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What Do We Celebrate on Reformation Day? · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Welcome back to the podcast. Tomorrow marks the five hundred and sixth celebration of
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  a Reformation Day, commemorating October thirty first, when Martin Luther fearlessly published his
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  ninety five Theses, mailed one copy to the archbishop, and then posted another
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  copy on a prominent church door for everyone to read. And whether it was
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  dramatically nailed to that door with a hammer or more likely glued to the door
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  with a pastebrush, Luther's document set in motion a wave of Reformation that we
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  honor half a millennium later. But given how much time has elapsed since this
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  event, we can find ourselves questioning what exactly we're celebrating each year. Is
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  it the profound recovery of the truth of justification by faith alone in Christ alone?
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  Is it the liberation of the Bible into the language of the people.
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  Is it the end of indulgences, the rejection of people authority, the dismantling
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  of the priest class as mediators between God and man? Or perhaps is it
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  all of these things all combined? Pastor John, is you honor the enduring
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  legacy of the Reformation? What's your primary cause for celebration? Let me fudge
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  on the word. Primarily, I'd like to replace it with five other words,
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  but I couldn't think of five other words. But I did think of
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  five other questions, I just couldn't think of words to go with them.
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  I thought of two, but I gave up on five words. So I'm
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  going to replace your question with five, but I will at the end,
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  I think, answer exactly what you're asking, all right, So here we
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  go. First, what am I celebrating ultimately? That is what's at the
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  top as the goal of all things when I celebrate the Reformation, And the
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  answer is the glory of Jesus Christ. In Calvin's response to the Roman Catholic
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  satelet, he said, you touch upon justification by faith, the first and
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  keenest subject of controversy between us. Wherever the knowledge of it is taken away,
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  the glory of Christ is extinguished. I think the same point could be
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  made on issue after issue in the disputes of the Reformation. So ultimately we
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  celebrate the exaltation of the glory of Christ. Second, what am I celebrating
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  most foundationally? So the first one was most ultimately. Second, most foundationally,
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  that is what's at the bottom, as the ground of all things when
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  I celebrate the Reformation, and the answer is the free and sovereign grace of
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  God. When Martin Luther came to the end of his life, he regarded
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  his book The Bondage of the Will as his most important work. And the
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  reason is because he regarded the issue of human autonomy versus sovereign grace as the
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  key underlying issue of the Reformation. He said, I condemn and reject as
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  nothing but error, all doctrines which exalt our free will, as being directly
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  opposed to this mediation and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. For since apart
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  from Christ, sin and death are our masters, and the devil is our
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  God and Prince, there can be no strength or power, no wit or
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  wisdom by which we can fit or fashion ourselves for righteousness and life. Which
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  means that as long as someone insists on ultimate human self determination, they fail
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  to grasp the depth of our need, and they obscure the greatness of the
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  free and sovereign grace of God, which alone can give life and faith.
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  So I'm going to celebrate that as bottom. That's the bottom, yes,
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  third, between the glory of Christ at the top and the free and sovereign
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  grace of God at the bottom. What am I celebrating in between as the
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  greatest achievement of God flowing from grace leading to glory and the answer is the
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  decisive achievement of the cross of Christ in providing peace with God for guilty sinners.
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  Four times four times in the Book of Hebrews, the author underlines and
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  emphasizes the work of Christ in the forgiveness of sins as once for all.
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  I love this phrase and the way he uses it Hebrews seven twenty seven,
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  nine to twelve, nine, twenty six, ten ten. He has this
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  is this is the first one seven twenty seven. He has no need.
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  Christ does, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for
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  his own sins, then for those of the people. Since He did this
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  once for all when he offered up himself. So I will be celebrating that
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  the finished and complete work of Christ in providing imputed punishment for our sins and
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  imputed perfection for our righteousness, was once for all and cannot be re enacted
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  in the Roman Catholic mass, so as to become a necessary point of transfer
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  of that decisive grace purchase once for all for us and given to us through
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  faith in Christ alone. Question between the glory of Christ at the top and
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  the free and sovereign grace of God at the bottom. What am I celebrating
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  in between as the decisive means of my enjoyment of peace with God that Christ
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  achieved answer? The inspired Word of God in scripture read and known by every
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  Christian. The Church of the Middle Ages cut people off from the Word of
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  God. They had done so intentionally. It was a capital crime in the
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  fourteen hundreds in Britain to translate the scriptures into English so people could read it.
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  They burned people alive for reading fragments of the English Bible, even children.
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  They believed that God did not offer his fellowship to be enjoyed through a
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  personal encounter with Him in his word, but rather through the ministry of priests
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  and sacraments. This was evil, and the chasm created between scripture and the
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  people of God has not been closed to this very day. I was mentioned
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  before my experience in Europe where a nun was converted at eighty years old and
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  had never read the Gospel of John's. A Roman Catholic professional religious woman never
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  had read the Gospel of John that is symptomatic of a deep evil in cutting
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  people off historically and today doing things that subtly discourage the personal encounter with God
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  through Christ in his Word. So I will be celebrating the personal preciousness and
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  access to the Word of God for my daily means of enjoying personal fellowship with
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  my Father in Heaven. And the last question, what great reformation truth will
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  I be celebrating concerning how I experience the living Christ through his word. Answer,
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  I will be celebrating the truth that Face acted directly on Christ through his
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  Word, not mediated by priestly sacraments, is the decisive primary way I enjoy
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  what Christ purchased and what the Word makes possible. So here's what I read
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  this morning, Tony and my devotions that made my heart sing. I was
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  reading in Ephesians three and that unspeakably great prayer where Paul says, I pray
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  according to the riches of His glory, that He may grant you to be
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  strengthened with power through His spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may
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  dwell in your hearts through faith. That's amazing, Yes, Christ dwells.
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  Now, this is a prayer for Christians. This is not a prayer for
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  conversion. We think, oh, that means Christ knocks on the door and
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  comes in. That's not He's in. He's in, and we are Christians.
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  He's praying for saints in emphasis that Christ would dwell that is consciously alive,
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  present at home, experienced how through faith, so that Christ may dwell
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  in your heart through faith. He's praying for Christians who already have Christ.
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  This is a prayer for real, authentic experience of the living Christ. So
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  when I embrace the crucified and risen Christ as my supreme treasure, alive present
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  at home in me, that very faith, that embrace, that faith is
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  the sufficient instrument for the enjoyment of His fellowship. That will be my primary
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  daily celebration. Yeah. Amen, opening a Bible in our native language,
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  reading and studying it, and encountering the real, authentic experience of the living
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  Christ. It's the best way to honor such a day. Thank you,
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  Pastor John, and thanks for joining us today. If you want to ask
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  Pastor John, type out your question as briefly as possible and email it to
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  me at ask Pastor John at desiring good dot org. Selfishness It's the antithesis
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  of Christ and the antithesis of the Holy Christian life. Yet despite its defiance
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  against the faith, selfish tendencies persist inside of us, leading one seventeen year
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  old to earnestly seek guidance on how to cultivate selflessness. That's up next time
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  on Thursday. I'm your host, Tony Raiki. See then.