Christian History Home > Issue 39 > Luther's Will and Testaments
Luther's Will and Testaments
He bequeathed statements of belief that guide millions of Christians today.
Dr. Eugemne F.A. Klug is professor of systematic theology and Luther studies at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and author of Getting into the Formula of Concord (Concordia, 1977). | posted 7/01/1993 12:00AM
Thomas Carlyle once described Martin Luther as “great, not as a hewn obelisk, but as an Alpine mountain, so simple, honest, spontaneous, not setting up to be great at all; there for another purpose than being great at all!” That “purpose” was, in Luther’s mind, to preserve and proclaim God-given doctrine.
The thought never nested in Luther’s mind that the doctrine for which he stood was his own. “It is not my doctrine, not my creation, but God’s gift,” he declared in a 1531 sermon. “Dear Lord God, it was not spun out of my head, nor grown in my garden. Nor did it flow out of my spring, nor was it born of me. It is God’s gift, not a human discovery.”
Confession of God-given doctrine has characterized the church bearing Luther’s name ever since. Nine documents, or “symbols,” define the Lutheran Church and its theology:
1. The Apostles’ Creed
2. The Nicene Creed
3. The Athanasian Creed
4. The unaltered Augsburg Confession
5. The Apology of the Augsburg Confession
...
7. Luther’s Large Catechism
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