The Story of the Monk Who Changed the World
With God’s Help
Martin Luther knelt before the altar in the monastery chapel. This was the official ceremony when Martin was made a monk. “What do you seek here?” asked a priest leading the service.
“God’s grace, and your mercy,” answered Martin.1
The priest next asked, “Are you married?” Martin had been born twenty-one years before in Eisleben, Germany, on November 10, 1483. He was christened at Saints Peter and Paul Church the next day. Martin was raised as a faithful Roman Catholic. That was the only Christian church present in Western Europe at the time. Soon after Martin’s birth, the family moved to Mansfeld where, at age seven, Martin entered the Mansfeld Latin School. Martin learned Latin grammar and prayers, and he memorized Aesop’s Fables. Since those early years, Martin had been a diligent student—first in Mansfeld and most recently at the university in Erfurt. He’d had little time for anything but studying. No, Martin had never been married.
“Are you hiding a secret sickness?” Martin’s entire reason for coming to the monastery was to please God and find grace through his good works. Martin was willing to do anything for God’s favor. He felt guilt and fear over his sin-sick soul, but he wasn’t hiding any physical sickness.
Martin answered “No” to each question. Then, the priest explained what life as a monk would involve. Martin could never get married, and he would be poor. He’d wear rough clothing, eat simple meals, and go without food regularly. Martin would have to wake up in the middle of the night for prayer, and he’d work hard at chores throughout the day.
The Story of Martin Luther
Jared Kennedy
This biography takes middle-graders on an exciting journey through Martin Luther’s life, exploring how God's Word transformed the world. Part of the Lives of Faith and Grace series, this book shows how God works through ordinary people.
“Are you ready to take up these burdens?”
“Yes, with God’s help,” Martin declared.
Next, the monks at the ceremony sang a hymn, and Martin lay on the floor with his arms stretched out wide in the shape of a cross. From that day forward, Martin committed to a life characterized by self-sacrifice.
From the Monastery to Rome
Despite this difficult life in the monastery, Martin thrived. He was a diligent monk. He excelled at his studies. He diligently kept the routine of the seven daily prayer vigils, and he fasted, sometimes for three days in a row without touching a crumb. “I was a good monk,” Martin later wrote, “and I kept the rule of my order so strictly that I might say that if ever a monk got to heaven by his monkery it was I.”2
Five years after entering the monastery, Martin walked 700 miles across the Alps, from Erfurt, Germany, to Rome, Italy. Why did he go? Was it to see Rome’s magnificent buildings, monuments, and art?
No, Martin Luther went to Rome for the saints. The Catholic church teaches that when godly saints behave better than they need to, they can store up a surplus of goodness in the Church’s heavenly bank account. To receive a portion of these “heavenly merits” and reduce the consequences due for their sins, Christians in Martin Luther’s time were told they could earn, or purchase, an indulgence. An indulgence is like a coupon for the saints’ heavenly merits. Christians could buy these coupons by giving money to the church, or by praying and taking communion at a sacred shrine dedicated to a saint.
When Martin arrived in Rome, he spent any extra time he had visiting these sacred shrines. He stopped at ones that supposedly displayed the apostle Peter’s skull, the finger of doubting Thomas, and the chains that bound Paul while he was in prison. Martin even saw a piece of wood said to be from Christ’s cross. Rome had more indulgence shops and shrines to sacred objects (known as relics) than anywhere else in the world. During his stay, Martin visited more than he could count.
Martin thought going to shrines and buying indulgences would make him more confident and capable of fulfilling God’s righteous demands. But the more Martin saw of Rome, the weaker his faith became. Before he left Rome, Martin visited one of the city’s most holy places: the Scala Sancta. This “holy stairway” is said to be the steps Jesus climbed on his way to stand trial before Pontius Pilate. Martin crawled up the stairs on his knees and repeated the Lord’s Prayer on each step. When he reached the top, he felt no comfort. The storm of doubt swirled within him. He stood up and said, “Who knows whether this works?”3
From Rome to God’s Righteousness
Martin Luther returned to Erfurt sad and despairing. To add to his misery, he was soon transferred away from his friends in the bustling city of Erfurt to the backwater village of Wittenberg. There he got to know Johann von Staupitz, the leader of the Augustinian order. Staupitz was a wise and gentle man, and he wanted to help Martin. Staupitz was convinced that curing Martin of his depression would mean taking the young monk’s focus off himself and sending him out to serve others.
Years later, Martin would write, “If it had not been for Dr. Staupitz, I should have sunk in hell.”4 But Martin’s gratitude for his mentor didn’t come right away. In the fall of 1511, the two men sat under a pear tree in front of the Black Cloister monastery, Martin’s new home in Wittenberg. There Staupitz gave Martin some unwelcome news. Martin had a new assignment: “You will be a preacher and a teacher of the Bible.”5
It’s not the strength or size of our faith that saves us. It’s Christ outside of us who saves.
Martin panicked. “I’m not qualified,” he said. Then, he rattled off a list of reasons he couldn’t do it. Staupitz wouldn’t change his mind, so on that day, Martin Luther was given a job to do. Martin finished his studies, and the next year, he joined the faculty at the University of Wittenberg. Teaching God’s word was Luther’s new job, a role that would change both him and the world.
Six years later, Martin Luther posted his Ninety-Five Theses, a document that called into question Roman Catholic teaching about indulgences. That act started one of world history’s most significant Christian movements—the Protestant Reformation. Martin would go on to publish hundreds of books, sermons, and hymns. He translated the entire Bible into the language of the common people in Germany. His teaching changed the way poor peasants and rich nobles in Germany related to one another, and it was a major turning point for the church in Europe and throughout the world. It changed what people believed, how they worshiped, and how they lived.
What made the difference? How did an unknown and insecure monk become a world-changing force? The answer is in the words “the righteousness of God.”
Romans 1:16–17 says, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel . . . for in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith.” When Martin Luther was growing up in school and at the monastery, he learned to think about the righteousness, or justice, of God as God’s active judgment against sin. He later wrote, “Though I lived as a good monk and no one could criticize my actions, I felt and knew that I was a sinner before God. I had an extremely disturbed conscience. . . . I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners.”6
But when Martin was made a university professor and began studying the Bible, he began to see “the righteousness of God” in a new light. Martin saw how Jesus Christ took on our humanity, how he lived a perfect life and died the painful and shameful death of the cross to take the punishment due for sins. Martin saw how God raised Jesus from the dead and how he now justifies Christians by faith. God declares that in his sight, Jesus’s righteous life and sacrificial death count for every believer. In this way, the “righteousness of God” isn’t merely his justice or judgment; it’s his gift of salvation.
What happened when Martin made this discovery? He described it: “Then I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise through open gates.”7 After that day, Martin began to teach that the righteousness God gives Christians can’t be earned by purchasing an indulgence, by saying a prayer, or even by having a good attitude. Our righteousness is ultimately found in and belongs to another: our Savior Jesus Christ.
In his Lectures on Galatians, Martin compared faith to the metal clasp of a ring. He said, “Faith takes hold of Christ, holding on to him like a ring holds its gem.”8
It’s not the metal band that gives the ring its worth. The value comes from the diamond the ring holds. In the same way, it’s not the strength or size of our faith that saves us. It’s Christ outside of us who saves. This is the beautiful truth Martin Luther proclaimed to the world: Christ is our righteousness. We must hold on to him.
Notes:
- Herman Selderhuis, Martin Luther: A Spiritual Biography (Crossway, 2017), 48. The remainder of the initiation ceremony reconstructed from Roland H. Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther Abingdon-Cokesbury, 1950), 34–35.
- Bainton, Here I Stand, 45.
- Adapted from Bainton, Here I Stand, 51.
- Bainton, Here I Stand, 53.
- Todd R. Hains, Martin Luther and the Rule of Faith: Reading God’s Word for God’s People, New Explorations in Theology (IVP Academic, 2022), 1; cf. James M. Kittelson and Hans H. Wiersma, Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career, 2nd ed. (Fortress, 2016), 45.
- Martin Luther, “45. Preface to the Complete Edition of Luther’s Latin Writings (Wittenberg, 1545)” in Martin Luther’s Basic Theological Writings, 3rd ed., Timothy F. Lull and William R. Russell, eds. (Fortress, 2012) 497
- Luther, “Latin Writings (1545),” 497.
- Martin Luther, “Lectures on Galatians, chapters 1–4 (1535)” in LW 26:132.
Jared Kennedy is the author of The Story of Martin Luther: The Monk Who Changed the World.
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