Luther on Music

Forward to Georg Rhau's Collection, "Symphoniae iucundae."

I, Doctor Martin Luther, wish all lovers of the unshackled art of music grace and peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ!

I truly desire that all Christians would love and regard as worthy the lovely gift of music, which is a precious, worthy, and costly treasure given to mankind by God.

The riches of music are so excellent and so precious that words fail me whenever I attempt to discuss and describe them... In summary, next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world. It controls our thoughts, minds, hearts, and spirits...

Our dear fathers and prophets did not desire without reason that music be always used in the churches. Hence, we have so many songs and psalms.

This precious gift has been given to man alone that he might thereby remind himself that God has created man for the express purpose of praising and extolling God.

However, when man's natural musical ability is whetted and polished to the extent that it becomes an art, then do we note with great surprise the great and perfect wisdom of God in music, which is, after all, His product and His gift; we marvel when we hear music in which one voice sings a simple melody, while three, four, or five other voices play and trip lustily around the voice that sings its simple melody and adorn this simple melody wonderfully with artistic musical effects, thus reminding us of a heavenly dance, where all meet in a spirit of friendliness, caress and embrace.

A person who gives this some thought and yet does not regard music as a marvelous creation of God, must be a clodhopper indeed and does not deserve to be called a human being; he should be permitted to hear nothing but the braying of asses and the grunting of hogs.

-Martin Luther

Casper Olevianus on the Benefits Believers Receive from the Resurrection of Christ.

102 Q. What benefits do believers receive from the resurrection of Christ?

A. Four in all. First, the resurrection of Christ is a sure testimony to us that God considers us to be as just and righteous in His eyes as the body of Christ was when He arose from the dead out of all of our sins. This is what St. Paul teaches in 1 Corinthians 15[:17]: "If Christ were not risen, you would still be in your sins." From that it follows that since Christ has risen, believers are no longer in their sins. Not that there is no more sin in them but that it is pardoned and not imputed to them. Christ died not in His own sin but in all of those sins of ours that we commit right up to our death, and He arose out of all of those selfsame sins. It necessarily follows, therefore, that every single one of our sins laid upon His body is completely punished and paid for. Otherwise Christ could not have arisen. For if even one sin remains, death, the penalty for sin, also remains (Rom. 6[:23]). This teaching is found in the verse mentioned a short while ago (1 Cor. 15[:17]) and in Romans 4[:25]: "Christ was delivered up because of our offenses and was raised because of our justification."

103 Q. What is the second benefit?

A. By the power of our Head, Jesus Christ, through the Spirit of faith, we rise in this life to a new life. Humanity was created in God's image to glorify and praise Him forever in a holy and upright life. It was necessary, therefore, that Christ raise us with Him by the power of His Spirit in order that we might begin to glorify and praise God here, until we reach the goal of perfection after this life (2 Cor. 4; Phil. 2; Col. 3; Rom. 6,8).

104 Q. What is the third benefit?

A. The resurrection of Christ is a guarantee to us that our bodies will also rise unto eternal life. For since not only our souls but also our bodies are members of Christ (1 Cor. 6:15) and it would be a disgrace to Christ's body to leave its members forever in the stench of decay, it must follow that the same Spirit who raised the body of Christ from the dead and dwells in our bodies will raise our bodies from the dead (Rom. 6[:4ff.]; 8[:11]). They will conform to the glorious body of Christ, with complete victory over sin and death and perfect righteousness and radiance (Phil. 3[:21]; 1 Cor. 15[:53-57]).

105 Q. Now give the last benefit.

A. We are certain that Christ has gained the victory for Himself and us against our enemies, namely, sin, mockery and scorn, death, and the power of Satan -- which are not only our enemies but also and especially Christ's. It is with joyful hearts, therefore, that we now accept whatever adversity these enemies bring upon us in this world. We do so with a sure confidence that all of this together will not only not hinder but even further the delight and enjoyment of our victory, already gained and freely given to us by Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15[:57]: "Thanks be to God, who gave us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 2 Corinthians 4[:10]: "We always carry about in our body the dying of Christ the Lord, that his life may also be manifested in our mortal flesh." See also 1 John 5 and 1 Peter 1.

- Casper Olivianus, A Firm Foundation (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1995)

Alleluia! The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia!

Bavinck On The Difference Between the Lutherans and Calvinists

Being a Reformed student at a Lutheran university I'm naturally interested in trying my best to understand where the differences are in the two theologies of the Reformation. Awhile ago I came across a short little section in Bavinck's dogmatics where he says the differences between the two can be clearly demonstrated by their difference in principle.

"For all the agreement between them--extending even to the confession of predestination--there was from the very beginning an important difference between the German and the Swiss Reformation... Historical researches into the characteristic difference between the two in recent years have clearly demonstrated that underlying the split is a difference of principle... The difference seems to be conveyed best by saying that the Reformed Christian thinks theologically, the Lutheran anthropologically. The Reformed person is not content with an exclusively historical stance but raises his sights to the idea, the eternal decree of God. By contrast the Lutheran takes his position in the midst of the history of redemption and feels no need to enter more deeply into the counsel of God. For the Reformed, therefore, election is the heart of the church; for Lutherans, justification is the article by which the church stands or falls. Among the former the primary question is: How is the glory of God advanced? Among the latter it is: How does a human get saved? The struggle of the former is above all against paganism--idolatry; that of the latter against Judaism--works-righteousness. The Reformed person does not rest until he has traced all things retrospectively to the divine decree, tracking down the "wherefore" of things, and has prospectively made all things subservient to the glory of God; the Lutheran is content with the "that" and enjoys the salvation in which he is, by faith, a participant. From this difference in principle, the dogmatic controversies between them (with respect to the image of God, original sin, the person of Christ, the order of salvation, the sacraments, church government, ethics, etc.) can be easily explained."

- Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 4 vols. (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2003), 1:176-177.

I have some thoughts on this but I'd be curious to hear what you think. Does Bavinck get it right?

The First Resurrection

Brian Vos pastor of Trinity United Reformed Church has a great sermon on The Heidelberg Catechism Lord's Day 16 Question 42. His focus is on The First Resurrection in Rev. 20:4-6.

You can find the sermon here

Also last semester I took a class on the book of Revelation and wrote a paper on the First Resurrection which you can find on the right hand side of this blog. Essentially I defended Meredith Kline's (as well as G.K. Beale's, and William Hendricksen's) thesis that the First Resurrection is the death of the believer (not baptism), while also looking at and critiquing the classic dispensational view and an alternative reformed/lutheran view of the First Resurrection (regarded as baptism).

Hope you will find it to be encouraging and helpful!