Historical Background: The Lutheran Church, the oldest and largest “Protestant” church in the world, came into existence through the Reformation in the 16th century A.D. However, Lutherans believe and maintain that the teachings of the Lutheran Church give it continuity right back to the apostles and the Lord Jesus Himself.
The Christian Church has had many ups and downs throughout its history. There have been times of rapid growth, and times of numerical decline. There have been times when obviously the Holy Spirit was powerfully at work in the hearts and lives of people, and other times when the Church seemed completely stagnant. There have been times of peace and quietness, and also times of persecution, when powerful enemies of the Church have hounded Christians, put them in prison, tortured or killed them because they confessed Jesus Christ as their only Lord. However, far from destroying the Church, persecution often strengthened the commitment of those who were Christians.
Again and again the Church has experienced division. A notable example was the major split in 1054 AD when Christians were divided into the Roman Catholic Church (in the west) and the Eastern Orthodox Church (in the east). Every generation of Christians has had to cope with false teachers in the church and with arguments about the interpretation of the Bible.
So, the history of the Christian Church has been a story of human weakness and sin, but at the same time it is the story of God’s grace and faithfulness. The Lord has marvelously fulfilled his promise that not even ‘the gates of hell’ would overcome His Church (Matthew 16:18); He has revived His Church when it seemed lifeless, and reformed it when it became corrupt.
Martin Luther: Martin Luther was one person through whom God reformed the Church. When Luther was born in Germany in 1483, the Roman Catholic Church was in bad shape. For years it had been plagued by corrupt and inept leaders – priests, bishops, even popes. There was much religious ignorance and superstition. Few church-members knew much about the Bible (the Bible was only read and mass only said in Latin which the common people did not know); pronouncements by the Church and its leaders were held up before the people as the supreme authority. The Gospel of God’s forgiveness as a free gift, which is ours only through faith in Jesus, was largely forgotten and seldom proclaimed. Instead, people were encouraged to rely on their own good works and religious performances to get right with God.
Luther, too, was brought up to think of God as an angry judge who was waiting to punish him for his sins. As a spiritually earnest young man, Luther decided to become a monk; he believed that, if he led a good religious life, he would make himself acceptable to God. But he found no peace; his sins continued to torment him constantly.
Good News For Luther: The Church soon ordained Luther as a priest, and later made him a Doctor of Theology. While studying and lecturing on the Bible (especially the Epistle to the Romans), Luther came to realize that a good standing before God does not depend on our own efforts, but is due entirely to God’s mercy shown to us through Jesus. We are saved not by works, but by grace alone, through faith in Jesus Christ. Luther had discovered (through the work of the Holy Spirit) the good news that God is for us for Jesus’ sake.
Luther did not set out to split or undermine the church, but he could not keep quiet about the things he had learned from the Bible. On October 31, 1517, he posted on the door of the castle church at Wittenberg 95 Theses (statements for debate), questioning some church teachings and practices – especially the selling of ‘indulgences’ as payment for sins. The common people welcomed the Theses so enthusiastically that the church leaders felt compelled to take action, lest their authority be undermined. Luther was accused of heresy (false teaching), and summoned before various gatherings of leaders of the church. When Luther resisted the papal threats, and kept on questioning teachings and practices which were against God’s Word, the pope responded by excommunicating him in early 1521.
Later that year, Emperor Charles V, pressed to match church action with a political ban, summoned Luther to Worms to answer the charge of false teaching. Luther refused to take back what he had written unless he could be shown from the Bible that he was wrong; the Holy Scriptures, he maintained, are our supreme authority.
Duly placed under the Emperor’s ban, Luther was in danger of being killed as an outlaw, but friends ‘kidnapped’ him and took him into hiding in the Wartburg castle. He spent some of his time of seclusion translating the Bible into German so that ordinary people could (for the first time) read God’s Word for themselves. Eventually, Luther felt compelled to come out of hiding and to resume his public preaching in order to restrain some of the radical reformers who wanted to sweep away almost anything connected with Roman Catholicism. Luther did not want to remove all of the traditions of the church, only those that conflicted with the Bible.
Luther broke with a church tradition when he married a former nun, Katharina von Bora. Six children were born to them, and their home was noted for its generous hospitality. Luther’s writings stressed the importance of family life, especially the role of fathers in the Christian education of their children.
The Lutheran Church: In 1530, the ‘Lutherans’ (as Luther’s followers had been nicknamed) prepared a statement of their teachings for presentation to a meeting of leaders of church and state at Augsburg. This statement – now known as the Augsburg Confession – became the first official ‘confession’ or doctrinal statement of the Lutheran Church. Fifty years later, all the confessions of the Lutheran Church were published in the Book of Concord. These are: the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, the Augsburg Confession, the Apology (Defense) of the Augsburg Confession, the Smalcald Articles, Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope, the Small Catechism, the Large Catechism, and the Formula of Concord (Epitome and Solid Declaration). Centuries later, faithful (confessional) Lutherans still hold to these teachings as an accurate confession of what the Bible teaches.
By the time Luther died in 1546, the Lutheran Reformation had spread through much of Europe, especially the Scandinavian and Baltic countries, as well as Germany. Political events prevented the Lutheran Church from establishing itself in the British Isles, but Luther’s teachings greatly influenced the Protestant Reformation in both England and Scotland.
Lutheran missionaries have taken the Gospel of Christ to most countries of the world. The Lutheran Church was brought to other countries such as: the USA, Brazil, Canada, and Australia by immigrants from Europe, some of whom left their homeland seeking freedom of worship. The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod was formed in the United States in 1847 and is the second largest Lutheran Church body in the United States.