Speeches

"The Significance of the Lutheran Reformation for the Worldwide Communion of Churches"

Mark S. Hanson, President, Lutheran World Federation, Presiding Bishop, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

September 20, 2008

It is a great joy to greet you on behalf of the Lutheran World Federation#68 million Lutherans in 140 member churches in 78 countries#and on behalf of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Thank you, people of Wittenberg, for your gracious hospitality and for your commitment to Wittenberg being a place of great historical significance that continues to contribute to the ongoing reformation of Christ's Church.

This weekend we commemorate Martin Luther's arrival in Wittenberg in 1508. Our festivities, including the dedication of the Luther Garden, provide an occasion for us to reflect upon the significance of the Lutheran Reformation for the worldwide communion of churches today. I trust this will be a topic for lively conversations throughout the world in the coming decade.

Karl Barth once said that those who set out to explain the relevance of Christianity to contemporary society will find themselves always running after the train that has just left. Perhaps we can say the same about trying to describe the ongoing significance of the Lutheran Reformation. We continue as an evangelical, ecumenical, reforming movement within the church catholic.

With more time we could reflect upon the great theological themes that continue to define us as Lutherans. We could site the many global examples of Lutheran commitment to unity in the Body of Christ. We could celebrate the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification signed in Augsburg in 1999 by representatives of the Vatican and the Lutheran World Federation. We could give thanks to God for countless ways Lutherans live out their faith through acts of prophetic diakonia. We could tell stories of Lutherans contributing to the struggle for human rights, a lasting just peace in the Middle East, the resettlement of refugees, and the reconciliation of warring parties. Given the time limits of this occasion, however, I wish to reflect upon just one central theme of the ongoing Lutheran Reformation:  repentance.

When Martin Luther first arrived in Wittenberg, he was anything but a person of worldwide significance. In the ensuing decade he began to attract the attention of a small community of peers. But what launched him into international prominence was a theological witness that began with the theme of repentance. The first of Martin Luther's famous 95 Theses on "the power and efficacy of indulgences" stated, "When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said 'Repent' (Matthew 4:17) he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance." (1)

If the Lutheran Reformation is to have any significance or contribution to the worldwide communion of churches today, repentance must be not simply an intellectual theme to be explored but a lived reality in our relationships with others. Gottfried Krodel has argued that the most appropriate observance of the Lutheran Reformation is not a triumphalist celebration but a repentant observance.

While the communion of Lutheran churches has become worldwide, what the Lutheran Reformation has to offer was first penned here in Wittenberg. It was offered neither in intellectual arrogance nor in crusading anger, but in a passionate and pastoral concern for the Gospel and the life of believers.

Repentance is not a stoic or heroic religious act or a performance required for humans to qualify for divine mercy. Rather, it is the character of an entire life lived in Jesus.  Or rather, it is the life that results where Jesus lives#a new creation, raised to new life with Christ. Repentance occurs when the Holy Spirit through the Gospel frees us to confront the reality that our lives have come to a dead end#i.e. we are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. Repentance has its distinctive character because Jesus wills it so and wants the new creation to be the entire life of a human creature.

In other words, what the Lutheran reformation has to say to a worldwide communion of churches is that repentance that is needed in our world is not an impossible goal to be achieved by a heroic few. In Jesus Christ repentance is God's gift to the world. I trust that you can recognize a distinctive Lutheran or, more accurately, evangelical perspective:  distinguishing between the impossible demand for a life of integrity before God and others and the completely surprising gift of a life lived in faith, in reliance on God's grace. In Jesus Christ, because he wills it so, repentance is receiving one's entire life as a gift of God's forgiving mercy.

In this repentant life relationships with God, others, and even oneself have the integrity of being both truthful and reconciled. Before addressing the Ecumenical Pre-conference on HIV and AIDS this past summer, I washed the feet of two women living with HIV. Why did I feel compelled to engage in this public act of humility and repentance? Because I needed to speak the truth that too often we people of faith have shunned and shamed those living with HIV and AIDS. Rather than engaging in acts of healing and reconciliation, we have too often stigmatized and marginalized those living with HIV and AIDS. Through this act of repentance I was speaking the truth for the sake of healing and reconciliation.

In this repentant life one's neighbors#in the home, in the local community, around the globe#are neither feared competitors nor rejected outcasts, but the fulfillment of daily life. In the small town in South Dakota where my father was raised, the railroad tracks came to an end. When a train arrived, a whistle blew and men came down to the railroad yard. They unhooked the engine from the cars and moved it onto a large round platform. Then, inserting long poles into the platform, they together turned the engine so that it could again travel in the right direction. Could this be an image of the communal character of the repentant life in Christ? We are being turned from a life preoccupied with ourselves#as individuals, churches, nations, cultures#to a life of serving the neighbor and seeking the common good.

In this repentant life we are being turned away from our complicit participation in the blasphemous abuse of God's creation that results in a murderous destruction of habitats for other creatures, both human and non-human. And we are turned toward a humble, yet hopeful, life of honoring the intricate interdependent relationships in God's creation.
 In this repentant life the strong theological themes of the Lutheran reformation become a foundation not just for our continuation as a communion, but for our contribution to the building up of the Body of Christ. Repentance is historically appropriate in view of the divisions that have resulted from the actions of all parties in the sixteenth century conflicts:  Protestants and Catholics, nobles and peasants, clergy and lay.

In this repentant life we Christians are turned away from our violence-breeding willful misrepresentation of those with whom we share a common Abrahamic tradition. We are turned toward a life of bearing witness together20 to the love of God through dialogue and working for peace.

In this repentant life in Christ the future is neither a feared nightmare nor an idolatrous fantasy, but a joyous hope firmly grounded in God's promise.

The joyous hope of this repentant life brings me to the place where we are gathered and the occasion for this gathering: the dedication of the Luther Garden. The time when Martin Luther lived was haunted by nightmares and fantasies about what the future would bring. They were nightmares of divine judgment and the fantasies of some utopia ironically created out of violence. There is a well-known story that Luther, when asked what he would do if God's final judgment were to arrive the next day, replied that he would plant an apple tree. Although the story is likely a legend, it reflects the confidence that the life lived in Jesus Christ can be lived in evangelical repentance that is both joyfully attentive to life in this creation and joyously hopeful for life in the new creation. May the dedication of this garden provide the occasion for our witness to the repentant life in Christ and our joyous hope of life where Jesus lives.

Mark S. Hanson
President, Lutheran World Federation,
Presiding Bishop, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
September 20, 2008

(1) Timothy F. Lull (ed.), Martin Luther's Basic Theological Writings (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989), p. 41.