1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,439 And Abelard said, this Christ is victim stuff that Anselm was talking about, I find repugnant. 2 00:00:07,040 --> 00:00:13,613 The idea that you've got to somehow pay off God or pay a price, I don't like that very 3 00:00:13,613 --> 00:00:17,684 much. And I don't like that picture of Jesus. What he liked a lot better was what he called 4 00:00:17,684 --> 00:00:30,263 the moral theory of the atonement. And it's a guy named Peter Abelard. I think I've got 5 00:00:30,263 --> 00:00:35,402 it spelled right. Somehow I get the idea there's two A's there but I could be wrong on that. 6 00:00:36,369 --> 00:00:42,275 Just one? Okay. Sometimes, yeah, sometimes these words get spelled differently by different 7 00:00:42,275 --> 00:00:48,214 people. But Peter of Abelard, Abelard came up with this kind of moral atonement theory. 8 00:00:49,282 --> 00:00:53,353 And what Abelard was saying is the best way to think about what Jesus is doing is he's 9 00:00:53,353 --> 00:00:59,259 showing us how we're supposed to live, setting us an example. And so the moral theory is 10 00:00:59,259 --> 00:01:04,731 the kind of example theory. So what Jesus is doing on the cross is He's showing the 11 00:01:04,864 --> 00:01:11,771 idea of giving of yourself, humility, being humble, trusting God, the absolute faith. 12 00:01:12,138 --> 00:01:16,609 That's what it's about. And so the way of salvation is when we do those sorts of things 13 00:01:16,609 --> 00:01:21,781 in our life. And so when we learn to be humble, when we learn to give of ourselves, when we 14 00:01:21,781 --> 00:01:26,986 learn to trust God perfectly, that's when salvation happens for us. Now, does that sound 15 00:01:26,986 --> 00:01:34,727 pretty attractive? It shouldn't. This theory, in fact, we would reject. We would say, Christus 16 00:01:34,727 --> 00:01:39,732 victor, Christus, victim, both work, both scriptural. But we would argue that the moral 17 00:01:39,732 --> 00:01:46,106 theory, while it has some elements of truth to it, at heart is dead wrong. Now, the element 18 00:01:46,106 --> 00:01:53,613 of truth is the fact that Jesus does say, follow me and be like me. So is Jesus our 19 00:01:53,613 --> 00:02:02,055 example? Sure He is. Jesus as example. There's no problem with that. He is example for us. 20 00:02:02,055 --> 00:02:09,429 But that does not equal salvation. See, the big problem for Abelard is he made the mistake 21 00:02:09,429 --> 00:02:15,034 that gets made again and again and again by people. He does not distinguish between the 22 00:02:15,735 --> 00:02:22,976 vertical and the horizontal. Jesus gives us an example to follow in the horizontal realm 23 00:02:24,043 --> 00:02:29,883 of how to live faithfully and humbly. But our living here does not mean I have salvation 24 00:02:29,883 --> 00:02:36,589 here. Abelard saw it as all one piece. That's the mistake he makes. Now, the mistake that 25 00:02:36,589 --> 00:02:41,995 we tend to make as Lutherans is we say, no, Jesus is the victor. Jesus is the victim who 26 00:02:41,995 --> 00:02:47,600 gives us everything. Moral, absolutely not. That's ruled out. No way for that. Is Jesus 27 00:02:47,600 --> 00:02:53,473 my example? No. Quit talking that way. He's your savior, not your example. And we get 28 00:02:53,473 --> 00:02:58,845 that kind of overemphasis and we end up missing the fact that he does give us an example of 29 00:02:58,845 --> 00:03:02,916 how to live. And he does teach us how we're supposed to live. In fact, in the Middle Ages 30 00:03:02,916 --> 00:03:08,855 there's another guy named Thomas à Kempis who wrote a book called the Imitatio Christi, 31 00:03:10,323 --> 00:03:16,796 which is just what it looks like, the imitation of Christ. And à Kempis said the life of a 32 00:03:16,796 --> 00:03:22,869 Christian should be imitating Jesus, following him. And Lutherans often in our history have 33 00:03:22,869 --> 00:03:28,308 resisted this and said, that's not right. We don't imitate Christ. We should just do 34 00:03:29,075 --> 00:03:33,046 faith, just believe in him. That's all we're supposed to do. Quite honestly, that's not 35 00:03:33,046 --> 00:03:37,350 what the Bible says. The Bible says in your life you should be emulating what Christ has 36 00:03:37,350 --> 00:03:42,155 done. The Imitatio Christi is a good thing. It has a place in the Lutheran Church. It 37 00:03:42,155 --> 00:03:47,760 does not bring you salvation. It does not earn God's favor or blessings. But it is exactly 38 00:03:47,760 --> 00:03:49,896 the description of how the Christian life should look. 39 00:03:50,697 --> 00:03:53,967 It's like Paul says, when you're in Christ you can't be in the flesh. 40 00:03:55,068 --> 00:04:00,506 Yeah. I mean, when you're doing things God's way, they're going to look like God's. And 41 00:04:01,307 --> 00:04:05,144 it's kind of really very simple. You're not going to do it in the flesh. I think of it 42 00:04:05,144 --> 00:04:09,582 this way. If I'm doing things the way God wants me to do and accomplishing his will, 43 00:04:09,816 --> 00:04:16,656 that means I'm doing basically conformity to the law. Well, who did that the best? 44 00:04:17,757 --> 00:04:24,063 Yeah. Jesus did. Jesus lived his life in full conformity with the Father's will. He kept 45 00:04:24,063 --> 00:04:31,104 the law. He lived it. Completely. That's what he did. And so, if I'm looking for an example 46 00:04:31,104 --> 00:04:38,044 of how I'm supposed to live and finding encouragement or direction or leading me along, well, where 47 00:04:38,044 --> 00:04:43,449 better to look than at Christ? But incidentally, when I look at Christ for my example, am I 48 00:04:43,616 --> 00:04:49,789 zeroing in on the divinity of Jesus or the humanity of Jesus? Exactly. I'm paying attention 49 00:04:49,789 --> 00:04:54,794 to Christ and His humanity. The divinity is of no interest to me, to be honest. I can't 50 00:04:54,794 --> 00:05:01,634 touch that. I'm not God. I'm not called to be God. I'm called to be fully human. Complete 51 00:05:01,634 --> 00:05:07,340 in my humanity. And who's the best example of full humanity? Jesus. The full human who 52 00:05:07,340 --> 00:05:11,244 lived the perfect human life, who did things God's way. And so, if I want to see what a 53 00:05:11,244 --> 00:05:16,582 real, complete human life looks like, I consider Jesus. And he does become my example. And 54 00:05:16,582 --> 00:05:24,791 I do emulate what he's done. And I follow him. So, it turns out that the WWJD people 55 00:05:24,791 --> 00:05:30,963 aren't so kooky as we thought. And I know it's popular in some of our circles to kind 56 00:05:30,963 --> 00:05:36,069 of make fun of WWJD and kind of run it down. But there's a place for this. There's a place 57 00:05:36,069 --> 00:05:39,806 for asking the question, what does Jesus, as the perfect human following the Father, 58 00:05:39,806 --> 00:05:47,513 do? And what should I do as one who tries to follow Christ? Now, WWJD also has its limits 59 00:05:47,513 --> 00:05:53,619 because just because Jesus did something doesn't mean you should do it. Because his calling 60 00:05:53,619 --> 00:05:58,591 or his vocation is different than yours. Jesus was called to be Messiah. None of you have 61 00:05:58,591 --> 00:06:04,330 that call. I'm quite confident of that. You have other callings. And so, you need to say, 62 00:06:04,330 --> 00:06:09,836 within my calling, within my vocation, how do I follow Christ? How do I emulate him? 63 00:06:10,002 --> 00:06:13,473 How do I do things the way he would do them? But it's a fair question to ask. How would 64 00:06:13,473 --> 00:06:18,611 Jesus approach the situation? You know, a classic example is Jesus hung out with prostitutes. 65 00:06:18,911 --> 00:06:22,515 And my experience is most of us probably don't have much business hanging out with prostitutes. 66 00:06:23,182 --> 00:06:27,453 Okay? Do we need to bring God's gospel to people who are downtrodden? Sure. But do 67 00:06:27,453 --> 00:06:33,559 we make a habit of doing everything the way Jesus did it? Not necessarily. Okay? All right. 68 00:06:33,559 --> 00:06:39,465 So, Christ as example, not the way Abelard talks about it. And Abelard, by and large, 69 00:06:39,832 --> 00:06:46,472 should be kind of looked at as bad guy. Not one of the good guys. Okay? Okay. Abelard 70 00:06:46,472 --> 00:06:48,374 had his other problems anyway. Go ahead. 71 00:06:49,609 --> 00:06:53,246 The, um, I'm going to mispronounce it. Imitatio Christi. 72 00:06:53,479 --> 00:06:55,214 Imitatio Christi. All right. 73 00:06:55,548 --> 00:06:57,650 That came out of Abelard's? 74 00:06:57,650 --> 00:06:59,285 No, this is part is à Kempis. 75 00:07:00,586 --> 00:07:06,192 Did he influence, like, did the moral theory influence that habit? Or was that way before? 76 00:07:06,492 --> 00:07:09,695 That's always around. That's kind of a separate thing going on. I'm just pointing out the 77 00:07:09,695 --> 00:07:13,466 fact that Christ as example is not a problem. But it is a problem if you try to make it 78 00:07:13,466 --> 00:07:19,505 salvific. That's the concern here. All right? Now, of these, one we're probably the most 79 00:07:19,505 --> 00:07:23,509 comfortable with, most familiar with is Christ as victim. We tend to think about that quite 80 00:07:23,509 --> 00:07:27,914 a bit. Pretty comfortable with that. But Christ as victor certainly also has its place. 81 00:07:29,282 --> 00:07:32,485 All right? Good. Other questions? 82 00:07:38,324 --> 00:07:39,725 All right. 83 00:07:41,794 --> 00:07:48,668 Good. Now, while we've got a minute here, let's talk just a little bit more about Abelard 84 00:07:48,668 --> 00:07:55,708 and about this whole problem of confusing the two ways, the two kinds of righteousness 85 00:07:55,708 --> 00:08:00,847 or the two realms, the vertical and the horizontal. Let's think about this a little more. One 86 00:08:00,847 --> 00:08:04,951 of the problems that was going on and Abelard represents this and it helps kind of just 87 00:08:04,951 --> 00:08:09,455 think about classic Roman Catholic theology, how things function and sort of what was going 88 00:08:09,455 --> 00:08:12,325 on in the Reformation. And I've got just enough time here, I think, to lay this thing out. 89 00:08:13,059 --> 00:08:17,463 Classic Roman Catholic theology with the kind that was being taught in Luther's day and 90 00:08:17,463 --> 00:08:23,436 the kind that, quite honestly, still exists and thrives all over the world, even in America, 91 00:08:23,436 --> 00:08:33,713 works something like this. The concept is that salvation is all about my climbing to 92 00:08:33,713 --> 00:08:40,720 God, what I accomplish. And so in classic Catholic theology, I am put on the staircase 93 00:08:40,720 --> 00:08:52,198 of salvation and of justification by the grace of God. And my task then is to climb and work 94 00:08:52,198 --> 00:08:57,837 my way to God. And do Catholics, we talked about this yesterday, do they depend on grace? 95 00:08:59,405 --> 00:09:04,810 Absolutely. Because I cannot even make a step, I can't climb without the grace of God to 96 00:09:04,810 --> 00:09:11,651 enable me to climb. And they work out all kinds of things within this system. So, for 97 00:09:11,651 --> 00:09:17,790 example, when I am born, I am an enemy of God. By grace, baptism comes and baptism basically 98 00:09:17,790 --> 00:09:23,763 puts me on the staircase, which is the life within the church. Because salvation doesn't 99 00:09:23,763 --> 00:09:28,834 happen apart from the church, all tied in together. So now I am part of the church and 100 00:09:28,834 --> 00:09:37,043 now I get to start making my way to God, climbing my way up. How do I do that? Yeah, good works. 101 00:09:37,510 --> 00:09:45,117 I go to mass. I go to confession. And I do the things that I am told to do. I give my 102 00:09:45,117 --> 00:09:49,255 tithes and my offerings. I do whatever I am supposed to do and I keep on working my way. 103 00:09:49,522 --> 00:09:56,329 And I get better and better. And it works out quite nicely. I am climbing my way. And 104 00:09:56,329 --> 00:10:01,167 if I make a mistake and I really blow it and I fall into some horrendous sin, no problem. 105 00:10:01,567 --> 00:10:07,306 We've got an answer for that too. You just go to confession and you do your penance and 106 00:10:07,306 --> 00:10:10,676 you take care of it. Everything is okay. You are back on track. You keep working at it. 107 00:10:10,676 --> 00:10:17,583 Everything is fine. And so that was the system that was essentially operating. So my performance 108 00:10:17,583 --> 00:10:24,457 would eventually earn me God's favor. Now, problems come though. What happens if I am 109 00:10:24,457 --> 00:10:29,996 working my way into God's favor and I am really climbing very well, but I am not quite done, 110 00:10:29,996 --> 00:10:34,367 but I die? Well, that's what we talked about that as well. That's where you have purgatory 111 00:10:34,367 --> 00:10:42,108 fits in. Okay? Purgatory is not the same as limbo. And people get this mixed up all 112 00:10:42,108 --> 00:10:50,049 the time. Purgatory is a place where I go and I am purged of my sin, cleaned up. And 113 00:10:50,049 --> 00:10:57,156 purgatory is not a fun place. Purgatory is essentially hell with a time limit. So when 114 00:10:57,156 --> 00:11:04,363 the souls go to purgatory, they endure suffering because you've got to pay for your sins. And 115 00:11:04,363 --> 00:11:10,102 so purgatory is a little hell and a little fires and pain and suffering, but it has a 116 00:11:10,102 --> 00:11:15,207 time limit, mercifully, so that when I am done with my time in purgatory, then I can 117 00:11:15,207 --> 00:11:21,647 get into God's presence. Now, the system is not done yet. It gets even better because 118 00:11:21,647 --> 00:11:27,586 there are some people who make the climb and they get there. They don't have to go to purgatory. 119 00:11:28,087 --> 00:11:32,692 There is no time spent. They have arrived at the level of perfection they need and they 120 00:11:32,692 --> 00:11:36,996 get to dodge purgatory entirely and just go right out into God's presence. Cool for 121 00:11:36,996 --> 00:11:45,371 them. In fact, there are a few saints, a handful, who are so perfect and so good in their climb 122 00:11:45,371 --> 00:11:51,010 that when they get to heaven, they actually have more merit than they need. They've got 123 00:11:51,010 --> 00:11:55,715 a surplus. They don't, they're not even in a deficit situation. They've got more merit 124 00:11:55,715 --> 00:12:00,586 than they need. So what happens then is over here somewhere, you have this treasury of 125 00:12:00,586 --> 00:12:08,994 merits or a merit bank. And if I get to, I arrive at the gates of heaven and I've got 126 00:12:08,994 --> 00:12:13,866 more than I need, well, I just make a nice deposit into the merit bank. Cha-ching. It 127 00:12:13,866 --> 00:12:19,271 works out really nicely. If I'm still in this life climbing, what do I need to get me along 128 00:12:19,271 --> 00:12:23,409 the way? Well, I need grace. I need to delve into this merit bank. In fact, I can try to 129 00:12:23,409 --> 00:12:28,714 make withdrawals from this merit bank to enable me to get along the way. Now you see where 130 00:12:28,714 --> 00:12:34,053 the doctrine of the saints fits in. I pray to the saints because those saints are the 131 00:12:34,053 --> 00:12:39,391 very ones who had achieved more merit than they need and if I ask them right and nicely, 132 00:12:39,391 --> 00:12:43,829 I can maybe shake loose some of the merit they earned and it'll get credited to my account. 133 00:12:44,330 --> 00:12:49,168 So it's like this huge, beautiful bank ledger. And so Peter over here has got more merit 134 00:12:49,168 --> 00:12:52,972 than he needs. This saint prayed really well. He climbed the stairs the way he was supposed 135 00:12:52,972 --> 00:12:57,743 to. He went to the shrine and he prayed in front of the relic. Bingo. We'll give him 136 00:12:57,743 --> 00:13:03,149 some merit. And so he gets merit credited to him. But he's also earned it because of 137 00:13:03,149 --> 00:13:07,787 his good actions. He deserves it. He's got it coming to him and he makes his way. And 138 00:13:07,787 --> 00:13:12,758 this also explains why you have the prayers for the dead. They're up there in purgatory. 139 00:13:13,125 --> 00:13:19,331 Oh, man. Is that a nasty place? And they're experiencing really terrible situations and 140 00:13:19,331 --> 00:13:25,771 a lot of suffering. So what do we do here? Well, I can pray for those souls and by praying 141 00:13:25,771 --> 00:13:31,377 for those souls, I can shake some merit loose on their behalf. And besides, I get some merit 142 00:13:31,377 --> 00:13:36,282 too because I prayed. So everybody wins. It's kind of a nice deal. But they get their time 143 00:13:36,282 --> 00:13:40,252 cut short in purgatory and they get quicker to God's presence and their suffering ends. 144 00:13:40,753 --> 00:13:49,328 This was the beautiful, elaborate system worked out in Luther's day. It works great. And limbo, 145 00:13:49,728 --> 00:13:54,200 like I mentioned that, they also had this teaching of limbo. Limbo is not purgatory. 146 00:13:54,200 --> 00:13:58,270 Limbo is the place where you send people who are really good but they're not Christian. 147 00:13:58,737 --> 00:14:02,908 What are you going to do with them? Like Aristotle or Plato. Okay? Don't want to send them to 148 00:14:02,908 --> 00:14:06,612 hell because they're actually very helpful. They wrote most of our theology for us. So 149 00:14:06,612 --> 00:14:09,481 we can't send them to hell. But well, you can't let them go to heaven either because 150 00:14:09,481 --> 00:14:13,285 they're not Christian. And what about babies who died before baptism? We don't know what 151 00:14:13,285 --> 00:14:18,424 happens to them either. We'll put them in limbo too. And so limbo is forever a place 152 00:14:18,424 --> 00:14:23,562 somewhere between heaven and somewhere between hell. It's not suffering. Purgatory, this 153 00:14:23,562 --> 00:14:29,869 is bad. You suffer in purgatory. But limbo is just kind of neutral. Not great, not bad, 154 00:14:29,969 --> 00:14:33,606 just kind of in between. And you put people there who you don't know what else to do with. 155 00:14:33,806 --> 00:14:38,611 Wouldn't it be better not to be a Christian then? You better be in limbo than you'd be 156 00:14:38,611 --> 00:14:41,947 in purgatory. No, no, no, no, no. Because purgatory is short. You just do your time. 157 00:14:41,947 --> 00:14:44,850 Oh, it's on your way. Yeah, you're on your way. The ultimate thing is going to be okay. 158 00:14:45,050 --> 00:14:48,988 You'll get there. It's just how long do you need to spend in purgatory. And the times 159 00:14:48,988 --> 00:14:53,025 of purgatory is racked right up. I mean we're not talking years or tens of years. We're 160 00:14:53,025 --> 00:14:59,265 talking thousands of years. It got pretty intense. And so this was the system. And in 161 00:14:59,265 --> 00:15:03,535 Luther's day it was just a really nice system worked out in the Middle Ages. It had developed 162 00:15:03,535 --> 00:15:08,007 pretty thoroughly. And if you really want to make sure you're getting in progress, well 163 00:15:08,007 --> 00:15:12,011 you've got to do the right thing. And one of the best things you can do is quit your 164 00:15:12,011 --> 00:15:16,916 life and go be a monk. Because now you're really on the fast track. Right? And so if 165 00:15:16,916 --> 00:15:20,452 you're going to take seriously spiritual stuff you go join a monastery or join a convent. 166 00:15:20,452 --> 00:15:24,223 Which is why the convent and the monasteries were just doing a booming business in the 167 00:15:24,223 --> 00:15:29,695 Middle Ages. Why not? Life at home is pretty lousy anyway. Life is hard in the Middle Ages. 168 00:15:30,529 --> 00:15:34,633 Go join a monastery. Get on the fast track to heaven. Earn my way. Get my way up there 169 00:15:34,633 --> 00:15:40,072 closer and quicker. It's great. Wonderful system. And then someone came up with an even 170 00:15:40,072 --> 00:15:45,244 better idea. How about instead of these guys having to just work their way, pray their 171 00:15:45,244 --> 00:15:48,914 way into this merit and try to earn their way into this merit, why don't we just let 172 00:15:48,914 --> 00:15:57,389 them buy it? And so they came up with a teaching of indulgences. And so what indulgences were 173 00:15:57,890 --> 00:16:04,797 was a brilliant idea. Because now when I really blow it and I fall back a few stairs, instead 174 00:16:04,797 --> 00:16:08,133 of having to go through this horrendous time of penance, which could get pretty hairy, 175 00:16:08,534 --> 00:16:11,303 all the canon law would lay it out. You've got to do this and this and this. Oh man. 176 00:16:11,670 --> 00:16:18,877 Or you can simply buy an indulgence. And that worked out a lot better. Now originally indulgences 177 00:16:18,877 --> 00:16:26,151 were aimed at the souls in purgatory. And it would work like this. Grandma Kleinschmidt, 178 00:16:26,785 --> 00:16:33,592 dear old lady, you loved her, but she was a real wench. You know? You all know it. And 179 00:16:33,592 --> 00:16:38,097 you can imagine, Grandma Kleinschmidt now, she's up there in purgatory. She was doing 180 00:16:38,097 --> 00:16:43,736 some hard time. And you know what? In your life you weren't very good to Grandma Kleinschmidt. 181 00:16:43,969 --> 00:16:48,741 In fact, at her funeral you skimped. You put her in that leaky pine box and you didn't 182 00:16:48,741 --> 00:16:52,544 show her the kind of affection you should have showed her. You didn't do it right by 183 00:16:52,544 --> 00:16:59,051 Grandma Kleinschmidt. But now you can. If you give us a nice contribution, a few thousand 184 00:16:59,051 --> 00:17:04,990 gulden, we will give you this document which will shorten Grandma Kleinschmidt's time in 185 00:17:04,990 --> 00:17:10,796 purgatory by 2,000 years. People are saying, wow, that's great. I feel really bad about 186 00:17:10,796 --> 00:17:15,968 Grandma Kleinschmidt. You know, she's dead. But I can help her out now. I'll do it. So 187 00:17:15,968 --> 00:17:21,673 indulgences were being sold hand over fist, buying people out of purgatory and shortening 188 00:17:21,673 --> 00:17:26,745 their time. And all the cash that was being earned was going straight back to Rome and 189 00:17:26,745 --> 00:17:32,551 was being used to build St. Peter's Basilica. So St. Peter's Basilica was built probably 190 00:17:32,551 --> 00:17:38,624 by your forebears if you are of Germanic or Eastern or Western European descent because 191 00:17:38,624 --> 00:17:43,896 the Germans and the French paid for St. Peter's in their sale of indulgences and the Germans 192 00:17:43,896 --> 00:17:47,900 were especially eager to buy indulgences. Maybe it's part of that guilty nature they 193 00:17:47,900 --> 00:17:52,871 have. And so indulgences were being sold hand over fist, shortening the time in purgatory, 194 00:17:53,172 --> 00:17:57,009 and the people would go flying off. This is Tesla's little thing. The moment the coin 195 00:17:57,009 --> 00:18:02,247 in the copper springs, the soul from purgatory springs. You know, and it's just how they 196 00:18:02,247 --> 00:18:06,785 believed it. The problem came when somebody said, we're making some great money selling 197 00:18:06,785 --> 00:18:11,056 these indulgences, but how about if we let people start buying them for their own sins? 198 00:18:11,623 --> 00:18:16,695 We can make some really serious money. So now if I get involved in some kind of sin spree, 199 00:18:17,029 --> 00:18:20,432 instead of having to do penance and actually have a heartfelt repentance, I can just go 200 00:18:20,432 --> 00:18:25,404 buy an indulgence, whack off a few thousand years of my purgatory time, and I'm all set. 201 00:18:25,904 --> 00:18:30,442 And so you're actually buying salvation. And it was about that point when Luther finally 202 00:18:30,442 --> 00:18:36,949 came unglued. Because what was really bothering Luther in the 15 teens, the start of the Reformation, 203 00:18:36,949 --> 00:18:41,820 was not that the Gospel was being muddled. He didn't know what the Gospel was, clearly, 204 00:18:41,987 --> 00:18:45,991 yet. What was bothering Luther was that people were getting to shortcut having to earn their 205 00:18:45,991 --> 00:18:50,629 salvation. He didn't like the idea of people being able to buy their way out of the ladder. 206 00:18:50,896 --> 00:18:55,334 He wanted people to have to do the work. That's what he was interested in. And if you read 207 00:18:55,334 --> 00:19:00,439 the 95 Theses, that's the general tenor of the 95 Theses. The Pope doesn't have the authority 208 00:19:00,439 --> 00:19:05,577 to shorten the time. The Pope can't sell indulgences. He's out of line because you've got to do 209 00:19:05,577 --> 00:19:10,415 it yourself. So he doesn't have the Gospel clearly yet in 1517, not all the way. He's 210 00:19:10,415 --> 00:19:13,252 starting to get little hints of it, but it's not coming clean just yet. It takes a little 211 00:19:13,252 --> 00:19:18,524 while, somewhere along the way. So this was the beautiful grand system. And the bottom 212 00:19:18,524 --> 00:19:25,164 line heart of the problem is that horizontal righteousness, what I do was earning me vertical 213 00:19:25,164 --> 00:19:32,204 salvation. That's the problem. And this system should look pretty familiar because Catholics 214 00:19:32,204 --> 00:19:36,475 developed it. They still teach this sort of thing. And a lot of evangelicals teach 215 00:19:36,475 --> 00:19:42,080 this sort of thing. Go to church, give my tithe, go to promise keepers, love my wife. 216 00:19:42,548 --> 00:19:47,319 I do enough of the right things and God's going to bless me and I'm in. And if I don't 217 00:19:47,319 --> 00:19:52,324 do those things, man, I'm not sure where I stand. See, it all gets muddled. This is such 218 00:19:52,324 --> 00:19:57,129 a temptation for us. We operate really well at this. We like this. Give me something to 219 00:19:57,129 --> 00:20:04,770 do. But God says, no stairs, no ladders, I simply come to you in Christ. And it's all 220 00:20:04,770 --> 00:20:11,176 about grace, which is an affront to our human ability. I'd rather do it myself. Thank you. 221 00:20:12,744 --> 00:20:13,645 Okay, questions. 222 00:20:15,247 --> 00:20:20,185 Explain why the Catholic Church is what six or seven means of grace, the sacraments will 223 00:20:20,185 --> 00:20:22,788 get to that later. That really doesn't explain it. That's a different issue. That has some 224 00:20:22,788 --> 00:20:27,693 definition of sacrament. We'll get to that. Maybe this afternoon. They just made this 225 00:20:27,693 --> 00:20:31,430 up without basing it on scripture. Oh, there's all kinds of scripture that talks about working 226 00:20:31,430 --> 00:20:38,103 out your salvation with fear and trembling. Right? Well, yeah, okay. Well, you got these 227 00:20:38,103 --> 00:20:42,808 kind of obscure things in the Apocrypha, which they claim for it. But yeah, the other thing 228 00:20:42,808 --> 00:20:47,980 you see here is, when somebody asks the question, what about them have baptized babies? Well, 229 00:20:47,980 --> 00:20:52,017 you don't want to stand in front of the group and say, I don't know. So you say, limbo, 230 00:20:52,017 --> 00:20:56,154 and everything's answered. And so the beauty of the system is there's an answer for everything. 231 00:20:57,189 --> 00:21:00,993 Everything. Everything's got an answer. There's no, there's nothing where you stand in front 232 00:21:00,993 --> 00:21:06,231 of the group and say, don't know about that. You got an answer for it all. And so the it's 233 00:21:06,231 --> 00:21:10,168 just also it's very tempting. It's very attractive. Nice to have an answer for everything. 234 00:21:12,271 --> 00:21:16,375 Looks like if you were rich, this would really be great. 235 00:21:16,541 --> 00:21:17,009 Oh, yeah. 236 00:21:17,409 --> 00:21:18,110 It's really great. 237 00:21:18,110 --> 00:21:20,746 Especially if you got rich by committing a bunch of sins. 238 00:21:21,246 --> 00:21:24,650 You could just give some of us back to the church and buy our way into heaven. 239 00:21:26,752 --> 00:21:33,058 But it seems like you could also argue that like that divine right of the king, you give 240 00:21:33,058 --> 00:21:34,092 the divine right of the rich. 241 00:21:34,826 --> 00:21:37,496 Well, God wants to be on your rich, so I give my indulgences. 242 00:21:37,629 --> 00:21:42,768 Sure. It all got explained that way. And you see this, you can also see now why when Luther 243 00:21:42,768 --> 00:21:47,606 came along and started asking some questions about indulgences, he was met with less than 244 00:21:47,606 --> 00:21:53,211 an enthusiastic response. Because the whole entire medieval system was built on this. 245 00:21:53,645 --> 00:22:00,252 You had the pope selling the right to sell indulgences to bishops and princes. You know, 246 00:22:00,385 --> 00:22:04,222 I think I want to sell an indulgence. Well, we can work that out. You give me 50 percent, 247 00:22:04,356 --> 00:22:07,759 you get to keep 40, whatever. You know, they had it all worked out. But the pope held the 248 00:22:07,759 --> 00:22:12,331 right on who gets to sell indulgences. It was a wonderful system. So when Luther started 249 00:22:12,331 --> 00:22:17,602 challenging indulgences, what the pope saw was there was my cash cow. And what the prince 250 00:22:17,602 --> 00:22:22,007 saw was there was my ability to raise money. And everything was just hinging on this. So 251 00:22:22,607 --> 00:22:27,446 nobody wanted this to change except for Luther and the people at the bottom of the pile who 252 00:22:27,446 --> 00:22:31,850 were being, you know, made to feel like they needed to buy these indulgences and were selling 253 00:22:31,850 --> 00:22:36,855 all their money. So Luther rather naively thought, hey, I've got to let the pope know 254 00:22:36,855 --> 00:22:41,326 what's going on here. There's a lot of abuse happening. Not realizing that the abuse went 255 00:22:41,326 --> 00:22:44,596 clear to the top and the pope was the very one who was delighting in it because he was 256 00:22:44,596 --> 00:22:47,065 seeing his basilica built and everything else.