In recent times, there’s been a major interest in the virtues and heroic accomplishments of the protestant Reformation from Bible-believing Christians. Many of us see that western Christianity is languishing in severe apathy, apostasy, and aimlessness. Therefore, many of us have longingly looked back at the successes of the Reformation in order to find a model for reforming the backslidden Christian life of most of our nominally evangelical churches. I contend that this is almost fruitless, and largely misguided.

Reformation is Needed

Before getting to the many reasons that the Reformation falls woefully short of providing a compatible model of reforming western Christianity, I must bring to your attention some of the proof that a reformation is needed. Sadly, one of the greatest reasons for this need is the many remnants of unbiblical Reformation beliefs and practices that are still alive and well among evangelical assemblies. Let me briefly describe to you two of the chief errors.

  1. The Formal Church Service

It seems to me that the most glaring error of western evangelicalism is the practice of what’s known as the “church service.” Far from being an accurate representation of the gatherings of the New Testament Christians, this practice is actually nothing less than a vestige of the Roman Catholic mass. And the mass gets its inspiration from the Old Testament sacrificial type of worship.

Think about the way that most churches conduct their services. First, almost all of the congregation is facing in one direction, toward what is often called an “altar,” or now — often — a stage. Second, most of the activity is conducted by a select few members, and often mostly by a single leader, usually called “the pastor.” Third, when the Lord’s Supper is celebrated, it’s done in a somber, ritualistic way, which is very much like the Catholic mass distributed, not to a family around an actual table, but to a mass (no pun intended) of individuals, who receive some of the sacrifice of the Lord.

Such practices hinder and deny the fact that the body of Jesus is made up of vital individual parts, each gifted with a unique ability and function to allow the body to perform properly. Rather than seeing the weekly gathering as an opportunity for each member to use his giftedness to encourage, help, and build up the others in the assembly, most believers view the service as mostly an opportunity to merely sing a little, and learn from an expert in Scripture. Which brings us to the next Reformation error.

2. The Clergy/Laity Distinction

Just as there has been in most of Christ’s body in the west since the early middle ages, it’s still the prodominant state of things to have two distinct groups of Christians among the assemblies. The first is the average believer “in the pew,” who holds no office in the church, has no title, and is payed no salary. This is commonly called the “laity”. In stark contrast to the lowly laymen are the elite, specially called, officially appointed, and financially supported “clergy,” most of whom are given the honorable title of “pastor.” These set apart men of God usually have received an extensive formal education, have a degree in theology, and have been officially hired by a congregation or church organization to serve in the roles of administrator, teacher, counselor, visitor, and organizer on a full-time basis. They are often revered as especially holy, closer to God, and essential for almost all of the functions and programs of the church organization.

However, if you study the New Testament’s description of the early assemblies, there was no such marked distinction, nor hierarchy, between so-called “laymen” and “pastors” or “bishops”. All believers in these assemblies had equal standing, equal importance, and equal opportunity to use their gifts to serve the localized community of saints. Although there’s no denying that there are two “offices,” or leadership roles, instituted by the apostles, they are far from being professional occupations, or set apart callings that elevate their holders above the rest of the “normal” Christians.

The Reformation Can’t Be Repeated Now

To summarize why the Reformation shouldn’t be emulated so much by evangelicals (especially self-styled Reformed people), the simple fact is that no such reformation can be even closely mimicked. There are a few major reasons for this.

To begin, we westerners today live in a completely different type of society. The Renaissance Europe of the 1500s was largely dominated by a Roman Catholic mindset, and if not explicitly so, still following the basics of traditional Catholic thinking and morality. This is due to the overwhelming power of the Church in the middle ages, which mostly continued throughout the Renaissance. For the most part, to be European was to be Catholic, even if only in a general view of the world. In other words, the so-called Christian religion was a fundamental part of European society.

Clearly, this isn’t the case at all today. Although this is betrayed by a great number of people’s behavior, no particular religion has any definitive sway over the governance and morality of western societies (except for secular humanism and perhaps Islam). What I’m getting at is that the Reformation wasn’t merely a reformation of individual churches or even denominations, but a reform of whole communities, cities, kingdoms, and eventually nations. And this is largely due to the bond between the Church and the state at the time.

Therefore, when the main reformers — Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Knox, etc. — set out to reform their local churches, they were dealing mostly with people who were already deeply committed to a basically biblical view of the world, man, salvation, and morality. They had much more knowledge and interest to work with, whereas any reformation that’s undertaken today can only aim at individual churches, denominations, and individuals. As westerners, it would simply be impossible to directly reform our whole societies.

Besides this, it shouldn’t even be part of our main goal to reform our society, since the most important community in this world is the body of Jesus. I assure you, as I’ve already hinted at, that western Christians are in dire need for revival and reform. And since we are the only people on earth that have the message and power of salvation to use on perishing sinners in their rebellion against God, it’s of the utmost importance that our focus be on fixing ourselves, before we attempt to holistically fix our societies or governments. The holy nation, royal priesthood, and heavenly embassy on earth (see 1 Peter) must be acting at its highest capacity if we are to have a paradigm-shifting effect on western society. This allows me to bring up the first way in which we shouldn’t attempt to repeat the Reformation.

The Reformation Sought an Unachievable Goal

First, the reformers were really aiming at the wrong goal when they began (especially the German reformers). Luther and his followers sought to reform Catholicism. But, in order to do this, what was required was to reject Catholicism in its essential tenets. Why? Because the very foundations of Roman Catholicism aren’t even from the teachings of Jesus and the apostles. First of all, this false Christianity claims that both the pope and the whole Church possess equal authority to the holy Scriptures. That is, some of what they teach is the very message of God, as if He Himself was speaking. However, what the Scriptures themselves teach is that only they have final authority over all other sources of truth — including all Christians and assemblies of Christians.

The second main tenet of Catholicism is that salvation comes through faith and engaging in the rituals of the Sacraments (aka doing good). It’s claimed by the Church that through doing the good deeds of the Sacraments, God’s grace is earned, and through this grace, one’s sins are atoned for. This is most blasphemously true of the Mass, which is believed to be a supernatural sacrifice of Jesus Himself, through which a believer receives grace through literal body and blood, thus receiving forgiveness. However, this is a blatant denial of the sufficiency and efficacy of Jesus’s once and for all death on the cross, which payed the full penalty for all of believers’ sins, and is never to be repeated again, but only relied on as the grounds of God’s full and complete forgiveness. In effect, per Catholicism, Jesus’s death and resurrection weren’t enough to pay for people’s sins, but they must atone for their sins by pleasing God through the Sacraments. This all means that the very foundations of the Church in the 1500s were already worthless, and beyond repair. There was no restoring the Church to spiritual health, since it was a spiritual corpse. This is only proven by the fact that the reformers could never unite with the Church, but had to establish new churches.

Most of the Reformation Leaders Used State Power to Impose, Maintain, and Enforce Reformation

Another aspect of the Reformation which must not be imitated is enlisting the violent threat of the state in order to impose biblical Christianity on people. In other contexts, this is referred to as theonomy, which literally means “God’s law”. Aside from the fact that this would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, in most cases, to achieve, this is no means of truly reforming God’s people.

For the magisterial reformers, they were largely able to ally themselves with rulers and legislatures to basically legislate Christian behavior because of the aforementioned fact of the union between the state, the church, and their societies. For Europeans at the time, part of being a good member of society was following the popular religious practices of the community. Thus, most people attended the weekly church service, even if they had no genuine commitment to the Church’s teachings. If someone went against this, they would usually be an outcast in their community, and viewed as a harmful blight. Hence, it was quite natural for the reformers who had friends in high places to persuade them to enforce the religious and moral changes that they had partly brought about. This can be seen in the lives of Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin. All three of them used the power of government officials (and their police) to legislate adherence to the new practices of worship, and a stricter morality. Obviously, due to the large degree of religious liberty that is usually enforced by modern-day western governments, such government-imposed religion can’t (and shouldn’t) be attempted.

The Reformation is Ongoing

Far from being successful in bringing reform back to pure New Testament Christianity, the Protestant Reformation was only a beginning of widespread revival that still continues now. At the end of the initial reformation during the beginning of the 1600s, the magisterial reformers and their closest followers had only accomplished the partial establishment of a New Testament Christianity.

In addition to the unbiblical characteristics already described, at least three other errors still remained to be rejected. These were infant baptism, the church membership of people merely on the basis of their infant baptism, and the union of church and state. Many of the nations that were significantly transformed by the Reformation instituted churches funded and supported by their governments. These included the Netherlands, Denmark, and England.

Although the magisterial reformers were successful in bringing genuine Christianity into their communities, they still stopped far short of restoring pure New Testament church life. Thankfully, there were those outliers during this time that went further than the popular reformers, and reinstituted believer’s baptism, believer church membership, and the separation of church and state. Most of them are referred to as the Anabaptists. Although there were some fanatics among them, many of them were genuine believers who began to closely follow the teachings and practices of the apostles and the early assemblies. Sadly, many of them were suppressed, and even killed or exiled, by self-professing Protestants. This is a big reason why their significance and successes are lesser known.

But following in the footsteps and teachings of the Anabaptists, there arose some Protestant groups that sought to follow the New Testament teachings as closely as possible. Most of them lived in England, and came to be known as the “Baptists”. In spite of their great strides in restoring New Testament Christianity, even Baptists have mostly failed to reform the vestiges of Roman Catholicism from western Christianity.

This is why I call you, believer, to compare the beliefs and practices of your assembly with the New Testament teaching, even though you may assume your in alignment with it. Examine your assembly rituals, structure, and leadership. Does your weekly gathering truly look like the gatherings of the believers in the New Testament — even in a small way? Is your leadership consistent with the leadership model outlined by the Lord and the apostles? Is your assembly more of a formal organization resembling a business, or is it a true spiritual family of brothers and sisters who share life together, and encourage each other to become more like the Lord? These are the things that need reforming today.

There is one major emphasis of the Reformation that must be taken to heart by us. And that is the teaching of sola Scriptura, or “Scripture alone” being the final authority for all our beliefs and practices as believers. I urge you to strive with all your heart and soul to be as faithful to the Scriptures of the apostles, evangelists, and prophets as possible, so you can see reform in your life, as well as in the lives of your closest brethren. At that point, the Lord has promised to use us to rescue many sinners through the demonstration and proclamation of the good news of the forgiveness of sins through faith alone.