What if Luther had Compromised
John MacArthur has some wonderful thoughts on Luther and compromise and its application for today’s church.
It is interesting to speculate what the church would be like today if Martin Luther had been
prone to compromise. The pressure was heavy on him to tone down his teaching, soften his message, stop poking his finger in the eye of the papacy. Even many of his friends and supporters urged Luther to come to terms with Rome for the sake of harmony in the church. Luther himself prayed earnestly that the effect of his teaching would not be divisive.
When he nailed his 95 Theses to the door, the last thing he wanted to do was split the church.
Yet sometimes division is fitting, even healthy, for the church. Especially in times like Luther’s—and like ours—when the visible church seems full of counterfeit Christians, it is right for the true people of God to declare themselves. Compromise is sometimes a worse evil than division. Second Corinthians 6:14-17 isn’t speaking only of marriage when it says,
Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, “I will dwell in them and walk among them; And I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,” says the Lord.
Sometimes we lose sight of the cost of not being faithful in all areas and with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. It is easy to think that we are saved and we are okay, the details are not that important. Maybe we see others who claim to be Christians and are tempted to think they are so much happier and better off because they are not so concerned with being abandoned to God. Imagine what the condition of the church could be like if Luther had shared such logic. We are to live for the Kingdom of God, not ourselves. This means that we should not be content with compromise because even if it has no realized effect upon us it may cost those around us or generations to come.
Soli Deo Gloria!
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July 30th, 2008 at 10:56 am
Luther DID compromise, quite a bit
He kept many of the Catholic traditions and worship methodology alive, despite the fact that there is no biblical evidence for any of it. The problem with MacArthur’s speculation is that he doesn’t seem to be very willing to define the baseline from which one shouldn’t compromise. Prooftexting really means nothing without a greater context in which we can place the Church..the Body of Christ.
July 31st, 2008 at 10:57 am
Virgil,
Good to have you comment again, but why do you only comment to rip the reformers? How about a little positive feed back once in awhile
I will concede that Luther did not bring the church as far from Catholic traditions as he should have. However, he never went against his conscience (what he was convinced of by Scriptures) in matters of truth and of the church and this is important. If ever convinced by Scripture of a truth he embraced it and put it into practice. Compromise is when we know what is right and what is required and cut corners or do not fully obey what we know to be right. Therefore, I would argue it was not compromise on Luther’s part but a failure to come to full understanding on all issues. On this I believe we have to cut him some slack because of how far away from truth the church was at that point and how much he brought it back. All evangelicals ought to be able to respect and appreciate Luther on this point. We all owe him gratitude for moving the church away from Rome.
I would also comment that your criticism of Luther and MacArthur further proves what the bottom of my post states. Although I would not call it compromise, Luther’s failures continue to negatively impact those that follow him. While he made great progress, some of his followers drifted back closer to Catholicism than he was because of his errors. Our theology and practice impacts the world in which we live and generations to come.
July 31st, 2008 at 12:56 pm
I absolutely appreciate Luther’s efforts; I loved the movie too…I think I took the family to see it twice. As far as “ripping on reformers,” I mostly comment on those issues because of doctrinal reasons, not any other negative reason in particular.
I guess with me the issue goes deeper: an adherence to “reformed theology” is as static in nature in my mind as Catholic theology. At the same time, something I have noticed in the western world is the theologians’ willingness to ignore virtually half of the contemporary Christendom, namely the Eastern Orthodox Church. In all my years in this country, I have not heard a single evangelical pastor or author make a single reference to eastern orthodoxy, cite or read theologians like Tim Ware or Chryssavgis. We could all do better in considering other opinions from the rest of the Church.
So there is a combination of factors which prompt me to answer to some of your posts, not a desire to be negative.