One of the things that we talked about last time is kind of critical to our ongoing discussions. So I would like to start with a kind of a review of one of the key tenets of last week's discussion. And that is this whole discussion of grace and righteousness. So we're talking in these weeks about the Reformation. And so one of the key areas of discussion here is, what is the great divide between Catholics and Protestants? Both Catholics and Protestants believe that human beings are sinful. that human beings are fallen, although there's a difference, the degree to which human beings are fallen, I think there's a kind of a key difference there, but to keep it simple for today, both Catholics and Protestants believe that, right, that human beings are fallen, that we're sinful, and that we need God's grace to be saved. So that's a common area. Both Catholics and Protestants believe that we cannot get to heaven simply on the merits of our own works. So there is a body of material here that you would say that we all hold in common. So where does the difference lie? The difference lies in how that grace of God gets to us. That's one of the key differences. So we've been talking in the past week or two about the Reformers, and Martin Luther in particular, and how it was that Luther had this great fear, and he grew up in a very austere background, and he had this terrible fear of the judgment of God. And we asked ourselves, what was the basis for this fear? Why did all these things take place? Why was he so driven? And so, let's talk about that by way of review here. There are these two views, right? We're gonna call them the imputation view and the infusion view. So the imputation view, who holds to the imputation view? Catholics or Protestants, you think? Protestants, right? So what happens with imputation? We had used a special word last week. We talked about even a double imputation, right? So if we think about how God's grace gets to us, we think about the cross, right? The righteousness of Christ is imputed to us, and our sins are imputed to him. In other words, he pays for them once and for all. And when God looks down on us, he does not see us in terms of the good works that we do in and of ourselves. He sees the good works of Christ. And so there's that double imputation. And I use the example, when I teach my kids, I tell them, God looks down at you with his Jesus glasses. That is the idea behind double imputation. All right, so that is, I think, the view that a lot of us come to this discussion from. But to understand this fear that Luther had and that he was not alone in, we need to understand where he was coming from. And that might be described as the infusion view. So again, Catholics believe that people, Christians, need the grace of God to be saved. So how does that take place? And the infusion view here, we're using a different metaphor here, it's like, This grace and this righteousness of Christ is kind of poured into the believer, as it were. It's like you're drinking a glass of water, right? It's poured into the believer. And how does that take place? It takes place by means of the sacraments. So when a person is baptized, then this infusion of grace takes place. There needs to be a certain cooperation between the person and the grace that is being applied. There needs to be a certain degree of cooperation. and an inclination to receive that grace. And going on into the future, there are other sacraments that kind of add to this grace. And then the person is enabled to do good works, and these good works are meritorious works that count as meritorious towards salvation. Okay, so it is kind of a combination. This grace is given to you starting in baptism. You get grace through the various sacraments. Then, of course, you're doing your own good works And so this is a view of cooperation. It's the good works that you're doing, which are your good works, and it's this grace that you're receiving. The bad news here, of course, is that there are things that you can do for that grace to be diminished or to be nullified, and there are certain sins that you can commit. And so there is this ongoing need of penitence. So when we talk about penitence, here again, I would say this is not something we don't, as Protestants, agree with the Catholic doctrine of penitence, but you don't need to agree with something to understand the logic, right? If somebody sins, what needs to happen? Well, that sin needs to be recognized. The person needs to repent, right? And the person, is that the end? Does the person just say, I'm sorry, and then go on sinning? Well, no. You need to, one needs to see this. One should see this from the life of the person. The person is in need, sorry. And so that's where this idea comes in of these works. They have to give evidence of their repentance. And so within the development of this view, there are various ways that you can show that penitence. And one thing that you could do for satisfaction was the purchase of indulgence, right? So that was part of the penitential system. So that's the view that we need to understand this with historically. All right. If we think about, you know, the difficulty that somebody would have in terms of their own confidence in coming from this system. It is one where you need to keep doing those good works and if you do not adequately do the good works, this is part of your salvation. So it puts a tremendous concern on the part of that person. Am I doing enough to be saved? And of course Luther looked at himself and he was honest. He looked at himself and sees his fallenness, right? And he looks at God and he sees this judge that is holy, and he says, you know, I'm trying to do this, I'm doing penitence and so on, but I just, I don't see how God could accept me. And again, we talked about how some people thought maybe he was a little overly sensitive, but one could also view this as saying he was just simply being honest. And he had perhaps greater clarity of view with pertaining to his own fallenness. All right, so what happens, what does he do? He becomes a monk. A few years later, he becomes a priest. And then in the course of time, he becomes a professor. And when he becomes a professor, that is when he makes this discovery of the gospel and this, what we might call the imputation view, right? That it is really God's righteousness which saves me. So when he looks down at me, he's not seeing my own works, he's seeing the works of Christ. And this is a discovery that he made when he was reading the Book of Romans. So we read all that last time, so that's a little bit of an introduction to today's topic, because now we're going to talk about what happened next, and how his discovery impacted the world. Aftermath of Luther's discovery, what does he do? Well, he's continuing to teach at the university, and he's having discussions with his fellow professors. And slowly but surely, they're coming around to his view of justification. and of other topics that are related to that. So he's looking at the teachings of some in the Catholic Church, and he's looking at his own teachings, and he's seeing a clear dichotomy here. And so he wants to have open discussions about this. And so what does he do? He does what professors do. They publish theses, which they invite other people in the academic world to come in and discuss. So Luther goes out and he posts what? The 95 Theses? No. The 97 Theses. Have you ever heard of the 97 Theses? I never had. It's amazing what you learn. But anyway, the first thing he does, he produces these 97 Theses, which he posts and which he expects a discussion on. And he's expecting a pretty significant response to this posting. So we don't have time today to go through all 97 theses, but I want to give you a flavor of what he posted in these 97 theses, because it is not the same as the 95 theses, OK? So I'm just going to read you a few of these, all right? You can, of course, look them up for yourselves. I have my sources here, but this is no big secret. You can Google it, and I'm sure you'll find it in different places. The following is a brief excerpt from Luther's 97 Theses. It is false to state that man's inclination is free to choose between either of two opposites. Indeed, the inclination is not free, but captive. It is false to state that the will can, by nature, conform to the correct precepts. Obviously, I'm not reading always the entire thing here, but what is germane to us today. As a matter of fact, without the grace of God, the will produces an act that is perverse and evil, does not sound like the 95 Theses. What does it sound like? Did anybody ever read or at least hear of the bondage of the will of men? The book by Luther, that famous book, you've got it? It sounds a little bit like that, right? And in that book, that book is actually a response to Erasmus of Rotterdam, who was a humanist. So Erasmus of Rotterdam was kind of watching the Reformation take place, and he didn't agree with everything that was being done, but he was kind of in the middle in some of these discussions. But at any rate, long story short, Erasmus writes this work on the free will of man, and so that book is a response of Luther. So I think a lot of us, at least myself, when we look at Luther in his early days, we think about these 95 theses, we think about indulgences and stuff like this. We don't think about this. kind of comprehensive theological view that we associate with some of his later works. But what was fascinating to me is there it is, right? There it is. This is even before the 95 Theses. This is before any of these great theological discussions that rocked the world. So these things that came out later, he had formulated much earlier. All right, he goes on in this vein. Again, I'm not gonna read all of these. One must concede that the will is not free to strive toward whatever is declared good. Nor is it surprising that the will can conform to erroneous and not to the correct precepts. So he's clearly talking about the sinful state of man and the bondage of the will. Can I do good by my nature? Can I cooperate with the grace of God to save myself? And I think that's where this is going. Because the view of the Church of Rome was that You had to, there had to be this cooperation there. And I think if you look at what he's saying about the will, you come to the inevitable conclusion that how can my will in its fallen state cooperate with the grace of God, right? So it is clearly linked to justification. Man is not, this is number 17 here, man is by nature unable to want God to be God. This sounds like something you could definitely hear from this pulpit, isn't it? Man is by nature unable to want God to be God. Indeed, he himself wants to be God and does not want God to be God. To love God above all things by nature is a fictitious term, a chimera, as it were. This is contrary to common teaching. So when I was reading this, I was very interested in all, of course, but I had never heard of the term chimera. So in the interest of your edification, I looked it up. Are you ready for this? There are two meanings, two possible meanings. The first one, in Greek mythology, a fire-breathing female monster with a lion's head, a goat's body, and a serpent's tail. Goat woman, fire-breathing goat woman. The second one is a thing that is hoped for or wished for, but is in fact illusory or impossible to achieve. The thread of logic between these two meanings escapes me. But at any rate, there you have it. To love God above all things by nature is a fictitious term, a chimera. So the thing that is, I think, illusory, right? It's a fiction. All right. So what would you expect these teachings to elicit in terms of a response? What would you expect? Would you expect some kind of significant response? Yeah, sort of, right? What happens? Not a whole lot. There's some discussion internally within the university, but poof, there it is, right? And it's as if Luther posts these 97 theses that say, you know what we kind of thought to be true about salvation? Well, it's not. And everybody just kind of yawned. So it's interesting the response or the lack of response that he gets, right? And it's a little surprising almost when you think about what happens next. Because next, a couple weeks later, he posts 95 theses, which again was meant to be a disputation in an academic setting. And in fact, I'm going to read the heading to the 95 theses here just so you get the flavor for this. Out of love for the truth and desire to elucidate it, the Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts in Sacred Theology and ordinary lecturer therein at Wittenberg. So in other words, he's a professor at Wittenberg. Long way of saying that. So if any of you have been involved in academic settings, perhaps in doing some studies where you had to introduce a topic and dispute it, this seems to be kind of what's going on here, right? 95 Theses. Well, we saw what the result was of his 97 theses that dealt with some pretty significant theological issues. This time, however, the result was deafening because now, as we shall see, Luther was hitting them where it counts, namely in their pocketbook. All right. But before we get into that, let's talk a little bit about what were in these 95 theses. And of course, we're not gonna read them all again, but I'll read a few of them so you get the flavor for it. When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, repent, Matthew 4, 17, he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance. This word cannot be understood as referring to the sacrament of penance. That is confession and satisfaction as administered by the clergy. So he's calling out this sacrament of penance and saying, I see a problem here, right? It's the whole life that is supposed to be characterized by repentance, these actions that we go through, and he's calling this out. And if we recall what we discussed about last time, if you consider your own sinful nature and that this sacrament of penance was such that you had to go on and confess and confess and confess. But we talked about the fact that the sins that we commit in one way or another are not just these big external things that everybody can point to. There are these actions that we take, there are the thoughts that we have, but more than that, they are at the core of our being. So when do you stop confessing, right? And that's the reason Luther never felt satisfied, because he went on and on and confessed at length. And then he would get home, or in his cell there, And he would think about other things that he should have confessed and he would be in torment. So it goes on, I'm going to read just a couple more of these. Number six here, the Pope cannot remit any guilt except by declaring and showing that it has been remitted by God or to be sure by remitting guilt in cases reserved to his judgment. It is his right to grant, if his right to grant remission in these cases were disregarded, the guilt would certainly remain unforgiven. So he's not saying anything there that's really revolutionary. He's trying to put the power of the pope and its historical scope. I'm going to read a couple more that are not on this that I thought were especially poignant. And so that is number 27 and 28. You can look it up yourself if you want at home. They preach only human doctrines who say that as soon as the money clinks in the money chest, the soul flies out of purgatory. It is certain that when the money clinks in the money chest, greed and avarice will be increased or can be increased. But when the church intercedes, the result is in the hands of God alone. So he's listening to these indulgences be preached, and he's got a serious problem with this. Why would that be? Indulgences were not something new. They were something that had been going on for some time. But again, viewed within the scope of the sacrament of penance, they were to be part of the penitential system. What was actually happening was very different than that. And so that's what we're going to get into now. All right. I'm going to jump ahead a little bit. OK. I'm going to jump ahead a little bit and talk about the second heading down. It's called the scheme So what's going on that he's so upset about? Dominican John Tetzel is out there, and John Tetzel was put in charge of a special sale of indulgences. And I think probably many of us have heard of John Tetzel, right? And his old saying, as soon as the coin from the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs, right? That was kind of his little slogan there in his bit of medieval marketing. and he would make claims to the effect that indulgences would make the sinner cleaner than Adam before the fall, or cleaner when coming out of baptism. So, some very over-the-top claims about what he was selling, right? As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory springs. Obviously, this is not what indulgences were intended originally to be, right? This is a very over-the-top sales guy, and he's going about and selling these things. And why is he doing this? And that's what we're going to get into now, the beneficiaries. So what was going on with Tesla's campaign here? This is kind of a marketing campaign. It was a sale that was prompted, or excuse me, This sale that prompted the response was authorized by Pope Leo X. So Pope Leo is involved here. And the other beneficiary here, one of the other chief beneficiaries was Albert of Brandenburg, who was a member of the House of Hohenzollern, which if you remember from your high school history, was one of the chief houses of royalty in European history within the Holy Roman Empire. This Albert wished to purchase the most important archbishopric in Germany, and that was that of Mainz. So he already had two bishoprics, and he wanted a third. So this guy's consolidating power. But something I mentioned a minute ago might have pricked your ears. He wished to purchase. Whatever your view is on all this stuff, this is bad, right? He wished to purchase. So that is a problem. So he and Pope Leo are coming to a meeting of the minds are coming to a little bit of a financial agreement. And Leo says, Okay, you know, and, and they make a deal. And the deal is the sum of 10,000 ducats. I had no idea what a ducat was, or a ducat or ducat, however it's called. So I'm always curious about these things. So I did a little research, and I was able to determine that a ducat or ducat is one Venetian gold ducat is about 3.5 grams of gold. So you do the arithmetic. That boils down to 35,000 grams, or somewhere around a couple million dollars, if my math is right. So I've seen different estimates for this. But it was a lot of money, basically. Old Al, he didn't have all this money, so what is he going to do? He has to come up with it somehow. And this was the scheme. So we're going to have these indulgences sold. Part of the proceeds will go to Al, part to Leo. Al gets his bishopric, his archbishopric of Mainz, and Leo, what does he get? Well, have you ever been to St. Peter's? Anybody here been to St. Peter's? Yes, a couple of nodding heads, right? I've been to St. Peter's, and if there's one place I've ever been to in my life that impressed me, it was St. Peter's. I have never seen, I've been all over the world, I've never seen anything like it. The very floor that you walk on is a priceless treasure. The walls that you look at are gilded with priceless paintings. The ceiling that you look at, everywhere you go, it's just astonishing in its beauty and artistic value. So the Pope wanted to work on this, right? And, of course, in doing so, he wanted to make a certain statement. That was not the only thing that was going on. They also had the Turks that were attacking and kind of banging on the door and trying to attack their frontier. And so he needs to fight the Turks. He wants to work on St. Peter's. He's got these different things he wants to do. Of course, these things don't happen by themselves. You have to fund them. So what is he going to do? He needs a revenue stream, and here you have it. So they have this special sale of indulgences. They say, John, go for it. And like any good sales manager, they want John to do well. And so they, of course, do not hinder him in his efforts to sell these indulgences, even though he's selling them in the way that he was. So Luther, bless his heart, he doesn't know all of this. And when he posts his 95 theses, what happens? Well, somebody gets a hold of it and they have a bunch printed off. And sooner or later, these 95 theses are turning up all over the place. You know, everybody's seen them. So that's not what he expected, right? He just expected to have this internal discussion in the university. and within academia, but that's not what happened. So this is the new age. We live in a new age ourselves, but this was the new age of the printing press. So these things are printed. They're sent all over the place. People are reading them. And he's like, wow, how about that? So Luther, again, bless his heart, he doesn't realize this little scheme. And he's thinking, once the higher ups in the Catholic Church, the Archbishops and the Pope and so on. Once they understand what is going on here, they will be incensed because the dignity of those Archbishops and the Pope is not being well served by what's going on. So what does he do? He takes a copy of these theses and he sends them to Al. He sends them to Albert of Brandenburg, the one who has commissioned this sale of indulgences, and it says, Al, you're never going to believe what's going on. And he sends a copy of these to Al with his compliments. So imagine yourself going into, flying down to Las Vegas and going to meet with the owner of a casino and saying, You're never going to believe this, but there are these people out there that are throwing all their money in these one-armed bandits. And not all of these people have a lot of money to spend, and those that do could really spend it better elsewhere. And expecting the owner of the casino to say, well, how about that? We should do something about that. You're absolutely right. Of course, that's not what happened. So what does happen? Albert gets all upset. He says, this is not good. Revenue stream threatened. Dials up the Pope and says, you've got to do something about this guy. And he's not the only one. There are other people that are looking at this and are threatened. And they say, you've got to do something. So Pope tries to deal with it. What is he going to do? Different approaches that he could take here. So the first thing that he does is he salutes an Augustinian. Right? Luther's an Augustinian. So he says, well, I'll have the Augustinians manage this guy. So he asked the Augustinians to manage, to silence him. And so they have a chapter meeting in Heidelberg, another beautiful city. So anyway, the Augustinians are meeting in Heidelberg, and they're having these discussions. Luther goes there, and he's kind of worried, right? Because the fewer of this is created is beyond anything that he expected. So he gets to Heidelberg, and he's really you know, wondering if he's going to come out of this in one piece. There are discussions in Heidelberg. But remember, these folks are Augustinian. And a lot of them kind of held views that were not all that dissimilar to his own. And so he walks away from that, not only in one piece, but a lot of the Augustinians are saying, yeah, we kind of agree with some of the things that you're saying. So instead of being silenced, which was the whole goal, he walks away from this and he's encouraged. Well, that didn't work. What is he going to do? Well, he's got to bring out the big guns. So Pope sends out his legate, Cardinal Cajetan, to a diet held in Augsburg. And so, Cardinal goes to this meeting with one thing in view, and that is that Luther will recant. Luther goes to this meeting with another thing in view, and that is that Cardinal just, he won't know what's going on, and I have to explain it to him. So he gets there, and the Cardinal receives him, and Luther, starts disputing with the Cardinal. The Cardinal says, wait a minute, you don't understand. There's no disputation here. There's just one word you have to say. It's called revoke. And Luther's just flabbergasted. So he continues to dispute with the Cardinal. And that does not go well. So he sees that it's not going well and he makes good his escape in the middle of the night. And so that is that. All right. So what has happened so far? It's become clear that the church kind of knows what's going on. But really they just want him to be quiet and this whole issue to go away so they can keep doing it, right? Okay. What next? Now, we're going to get into the next page. All right. This next page, the heading is The Plot Thickens. So what happens? Bear with me one second here. Yes. I need to learn to number my pages a little bit. The emperor dies. So the current emperor dies. And so I'm telling you this not just for your own interest, but because this bears directly on what happens here theologically. The emperor dies. And so remember, this is the Holy Roman Empire. And this is like a little bit of a democracy, right? So you didn't just hand it off to your son. A new emperor had to be elected. And the people that did that were called electors. And there were a handful of them, and they were very powerful. And one of those guys was Frederick the Wise. So he was somebody that could have actually become the emperor. So the Pope is looking at the potential replacement for Emperor Maximilian. He says, well, we got two leading horses here. One is Francis of France, and the other one is Charles of Spain. Now, both of these guys are super powerful, even without being emperors. So the Pope is looking at this thinking, not good. You know, not good. Because if one of these guys who are already very, very powerful become emperor, then how am I going to deal with him? So he wants a candidate and he wants support from others that will help him consolidate his own influence versus that of these monarchs. Frederick the Wise was just such a man. So the Pope couldn't afford at this point to do anything to upset him too much. So what does he do? Well, Frederick protects Luther. The Pope doesn't want to anger Frederick or be on bad terms with him, so he backs off. He says, all right, we've got a problem here with this Augustinian monk, but I'm not going to do anything just now, because it would be politically inauspicious time to do so. So there is something of a truce. And this truce goes on for a while, and all sides back off a little bit, until one fine day. when a man by the name of John Eck, remember John Eck? Remember him? He's known as the guy who disputed with Luther. John Eck challenges, not Luther himself, because that would have been against the terms of the truce. He challenges one of the followers of Luther, a guy by the name of Karlstadt. Karlstadt was another professor. So Karlstadt is teaching some of the things that Luther's teaching, and then Eck challenges him. And they have a debate which is to be held at the University of Leipzig. So I'm going to back off here a second and talk about this Leipzig. Why is Leipzig highly relevant here. Remember last week when we were talking about John last week a couple weeks ago. John Huss we're talking about John Huss at some point in time. John Huss was in Prague, of course, right? And so we talked about John Huss being in Prague, and he was a professor at the university, and that faculty was mixed between the Germans and the Czechs, right? And at some point, the Germans left because they didn't like the way that things were going in that university. They were kind of old school Romanist conservatives. So what do they do? They go away from Prague. And where do they go? Leipzig. And they set up a university there. And guess what the characteristics of this university are in terms of the theological leanings? Very anti-Reformation. So this is why Leipzig is kind of interesting here, that it happens there. Things are not stacked well in the favor of the Reformer here. But anyway, Luther looks at this and he says, you're gonna challenge Carl Stott. What you're really trying to do is challenge me. I know what's going on. So he goes over and he debates at himself. and the debate goes back and forth, and Luther shows in his debating that he knows a lot more about the Bible than Eck does. But Eck, for his part, was a very astute theologian, and in that, he knew the church doctrine, and he knew that if he could only position Luther in such a way that he associated him with heretics, his job would be successful. So that's exactly what he does. he forces Luther into a corner where Luther identifies himself with John Hus, who was, of course, burned at the stake a century earlier, and was declared a heretic, not just by the Pope, but by a council. So Luther says, yes, I'm a Hussite. I'm a Hussite. And you know what else? Councils can be wrong, and this one was. It didn't really matter what he said after that. So X job was done and he was held the victor by the faculty there. And so now Luther is in a very dangerous position because he's walked into this trap. At the same time though, despite this discussion, others are listening into this, a lot of other people, and the support for the Reformation is growing and growing and growing. So the next heading is called The Bull and the Boar. That's what we're gonna look at now. The Bull and the Boar, so what happens? Well, remember now, we just said Luther's in trouble because of this disputation he had with Ackbar. He identified himself with a condemned heretic that was burned at the stake. Charles of Spain, one of the most powerful men in the empire, is elected to be the emperor. So what does that mean? Why do I tell you this? Well, it's for this reason. That ends the delay of the condemnation of Luther by the Pope. So the Pope's got no reason to wait anymore to do this, right? Frederick's not going to become emperor. The Pope now has to deal with Charles of Spain one way or the other. And by the way, during this time there are wars. that take place between Francis, Charles, the Pope. We won't go into that. It makes for some fascinating reading. It's beyond the scope of what we can talk about today. Charles of Spain is elected emperor, ending the delay in the condemnation for Luther. In his papal bull, Leo declared, by the way, the name of this papal bull, you might recognize this, at least some of you, exerge domine, arise, oh Lord. A wild boar has entered your vineyard. That's, of course, what he was referring to Luther as, right? Exerge domine, arise, O Lord. It was a call for God to rise up and punish the heretic. So this bull identified where Luther's teachings were against the Catholic teachings, accepted teachings of the Catholic Church. And in that, it noted they attacked indulgences and people power. So this bull, of course, this is the day of the printing press. The bull is distributed all over the place, right? So it is distributed throughout the Holy Roman Empire. And so different people are receiving it. They're reading it. And one of two things has happened. They either say, OK, I better be a good follower of the papers here and fall in line, in which case they have to burn the Reformation books. And the other camp is saying, I disagree with that. I'm with the Reformation, and they're burning the bull. One way or the other, there's a lot of bonfires these days in the Holy Roman Empire. Luther receives this thing, and he reads it. And of course, it tells him that he's got a chance to recant. And if he doesn't recant, then he's going to be excommunicated for heresy. Now that would, I think, upset any one of us. But remember, heresy is a capital crime, which merited capital punishment. So this was, in a very real sense, a death sentence. This is serious business. So Luther gets this thing and what does he do? He takes it out and he publicly burns the bull. So this is a line firmly drawn in the sand from which there will be no going back. Luther publicly burns the bowl along with some writings of his opponents, and that's that. The Reformation is on. So now what? Well, Luther is called to the famous Diet of Worms. And you might be thinking to yourself, why is he being called to a diet? By the way, the Ida words, if there's any confusion about what that term means, this is the Holy Roman Empire. It wasn't just ruled by the emperor. It was ruled by the emperor, along with hundreds of princes and monarchs. And so these folks got together occasionally and held a session. That session was called a diet. So this was one such diet. So it's like Congress was in session, right? So you might be thinking, OK, the church has declared them a heretic. What is there left to decide? but it was not the job of the church to, it was the job of the church to excommunicate, but not to kill, not to punish, not to execute, do the punishment. So this was kind of the next step in the process. So the Diet of Worms was basically, you're gonna go from, you're gonna go face the executioner more or less, right? But remember, Luther is protected by his famous prince, Frederick the Wise, who grants him and gets from the Holy Roman Emperor a safe passage conduct. So he is guaranteed safe passage to this place. Now remember, a couple of weeks ago, we talked about John Huss. He also had a safe passage to that council, which condemned him. And when he got there, they basically grabbed him and tied him to the stake and burned him to death. So Luther looked at this, and he went. And we should recognize here, he was incredibly brave to do so, because he was in all likelihood going to his death. So Luther goes to Worms. And I remember when I myself was a student in the University of Worms, when you approach the cathedral, you walk by this Roman wall that was built by the Romans, very, very old. And you go through this archway and you look and you just see this massive imposing thing. It's not like one of these Gothic cathedral with all these spires and so on. It was just this broad, massive, imposing structure. And at the time when Luther lived, there was attached to this a bishop's palace. So it was actually bigger than it is today. And if you go there, There's a little plaque on the ground that says, you know, this is where Luther stood when he made his famous statement. But it's a very imposing place. And so Luther is off to the Diet of Worms. Now when he arrives, the streets are lined with people who are shouting in his favor, and they're cheering and clapping and jumping around and giving him a lot of encouragement. So he's looking at this, and his spirits are lifted, and he's got a smile on his face. And he walks into the Diet, and he's actually got a grin on his face, which is kind of a little bit de classe. It's not the way that you are to approach the emperor and the papal legates and so on. But he walks in there. And who does he face but Eck, old Eck from Leipzig. So Eck says, he points to a list of books and he says, are these yours? And Luther says, well, can you name them to me? And he does and he says, yes, they're mine and I've also written some other ones. And Eck says, will you take back what you've said in these writings? And Luther, you probably know the story, what does he say? He says, give me some time to think about it. Now his life is on the line, right? And he knows it. This is a decision that he's thinking in his head, do I live or do I die? And there was probably more to it than that. He was going through what some have termed a little bit of a dark night of the soul. And why? He's looking around him and he's seeing papal legates, highly educated professors, the emperor himself. Luther was son of a miner, okay? So one can well understand that he was very taken back a little bit by these proceedings. So it's impossible to know what went exactly through his head at that time, but I sure certainly would have been a bit concerned. So he says, give me some time to think about it. And so the emperor grants this. He goes back, and his supporters are saying, Martin, what are you doing up there? You're making a fool of yourself. This is not the way you're supposed to equate yourself. And so I think they had expected something more. But Luther, of course, a lot of weight is on his shoulders, right? So he goes back to his room. And he starts thinking about this, and he's thinking about all this fancy place and all these educated, powerful people, and he's saying to himself, really? Am I alone wise? Do I really presume to think I know better than all these other people? And he is plagued, because now is the moment of truth from which there will be no going back. So he prays and he reads the Bible. I don't know what he read, but as he does this, he becomes more and more convinced. Listen, all I'm doing is what I'm seeing here. All I'm saying is what is clearly written. And he becomes convinced that he has to do this. So the next day he goes back and they go through this whole spiel again. And so they say, will you take back these works? And he says, well, which ones? Basically, there are three buckets here, three categories. In some works, I've just set out basic Christian doctrine that nobody in this house would disagree with. If I take that back, then basically I'm a heretic by my own declaration. I have other works which I have written on behalf of the constituent people of the Holy Roman Empire who are being persecuted by some of their governors and the rulers. And I'm not going to take that back. And the other works that I've written were against, you know, my theological opponents. And I grant you, I've said some things which maybe I shouldn't have in terms of the vehemence of my response. However, I cannot take these back either. And in fact, the exact term that he used, I should have it here. All right, it's in there somewhere, but basically says, ah, yes, here it is. Unless I'm convinced by proofs from scriptures or by plain and clear reasons and arguments, I can and I will not retract, for it is neither safe nor wise to do anything against conscience. Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen. And God help him indeed. because at this point he was not only taking a stand against the Pope, but also the emperor himself. And so he was in dire straits. According to his own records, some of the guards at this point start to chant, to the flames, to the flames. So what happens? Well, remember this is a large assembly. And the decision that needs to be come to has to be agreed to by this assembly. So there's a lot of disputation, discussion going back and forth between the emperor, who wants to take a strong stand, and a lot of folks who frankly supported Luther, because he did have a lot of support. And so this goes on and on, right? In the meantime, Luther escapes. Or rather, he is quote unquote kidnapped. And so what happened is Frederick the Wise, his ruler, had him kidnapped by his own armed men and had him spirited away to a safe place. And that safe place was the castle of Wartburg. But very astutely, this ruler said to his people, do not tell me where you are taking him, because I don't want to know. Right? Don't tell me where you're taking him. So they speared him away to the castle at Wartburg. Frederick doesn't know where he is, so the emperor comes to Frederick and said, where is he? You know, where's Luther? I don't know. Very truthfully responded, right? Okay, folks. We have reached 20 after. More to say on this topic, obviously, in the next few pages here. But that will have to wait until next week, which we will tell the rest of the story. And we will also get into some more teaching about Luther's doctrines. And I hope this was interesting and edifying to you. And please be here next time when you get to hear, as Paul Harvey used to say, the rest of the story. Let's close in prayer.