Inspirational Quotes on Reformation

“We know from Moses that the world was not in existence before 6,000 years ago. . . . He calls “a spade a spade,” i.e., he employs the term “day” and “evening” without allegory, just as we customarily do . . . we assert that Moses spoke in the literal sense, not allegorically or figuratively, i.e., that the world, with all its creatures, was created within six days, as the words read. If we do not comprehend the reason for this, let us remain pupils and leave the job of the teacher to the Holy Spirit.”

“To associate what is nice with what is evil happened easily in the sixteenth century. Comfortable houses, nice clothes, and orderly, easy lives belonged to the “world” and only dungeons, flight, torture, grief, and anxiety remained for the true followers of Christ. The Anabaptists, living in such an other-worldly atmosphere of persecution, had no time for humour or recreation. At first from necessity, but soon from a brotherhood emphasis on strict asceticism, they ruled out many normal comforts of life. In Switzerland the Anabaptists even condemned congregational singing as a frivolous concession to the senses.”

“12. So then, he that is left without chastisement is so left by the Divine judgment, and God is long-suffering towards some sinners, not without reason, but because it will be good for them, having regard to the immortality of the soul and eternal life, that they be not too soon assisted in the attainment of salvation, but be slowly brought thereto after they have had experience of much evil. For as physicians, though they might quickly cure a man, will adopt the opposite of remedial measures whenever they suspect lurking mischief, because by so doing they mean to make the cure more permanent, and think it better to keep the patient for a long time in feverishness and sickness, so that he may make a sounder recovery, than that he should soon seem to pick up strength, but suffer a relapse, and the too hasty cure prove to be only temporary: so God also, knowing the secrets of the heart and having foreknowledge of the future, in His long-suffering perhaps lets things take their course, and by means of outward circumstances draws forth the secret evil, in order to cleanse him, who through neglect, has harboured the seeds of sin; so that a man having vomited them when they have come to the surface, even if he be far gone in wickedness, may afterwards find strength when he has been cleansed from his wickness and been renewed. For God governs the souls of men, not, if I may so speak, according to the scale of an earthly life of fifty years, but by the measure of eternity; for He has made the intellectual nature incorruptible and akin to Himself; and the rational soul is not debarred of healing, as if this present life were all.”

“Und der nämliche ist gerecht und gut, der wahrhafte Gott, der selbst alles ist, wie alles er selbst ist, weil er selbst Gott, der alleinige Gott ist. Denn wie der Spiegel dem Häßlichen nicht übelgesinnt ist, weil er ihn so zeigt, wie er ist, und wie der Arzt dem Kranken nicht übelgesinnt ist, wenn er ihm sagt, daß er Fieber hat (denn der Arzt ist nicht schuld an dem Fieber, sondern er stellt das Fieber nur fest), so ist auch der Tadelnde gegen den nicht übelgesinnt, der an seiner Seele krank ist; denn er bringt die Verfehlungen nicht erst in sie hinein, sondern weist auf die vorhandenen Sünden hin, um von ähnlicher Handlungsweise abzuhalten.”

“I’m looking for a second reformation. The first reformation of the church 500 years ago was about beliefs. This one is going to be about behavior. The first one was about creeds. This one is going to be about deeds. It is not going to be about what does the church believe, but about what is the church doing.”