R.C. Sproul Speaks on 'Sola Scriptura' at Proclaim 17

[Music] can I tell you something about our first speaker as I introduced him there are some people that you've listened to in your life where you could go back and you could point out places in the road where you were listening to something specific that was said something you heard something that was altering to your way of thinking I could take you to a spot in Little Rock where I was listening to a cassette tape as I was driving back and forth on my daily commute one day and on that cassette tape I heard doctor Arcee sprawl say that the problem in our church today is that most people do not believe that God is as holy as he is and that most of us do not believe that we are as sinful as we are and I remember being pricked and provoked by that statement recognizing my own tendency to think too highly of myself and conversely my own tendency to minimize the holiness of God that theme the holiness of God is a theme that has marked - dr. squirrel's ministry over the now more than 50 years that he has been ministering but beyond that theme the larger theme of the Reformation truths that we have been celebrating here at NRB this week have been a part of what dr. Sproul has almost single-handedly reintroduced to the church in our generation and it's a real privilege for us to have here on the closing night of this event our first speaker tonight the founder and president of Ligonier ministries would you give a warm and RB welcome to dr. RC scroll [Applause] it's a delight for me to be here a singular honor and privilege for this annual event it's a special time for me for my family and for all of us on the staff at the Ligonier and I'd like to begin by opening a prayer shall we my father and our God is we think tonight of those central truths that were so vital to the history of your church that we remember in these days we ask that the Holy Spirit would be present in power as we contemplate these truths particularly the central importance of your word for we ask it in Jesus name Amen as you've been hearing throughout the week that this is 2017 and we are keenly aware that this is the 500th anniversary of the Reformation that began in the month of October in the year 1517 somebody said to me recently that the anniversary of the Reformation only comes every 500 years and so here we go again well in any case and we've looked at the different SOLAS that became key points of discussion during the 16th century Reformation and it has been left to me to discuss briefly the affirmation of Sola scriptura and to introduce that concept let me say to you that historians as they think about the significance of the 1517 monumental change cataclysmic change indeed in the history of the church if they ask the simple question what caused these things to the past and never multiple influences that were involved at that time but again it's customary for historians to indicate two chief causes for the Protestant Reformation then they distinguish them between what is called the material cause on the one hand and the formal cause on the other and those of you who are students of philosophy understand that that language originated with Aristotle who distinguished several different causes of motion or of change and included many more such subtle distinctions between the two material and formal causes we know that the material cause of the Reformation or the question of what was the matter at the time focused on the issue of the gospel and the the answer to the question how are we as unjust people justified in the presence of a holy God and so the central material aspect was the debate over the issue of justification by faith alone but throughout that discussion of the material principle of the Reformation there was always just beneath the surface and quite frequently bubbled to the surface of the controversy the issue of the formal cause of the Reformation and that issue was the question of authority by what authority did Luther declare his doctrine of justification by faith alone and we all know that there in on 1517 on Al Hallows Eve Luther posted his 95 theses on the church door or the castle church door at Vinton burg he was not involved in an act of vandalism this was the standard place where notices were posted and the theses were written in Latin particularly because Luther meant the issues to be discussed simply among the members of the faculty of the colleagues that he had there at Vinton burr he certainly had no intention of raising these issues publicly but some enterprising students took it upon themselves when they understood the import of these theses that Luther wanted to discuss translated them into the vernacular translated them into German without Luther's knowledge and without his permission and within two weeks the ninety-five theses were in every village and hamlet throughout Germany and all of a sudden we had the cataclysmic experience of the Protestant Reformation Kalb art once observed that Luther had no idea of what he was starting and he was like a blind man climbing the tower in a church and he lost his grip and began to fall from the ladder and he reached out to grab a hold something that would stabilize him and unbeknownst to him what he grabbed was the Rope for the town church bell and he awakened the whole city by this controversy and of course when the 95 theses were written the immediate issue was the issue of indulgences that were being abused by their sale in a neighboring county there by Tetzel and Luther was very much concerned about this matter but when he wrote the 95 theses he included other issues beyond the issue of the indulgences including the whole Sasser total system of the Roman Catholic Church specifically on the matter of the issue of the Treasury of merits and that created a firestorm in the church and it went very quickly to the news to Rome itself and Luther was caught on the carpet and he asked indeed begged for dis mutations that is for an opportunity to debate the issue with Roman theologians lest he be misunderstood and criminally indicted well the first of those responses took place in 1518 in May of that year at Heidelberg where Luther was invited to speak to a convention of Augustinian monks and a new general superintendent had been elected to lead that Conclave and Luther fully expected as he was advised by his friends not even to attend that if he went to Heidelberg it would only be a matter of two to three weeks before he would be arrested and executed as a heretic but nevertheless he went and he appeared there at the Conclave in Heidelberg and speaking to issues of the faith and saint of his own monastery st. Agustin and Augustine's view of the depravity of man who apart from God's redemptive grace could not possibly save himself and Luther was so persuasive and so winsome at this Conclave that his the response to it was eminently pleasing to the ears particularly the younger clergy that were assembled in that particular venue and including one who was visiting as a Dominican priest whose name was a name that I know very well and can't remember [Laughter] there was Martin Buser who was at Strasbourg and he became a critical critically important element in the Reformation thereafter and so Luther responds at Heidelberg was one that he considered a victorious moment and he then continued to beseech the church to have serious debate and discussion about the matters well the popularity with which he experienced the reception there in Heidelberg changed dramatically when he was summoned to a dispute with the leading theologian of the Roman Catholic Church Cardinal cajon who was extremely trained in debate and was erudite as the supreme master of theology of 16th century Rome and so he came then to visit with Luther at Augsburg and when they had that debate it was supposedly closed to the outside world and really what Caden wanted was no part of a debate he wanted to simply deliver a message from the church at Rome that Luther was simply to submit to the authority of Rome and say the words revoke oh I recant well Luther wasn't willing to do that without some discussion and so he pressed some points about this issue of the Treasury of merits and in response to that and in one sense Luther was really outclassed by Cajun and Cajun didn't reminded him that this was the official teaching of the church dating back to the 14th century with Clement the 6th of Rome who paid who published a papal bull or a papal encyclical intelligent Genesis Eunice in which he defined clearly the doctrine of the Treasury of Merit and Luther tried to quibble his way past this point of the discussion with Kay Jaden to no avail and cage inton finally got him to admit that Luther was differing from an edict that had come down from the Pope himself early in the 14th century and so losing his patience cajon didn't wanted to just get rid of Luther and have the church burn him at the stake in any case the meeting broke up and it was seen by those who were discussing it in various faculties that cage inton was the winner because he was able to back Luther into such a position where he would say publicly that it was possible that even in a sober and cyclical delivered by the pardon himself that the Pope could earn and even at that point in the dispute Luther was wrestling his case on Scripture and on Scripture alone and then followed another dispute at Leipzig with Germans leading the German leading theologian of that nation whose name was AK the irony of that is the German meaning of the word Eck is corner because Eck cornered Luther where he got into a debate with Luther about earlier heresies that the church had condemned not only by the Pope but by ecclesiastical councils and among those who had been condemned in the past were Wickliffe and particularly John Haase and so ik was able to as I said back Luther into a corner of his own and to describe the heresies for which John HUS had been burned at the stake we were in Prague several years ago and had a guided tour and we saw the church where the Council of Constance was held and where Haase was condemned then our guide said this is the place where John HUS was fired took on a whole new meaning to being fired as the translator used that term instead of being burned at the stake he said he was fired well he was fired in in a major way at that time but the many of the issues that for which John HUS a century before Luthor had been condemned as a heretic included his elevation of Sacred Scripture as the supreme authority of the church and one of the great ironies of church history is that the bishop who pronounced the verdict of judgment against John HUS heard Haase say and that word Haase in Czech means Aarhus as is pronounced in Czech means goose and so he said to the bishop you may cook this goose now but there will come a time where a swan will appear and you won't be able to silence him and at various times of celebration for Lutheran reasons in Germany when Luther's portrait is portrayed in the background is the silhouette of a swan because the German people believed that this was the fulfillment of Hoss's prophecy of the Swan who was to come now here's the irony when Martin Luther was ordained as a priest to monastery in earth he had to lie on his stomach with his arms spread apart prostrate before the altar and right beneath that altar underneath the stone had been interred the remains of the very bishop that had condemned John HUS to death now this isn't part of the history but I think it should be it's legend or myth that I have created just arbitrarily but I like to believe that when John HUS said to the bishop you may cook this goose but the Swan will appear who whom you will not be able to silence that the bishop said to join us over my dead body that's not history but it wouldn't have been great had it actually been part of the historical record so at any case in this maneuvering time ak was able to get Luther to concede that some of the very views for which John HUS have been condemned as a heretics were shared by Luther himself namely the authority of Scripture and here by attacking the legitimacy of the decision of the Council of Constance in the destruction of John who's Luther was actually saying that not only could the Pope make a mistake as he did in the 14th century with the encyclical on the Treasury of merits but here a church council could be wrong in making their deliberate decision of declaring John Haase a heretic so now Luther is guilty on two counts he's denied the availability of the Pope and now the infallibility of the church salts and so by now things are really heating up and in 1521 the newly elected an emperor of the Holy Roman Empire which was a holy war room and or an empire in any case Charles the fifth convened the Imperial diet at forms where Luther received the safe conduct in order to appear before the diet and at last believed he was finally getting what he had want wanted all along a hearing theological debate with Rome the representatives of Rome themselves on the issues particularly of justification by faith alone Luther was warned by his friends not to go to forms saying that this would be a trap set for him and safe conduct or else he would still be risking his life if he would appear at the Imperial diet and Luther respond of that saying if there are many Devils as there are in as there are towels on the roof informs if you ever been to a city in Germany like that and see their their roof tiles you know that he's talking about tens and tens of thousands of houses if there's many devils at forms as there are towels on the roof nevertheless I must go and so he came and appeared before the assembly and as he appeared before the assembly his books were placed on the table and Luther was again denied an opportunity to bait the issues the question was simply are these your books and he acknowledged that indeed they were his books and again they said to him well then you must say before the authorities of the church and the authorities of the state revoke oh I recant and history doesn't show this in the movies that display it the way only Hollywood can Luther trembled before this and he tried to say well what parts of the books do you find offensive certainly there's a lot of things that in this book that I have any controversy at all I firmed the deity of Christ I affirm the atonement all these things and they didn't want to quibble about that they said these are your books say I revoke Oh answer our question non kanuda without horns and then everybody assumes that as the movie show it that Luther stuck out his chest and his chin and he said you know here I stand and all that that's not what happened instead Luther said can I have 24 hours to think it over after all this time and all this crisis and all this controversy he came there and he was asking himself this question can I alone be right about this and so they allowed him 24 hours he went back to his cell in the monastery and he got on his knees and prayed when the most poignant prayers that I've ever read in my life where he cried out before God and he said God where are you are you hiding please rise and defend me at this time the cause is yours and I am yours and then he resolved himself that whatever the outcome would be determined by God's sovereignty Luther would accept and so it was then on the next day that Luther returned to the assembly hall at forms and again they enter and talk interrogatory der said to him now will you say revoke oh now will you give us a plain and simple answer without an equivalent and he said I will answer your question nan canoodle without horns unless I am convinced by Sacred Scripture or by evident reason for Pope's and counsels can and have erred in the past so that unless I'm convinced by Sacred Scripture or by evident reason I will not recant for my conscience is held captive by the Word of God and to act against conscience he said is neither right nor safe let me pause for just a second do you hear what Luther's saying there my conscience may be seared by my guilt my repeated offenses against God maybe I have the forehead of the harlot where I've lost my capacity to blush maybe I've done everything in my power to excuse my sins before the world as we are wanted to do but I'm sorry I've been captured by the Word of God and held captive by the Word of God my conscience is bound by Sacred Scripture and to act against conscience is neither right nor safe here I stand I can do no other god help me and then of course the Assembly Hall erupted in chaos and he mmediately Charles v the Emperor repented of ever granting safety to Luther and Luther zone friends then abducted him and whisked him off in the skies in 1521 at the wart board where he spent his time translating the Bible into German that time that we have in front of us on this clock Bob has changed 15 times in the in the last five minutes so I'm trying to honor that's the time that I have could I have five more minutes okay quickly when the Roman Catholic Church responded in the middle of the sixteenth century with the ecumenical council of trent defining its position on justification and on sacred scripture it was the sixth session on justification that rome declared the justification is by faith faith is necessary a necessary condition to be justified but not a sufficient condition the issue was that little word alone then earlier in the fourth session the debate was how many sources of authority from God do we have in the first draft of the fourth session of the Council of Trent the Latin words were included part team partum that is to say that the truth of God is revealed partly in Scripture and partly in tradition to delegates who were priests to the fourth session of Trent one by the name of unit Co the other by the name of knocking aren't they stood up in protest and said we don't agree with this statement because it undermines the sufficiency and unique authority of Sacred Scripture and then all of a sudden the record shows that the words part team part him disappeared from the text and we're replaced by the simple connective ward at where Rome says that the truth of God is revealed in Sacred Scripture and in tradition well every Protestant believes that we believe that creeds and confessions and NACA medical counsels are important and that God's truth is revealed in Scripture as well as shown to us by our historic confessions and creeds and so the question is did Rome respond to the protest and make that literary change in the Latin between partly this and partly that or was it simply a stylistic question nobody knew at the time some even suspect that it was an intentional a study of ambiguity to let both parties be satisfied but that issue was finally resolved in the 20th century in Pius the 12th encyclical in the 1940s called Himani gainers in which it was said that there are two sources of divine special revelation the Bible and tradition what Luther said in the sixteenth century and then what we say today is as important as the instruction that we receive from the great theologians of the past from the commentaries from the Creed's from the confessions as important as that is there's only one source that has the authority absolutely to bind our consciousness is Sacred Scripture that was the origin of the issue Sola scriptura and what I want to say thank you what I want to say in closing to you dear friends is if we want to see an awakening in our time if we want to see a new Reformation in our time what we're gonna have to see are Christians whose consciences have been captured by Sacred Scripture and can say here we stand we can do no other let me pray once my father and our God we thank you for your words for the prayer of our Lord Himself when he prayed in the upper room father's sanctify them in truth thy Word is truth and so we thank you that you have given us your unadulterated inspired infallible and inerrant revelation upon which we stand and upon which the church stands or falls where we thank you for this in Jesus name Amen roll [Music]

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Length: 31min 28sec (1888 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 18 2017