching and sacraments, abuse of episcopal office and the role of the laity in a worship held in Latin, to name but a few. Those raising the questions were not interested in leaving the church, but in reforming it. Yet some were excommunicated for their efforts, and others followed them. Thus were born the churches of the Reformation.
Some of these churches have almost five hundred years of historical experience, many with a number of their own reformations. These churches themselves have changed since the Reformation and continue to change. But are there any similarities between us and the time of the Reformation?
Replacing the Roman Catholic altar with a pulpit for proclaiming the Word characterized Reformation era churches. What do we do with pulpits today? What do they mean today? Do they communicate the same emphasis on the proclamation of the Word and the subordination of the sacraments to the Word? Reformation arguments against indulgences, payments to reduce time in purgatory, were part of the promotion of the free gift of grace and life eternal, and liberated many from false and abusive church practices. Today many pulpits (and platforms) proclaim the clear gospel of health and wealth to reduce earthly debt and suffering (and please send in a donation). Reformation believers knew that this world was filled with devils, and we may even sing that part of Luther’s famous hymn this week. But in an age of electricity, genetic engineering, and telescopes peering into the universe’s past, belief in the existence of angels and demons is deemed quaint. Who or what are the participants in the contemporary religious struggles?
When we think about the 16th century Reformation this week, what will we remember? Do the burning issues of that time remain important today? How are grace preached and sacraments administered? How is ecclesiastical office exercised and justification is experienced?. And what about the fact we no longer live in a Christian, but decidedly pluralist, culture in which Christianity is no longer the privileged religion, but others are? What might lead us to work for a much needed reformation in our time? Is our piety too worldly or self-indulgent? Is our worship more about us than about God? Do we, or should we, worry about our eternal destiny?
Whatever may be the case for reformation today, Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress is our God” continues to be relevant. It gets at the essentials: God and his victory over sin and evil, our own inability to improve our spiritual condition and total dependence on Christ, trust in God and his victory over all that seeks to undo the church (them devils); and the gift of the Spirit. Especially challenging for every age are these words: “Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also, the body they may kill; God’s truth abideth still; his kingdom is forever.”
ACL
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