GYC West 2014: I Am The Conflict Continues

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GYC West

Dave Fiedler

You Have A Name

If you are here Perhaps for the first meeting today, your first meeting, let me just fill you in a little bit.

Previous speakers have been tracing the great controversy down through history.

We began with the fall of Lucifer and the temptation in the garden.

We've worked our way on down through the various episodes, looking at the life of Christ and of his sacrifice on the cross.

We're going to continue that historical progression.

Jumping ahead, however, more than a millennium, we're going to come down to the time of the Reformation.

There are many lessons that we could draw from the Reformation.

This morning I just want to focus on perhaps the simplest of them.

Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.

Father we invite your presence in your spirit.

And yet preserve in our hearts and in our minds the simplicity of what it means to trust you.

If you'll turn with me to the third chapter of the book of Revelation.

And Jesus says to the angel of the church in Sardis, write, these things says he who has the 7 spirits of God and the 7 stars, I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead.

It's not a very promising beginning, is it?

It may be a surprise, but this is the Church of the Reformation.

We look at the Reformation as a highlight of sacred history.

The scripture tells us they have a name, that they are alive, but they were dead.

Well, 1 thing to remember is that anytime you try to encapsulate a long period of time into a few verses, you're going to have to cut a few corners and not address every detail.

So I wouldn't think that this would apply with equal force to everyone at every point in time.

This may be especially difficult in a sense for Seventh-day Adventists in a peculiar way because hopefully, and if not, I sincerely recommend that you read Great Controversy and when you read the chapters on the Reformation you don't hear a lot about the you are dead part.

Ellen White chose, and I would say wisely chose, to present the Reformation and its leading characters in a positive and faith-building light.

And without intending any disrespect whatsoever for any of them, for the simple reason that they were all better men than I am, they were yet men.

And they did fall short at times and in ways.

We have the great principles, sola scriptura, Bible alone, never let go of that.

Sola Fide, faith, Trust the simplicity of that.

It is a faith that purifies itself by love, but it is faith alone.

Well, some of the prominent aspects of the Reformation here.

Some of these great quotes, don't you love these quotes?

I shall not die, but live and again declare the evil deeds of the friars.

Most joyfully will I wear this crown of shame for thy sake O Jesus Who for me didst wear a crown of thorns?

And John Hus went to the fires of the stake singing, Jesus Thou Son of David, have mercy on me.

To pray well is the better half of study.

If ever monk could obtain heaven by his monkish works, I should certainly have been entitled to it.

In matters of conscience, the majority has no power.

We shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in England as I trust shall never be put out.

Do you know where and when that was said?

There is a call in scripture, there is a call in God's service to rise to higher heights, to do more than we can humanly do, To play the man in Christ Jesus, the full stature of the man.

And if God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plow to know more of scripture than you do.

In an age when the Bible was not readily available, that was a serious threat.

Historians in looking at the Reformation have divided the reformers into 2 categories.

You know, scholars always want to try and get a handle on something so they can understand it.

And so we speak of the magisterial reformers and the radical reformers.

The name magisterial doesn't come from, well, it sort of comes from majesty.

And it has to do with the working relationship, shall we say, the understanding between the reformers and the reformation, the element of it that they represented, and the rulers of whatever territory they were in.

The magisterial reformers are the ones who, in 1 way or another, and there were variations, developed a fairly tight, shall we say, working relationship with the political powers.

The radical reformers did not, and they chose not to.

Sometimes, sometimes they displayed less than perfect wisdom in their handling of matters.

It's an interesting distinction to be made between the magisterial and the radical reformers.

And there's something to be learned from this.

Martin Luther, early on in the process of the Reformation made this comment.

He said, Be it known to your Highness that I am going to Wittenberg under protection of a higher than that of princes and electors.

There is no sword that can further this cause.

God alone must do everything without the help or concurrence of man.

I'm just gonna pop this up here, make it a little bit easier.

Luther at this point in his experience said, this is God's problem.

You know, we don't need the royal protection.

There's an aspect of this that I haven't found much discussed within Adventism, and so it's kind of interesting and I want to just touch on it as we go past.

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You Have A Name

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