The fifth and final cry of the protestant reformation is Soli Deo Gloria which means “to the glory of God alone.”  This phrase reminds me of my favorite chapel which is located at Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University.  This divinity chapel is designed to reflect the history of the Christian faith by having sculptures and pictures decorating the chapel of Christians throughout the history of the church.  At the pinnacle of the chapel is this saying engraved - Soli Deo Gloria.

The glory of God alone should be the fuel of our lives as Christians.  We should live to make the name of Jesus famous and to give glory to God alone.  These words if pondered and lived would radically change the way that we live and minister.  Let us always remember who we are making famous.  Not ourselves but God alone.

This is the first message in a two part series that I preached at a middle school retreat for Cove Church in Owens Cross Roads, Alabama. This message is about Jesus calling His disciples and how He is also calling us to follow him.  I hope that this is encouraging to you in your walk with Christ!

 

 Called by Christ- Cove Church [22:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

JD Greer, the pastor of Summit Church, had some interesting insights on his blog today from Mark Driscoll, Greg Surratt, and Larry Osborne that were very insightful.  Enjoy!

Continued from yesterday. (I got to spend the last 3 days in a small group with 3 great church leaders–Mark Driscoll, Greg Surratt [of Seacoast Church and one of the multi-site pioneers] and Larry Osborne [an ex-hippie of the Jesus movement, now pastor of 8000 attender North Coast Church of San Diego and truly one of the most insightful thinkers I've ever been around]. My time with them left me swimming with new ideas about innovation in ministry.

• The American idea to “achieve your potential” is a tyrannical goddess. It tells us that whatever we are doing is not good enough, because we have “more potential.” We should be living higher with more power. Potential is not a biblical concept, but an American one. “Calling” is the biblical concept, and often “calling” is simply taking the form of a servant (Phil 2:6-11) and not achieving your potential. 

• Most pastors turn ministry into a functional savior. When the ministry is going well, they feel closer to God; when it is going poorly, they feel farther away from God.
• To pastors who say: “I don’t count people.” Do you count money? Is money more important to you than someone’s soul? 

• In a rapidly multiplying church, we often have to settle for “good enough” rather than perfect. While we realize that we should do all things excellently to the glory of God, excellence can become an inhibiter to real ministry when it monopolizes our resources and keeps them from doing things that would increase our capacity to multiply. As we learn on the mission field, reproducibility is a crucial dimension of church planting. 

• The pastoral office includes “prophet, priest and king.” Kings are leaders. Prophets are guys who think about what the Bible says and it burns inside them to tell others. Priests care about people.” Whichever you’re not the strongest on, hire someone to do. (Mark Driscoll). (p.s. He asked me what each of us was… he then looked at me and said, “I know what you are. You’re freakin’ ‘open the Bible and yell at everyone’ guy.” Exact quote. He meant this as a compliment.) 

• Larry Osborne to me: “I’ve been at North Coast (a congregation of about 8000) for 28 years. The thing I am most grateful for is EVERY child of staff member has grown up to follow Jesus.” He went on to explain to me some things he’s learned about that. Of particular interest was his statement that one of the most important lessons to learn was that exuberance in the faith in the parent often works against the kid. What he meant was that often the ministry parent wanted their kid to feel the passion that they did for Jesus, evangelism, etc, and they often forced the child into situations hoping that would grow. Instead, it embarrassed the child and turned them off. The passions of the heart for Jesus must develop ‘naturally,’ by faith, and not be imposed from outside on the child. We expect our kids to grow up too quickly.”
• In Seattle we have a “Canadian arsonist nudist colony.’ I’m going to go ahead and tell you, unless they repent, they’re going to hell, but what a fun way to go. Getting naked and burning stuff down.” (Mark Driscoll) To note: comments such as this one do not reflect the opinions of jdgreear.com or its affiliates. Opinions are solely those of the ones being quoted).

The fourth cry of the protestant reformation is solus Christus which is a Latin phrase meaning “in Christ alone.”   Our salvation is in Christ alone.  Jesus was not merely a good teacher, a philosopher, or a healer.  He was God.  John 1 speaks of Jesus Christ as the creator who became flesh and dwelt among us.  Jesus was and is God.  He is a God that not only came to the earth but who died on a cross to give us victory over sin and death.  He is a Lord and Savior that can be trusted.  The Christians of the reformation were calling people to place their faith in Christ alone!

Today is the one day of the year that we set aside to give thanks.  The rest of the year, we have a tendency to focus so much on ourselves that we do not remember to be thankful to God and others.  Today, I would encourage you to spend some extended time with the Lord thanking and praising Him for what He has done in your life!  I would also encourage you to share with the people in your life what you are thankful for about them.  

When I was in high school, one of my teachers suggested making a list of 10 things you are thankful for every hour throughout the day.  That is a great way to remind ourselves that we are blessed.  So here is a small portion of what I am thankful for:

• Life
• Breath
• Jesus Christ 
• Family 
• Friends
• Health
• My Gifts and Talents
• Grace
• Jesus’ Life, Death, and Resurrection
• The Gospel
• Church
• People Who Have Invested in My Life
• My Job
• And Many More Things that I Do Not Have Time to List

The third cry of the protestant reformation is sola gratia, which means “by grace alone.”  This means that we come to Jesus not by our good works or achievements but by grace alone.  The grace of God through Jesus’ death on the cross is what saves someone.  Salvation comes purely by the grace of God and not due to someone’s worth or value that would cause them to deserve it.  

Grace is unmerited favor from God.  We need to live lives in light of the grace of God and look for ways to share sola graitia with those around us.

The second cry of the protestant reformation that we will explore is sola fide which means “by faith alone.”  This truth as a focus in the reformation is essential to Christian doctrine.  Sinners come to Jesus not by their good works, morality, or penance.  They come to Jesus by faith alone.  Faith places all of one’s belief in Jesus Christ to be who He says that He is and to do what He says He will do.  

Faith is an easy theological word, but it is hard to live and embrace.  We live in a culture that is so focused on individual achievement that it is hard for us to acknowledge by faith that Jesus is all we need.  Embracing Jesus as the only hope for our salvation and not trying to impress God by adding something to pure faith is the essence of sola fide.

The first summary statement of the Protestant Reformation is sola scriptura.  This Latin statement means “by scripture alone.”  The Protestant Reformation placed scripture as the center of any theological and practical discussion.  Scripture was to be read and studied by all people not just the professional church people.  

The importance of making scripture central in the church was a response to the false teachings of purgatory and indulgences that Luther’s 95 Thesis addressed.  Scripture should be the standard of truth through which all ideas and teachings are filtered.  If something is being taught, even by a church minister, that contradicts scripture, the Christian must stick with scripture.  

Man’s words, no matter how eloquent or convincing they may sound, are still merely the words of man.  God’s words in scripture are truth from the mouth of God.  We must stand behind the words of God!

This week, we will be exploring the five solas of the Protestant Reformation and their importance to our theology.  On October 31st, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Thesis on the front door of a Catholic church in Wittenburg, Germany.  These 95 Thesis were a call to the church to embrace the Bible as a basis of theology and Christian practice and to protest indulgences.  

Indulgences were essentially get out of purgatory for a price cards that the church was selling to raise money to spend on massive cathedrals.  The idea of purgatory, a place where one goes after death as a waiting room before entering their eternal destination of heaven or hell, is entirely unbiblical.  There is no biblical evidence that this waiting room exists.  In addition to this theological fabrication, the church was using scare tactics to get people to purchase these indulgences.  Imagine hearing that you could get grandma out of purgatory for only $500.  The guilt of not doing what you could and giving money was used to force giving.  

The people were convinced this was the truth because they had no access to scripture.  The Word’s of God only came through the mouths of church leadership leaving church leaders with little accountability and the people with no standard to determine truth from error.  

The Protestant Reformation, which many say began with Luther’s 95 Thesis, brought the Word of God to the people and centered around five key priorities that are essential for the church to continue to embrace today.  These priorities in Latin are:

• Sola Scriptura
  
• Sola Fide
• Sola Gratia
• Solus Christus
• Soli Deo Gloria