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Episode 110 · July 9, 2026 · 44:32

Protestant Audacity

In this episode of Peaceable and Kind, Derek Vreeland continues the Holy Convergence series by exploring the gift of Protestantism: audacity.

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Show Notes

In this episode of Peaceable and Kind, Derek Vreeland continues the Holy Convergence series by exploring the gift of Protestantism: audacity. Audacity is the courage to challenge assumptions, confront corruption, and pursue reform when faithfulness requires it. While audacity can easily become arrogance when detached from humility and love, it has also been the driving force behind many of history’s most important movements for renewal and justice.  

The episode traces the origins of the Protestant Reformation through the life of Martin Luther, the German monk whose spiritual struggle led him to rediscover the biblical message of salvation by grace through faith. Derek recounts Luther’s famous thunderstorm vow, his growing concerns over indulgences, and the events surrounding the Ninety-Five Theses. What began as a call for theological debate eventually became a movement that transformed the church, reshaped Europe, and challenged one of the most powerful institutions in the world. 

Beyond Luther, Derek highlights other reformers such as Huldrych Zwingli, John Calvin, and William Tyndale, whose courage helped spread the Reformation throughout Europe. He also explores the Five Solas as a summary of Protestant theology, while offering thoughtful reflections on both their strengths and limitations. 

Ultimately, this episode argues that the gift of Protestantism is not division for its own sake, but the willingness to continually ask whether our beliefs, practices, and traditions remain faithful to Jesus and the gospel. The church must always be willing to reform itself when necessary, keeping Christ at the center of all things. 

 

Key Takeaways 

 

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Transcript

Welcome back to another Episode of Peaceable and Kind. I am your host, Derek Freeland. Thank you for joining me for this episode. We are in a miniseries of sorts here at Peaceable and Kind. Where we are talking about a holy convergence. This is something that I’ve experienced personally. This is something that our church is experiencing. It is a convergence of various gifts offered from seven different Christian traditions. And today I want to talk about Protestant audacity. But before we jump into today’s episode, let me invite you to subscribe if you are new to Peaceable and Kind. Leave us a rating and review. I would love to hear from you and what you think about this holy convergence. It’s been difficult for me as a pastor to really explain the flavor and the vibe and values of our church when people say, Well what kinda what kind of church is Word of Life Church where I serve as a pastor? And often my default is, well, we’re a Jesus church. We’re making disciples of Jesus. We’re leading people to Jesus. And that’s a simple answer, but If the person asking the question has some kind of church background, they usually mean something deeper, or at least they want more information. And so I often will ask them about their church background. Because I go on to explain that we are both non-denominational and we are interdenominational in the sense that we are a congregation that has been influenced by seven different traditions that as a church we are a convergence of these seven different traditions. So I’ve been exploring these traditions on the Podcast and I want to talk today about Protestant Audacity. I do like that word audacity. The word itself reflects the nature of what we’re talking about because Audacity is an attitude. It is a willingness to challenge established norms. So if you are a keeper of the norms that are being challenged, you might see an audacious person sort of in a negative light, especially if that audacious person is self-assured and smug and arrogant and often when someone is is audacious people will say, how dare they? Who do they think they are? But Audacity can also describe a person with courage, with boldness to Challenge assumptions, to ask questions, to speak the truth, when silence would often be safer. Every meaningful reform movement that we’ve ever seen requires a measure of audacity. And reform is always necessary because people are fallible. We are going to make mistakes And audacity can be felt in the hearts of people who say that the world as it presently is doesn’t need to continue. That change, real change, is possible So as we look back historically, we can find audacity among the Hebrew prophets of ancient Israel We can find audacity among the thinkers at the heart of the scientific revolution in the seventeenth century. The brave men and women of the civil rights movement in the nineteen sixties had it. And in the 16th century, Audacity lived in the heart of an Augustinian German monk. Of course, I’m talking about Martin Luther. Luther became the spark for a reformation movement which has now become its own unique and somewhat diverse Christian tradition. The Protestant Reformation in Western Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries took extraordinary courage. The Protestant Reformers took on one of the most powerful institutions in the world at that time. the Roman Catholic Church. And to set the scene, it’s important to note that the Reformers didn’t desire a fracture. They didn’t start off by simply wanting to break away from the Roman Catholic Church. The Reformers, including Martin Luther, didn’t want to start something new. Like all renewal movements in the Church, they wanted to see the Church they loved returned to its biblical and apostolic roots. They understood that faithfulness to God sometimes requires questioning established traditions. And this is what reformers do. They want to push the envelope by asking questions. And for church leaders who are entrenched in institutions, those questions can be threatening. And for me, asking questions in the face of strict, uh, dogmatic, rigid, religious institutions and systems. Will often get you in trouble. So to understand the true audacity of the reformers, we need to understand the world they inhabited. So let’s go back more than 500 years. In the early 16th century, the Roman Catholic Church dominated Western Europe. The Catholic Church was more than just simply a religious institution as we understand religion today I mean, those of us living in modern liberal democracies have grown up with a natural division between the civic nation and religious institutions Although in recent times Christian nationalism has been working to blur that distinction always for the benefit of the state, by the way. Anytime Christian nationalists work to merge together the Christian faith with the civic life of the state. It’s always to the detriment of the church and the benefit of the state. But I digress. Let’s go back to the world before the Reformation. Before the Protestant Reformation The Catholic Church’s shadow fell on politics, on education, economics. It dominated the culture. Western Europe at that time had been thoroughly Christianized, which by the way is not to say that it always looked Christ-like. because often it didn’t. When you merge together the spirit of empire, which was very present, in Western Europe at that time, with the gospel, uh things are going to be out of sorts What often happens is that political leaders use the language of the Christian faith without the soul of the faith. So to say that Western Europe was Christianized does not mean they were Christ-like. Western Europe had become culturally Christian. where many people were nominally Christian. That is, they were Christian in name only. And they they didn’t have a choice. They didn’t choose faith. They didn’t choose the Christian faith. I mean If you were born in what we now know as Germany, in the fifteen hundreds, you were Christian by the same means that you spoke some form of German. You didn’t choose it, you just grew up with it. There was no difference between being German and being Christian. It meant the same thing. And that is problematic. And so in this world that gave birth to the Protestant Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church dominated everything. Kings sought the approval of church leaders. Universities were connected to the church. I mean, just Everyday ordinary people experienced every major life event in connection with the church. birth and marriage and confession and burial. And the only church in Western Europe was the Roman Catholic Church. There was no Baptist church down the street you could go to. There was no Presbyterian church across town. There was no hip young non-denominational church with cool music and a coffee bar to be found. The church was the Catholic Church. So to challenge what the church was teaching and what the church was doing in your city. Could be viewed as a threat to the very fabric of social order itself And so before the Reformation, there was order that was created by the church, but there was a growing dissatisfaction. Now, truth be told, many church leaders lived faithfully to Jesus, lived out the gospel. They were serving their churches and serving and caring for the poor, but corruption was also widespread. There was Political maneuvering within the church, financial abuses, moral failures among some clergy. And this was causing concern Among those in Western Europe who believed in Jesus and were truly living out the gospel. And so calls for reform had been raised before Martin Luther in Germany. So, for example, John Wycliffe in England. He had been criticizing church corruption back in the fourteenth century. John Huss in Bohemia, which is modern day Czech Republic, he had called for reform in the fifteenth century and was eventually condemned for heresy. and burned at the stake. The desire for reform existed long before Martin Luther arrived on the scene But history often waits for the right person at the right moment. And Luther was that right person. So let me give you a little background on the life of the Protestant reformer Martin Luther. He was born in Germany in 1483. And as a young man, he was smart, but he was also deeply concerned about his relationship with God. Now, some popular portrayal sometimes will reduce Luther to this cartoonish rebel. who dislike church authority. But in reality, Luther loved the church and began his ministry as a devoted Catholic monk with vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. So Luther, very early on, as a young adult, saw himself as a servant to the church. And here’s how he entered into the monastery. It was July 1505 and Martin Luther was 22 years old, and he was traveling near the village of Statternheim when he found himself caught in a violent thunderstorm. And he was absolutely terrified when a lightning bolt struck nearby. And so he cried out to one of the saints. He said, Help me, Saint Anne, I will become a monk. And believing that he had been spared from death, Luther took his vow seriously. and kept his vow. Within a few weeks he entered an Augustinian monastery. And as a monk he fasted and prayed He often confessed his sins. He just saw himself as a as a corrupted sinner from the inside out. He pursued every spiritual discipline available to him, and yet his soul was troubled. He did not feel forgiven of his sins. On one occasion Luther painfully climbed a staircase on his knees, a stone staircase. kissing each step and praying the Lord’s Prayer along the way. He did this because he wanted to be absolved of his sins. And so in the unsettledness of his troubled soul, he was asking, how? Could a holy God even accept sinful people? How could anyone know they were forgiven? And he was asking, what must I do as a sinful man to be justified before a holy God? Now, Luther was smart. He was reading and writing Latin as a child. His dad wanted him to become a lawyer, and I bet he would have been a successful lawyer, but As a monk, he remained studious and he was devoted to Jesus and the church. And so Luther studied the scriptures. Especially Paul’s letter to the Romans, and he became convinced that salvation was not earned through human effort. but was received simply through faith in Jesus. He came to believe that a person was justified By God’s grace through faith. That conviction would eventually ignite a revolution, one that would require both perseverance and audacity And that audacious moment came in 1517. Luther at this time had become increasingly bothered by the church’s practice of selling indulgences. Indulgences were connected to the Church’s teaching about purgatory. By the time of Martin Luther, the Roman Catholic Church taught the doctrine of purgatory, which was this Step below heaven, where people after death, on their way to heaven, would be purified of their sins through a process of post-mortem suffering And so during the time of Luther, the church was teaching the selling of indulgences, that if you made a financial contribution to the church, you could receive an indulgence, a pardon from purgatory that could be used for you, or one that could be granted to a family member currently suffering there And John Tetzel was in Martin Luther’s Germany selling indulgences. He even had a slogan for his fundraising practice. The slogan went something like, When the coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs. And as you can imagine, this was a very successful fundraising endeavor. Imagine Tetzel coming to your town, asking you, well, do you have a mother still living? No. Is your mother dead? Yes. Well, is she suffering in purgatory? Well, maybe. Well, if she’s suffering Wouldn’t you like for her soul to be released from purgatory so she can go to heaven? Well, for a donation of any amount. We can ensure that your dear mother is not suffering any longer. I mean, just think how manipulative and diabolical that scheme is. Well, just as uneasy as you feel, that’s what Martin Luther felt. He became convinced that the practice of selling indulgences distorted the gospel and it gave people false assurance So in response, Luther wrote a document known as the Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences. what we know today as the ninety-five theses. So on October thirty-first 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the Wittenberg Chapel. This is a very famous historical event. Now, he did so to start a theological debate about the nature of indulgences But there was no takers. Nobody wanted to have a theological debate. And here’s what’s so remarkable about this whole thing, the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. I mean, Luther did not initially intend on launching a new church. He simply wanted to have a conversation. The nailing of the ninety five theses upon the door of the Wittenberg Chapel was nothing more than the call for an academic discussion. That’s all he wanted. He believed that abuses in the church should be corrected, to which, you know, we’re saying amen to that I mean, he still considered himself a faithful Catholic. Remember, as a monk, he had vows of obedience, not only to the abbot, but to the church itself. But ideas like Martin Luther’s audacious ideas of questioning church practice Well, those ideas have consequences. And so the printing press spread Luther’s arguments and complaints about corruption in the church. Across Europe with unprecedented speed. I mean, the invention of the printing press was to Luther’s day what the internet and social media has become for our day. In fact, I don’t think the Protestant Reformation would have taken root without the technological advancement of the printing press So let’s keep a spirit of gratitude when it comes to technology. Yes, we need to be cautious around technology. I mean we’re asking those questions now about smartphones and social media and apps on our phone and how is that shaping ourselves? We’re asking questions about AI technology and we’re just at the cusp of an AI revolution. So we need to be skeptical and ask questions, but we also need not be afraid of technology. the technology of the printing press gave scripture into the hands of common people. And without the printing press, I don’t think the Protestant Reformation would have ever happened. Hey friends, I want to pause this episode for just a moment to let you know that Resurrection, eight lessons on how God restores us, the third and final book in the God in the Neighborhood Bible study. series is out now. Go to the show notes for ordering information. Luther’s ideas began to spread, and what began as the request for an academic discussion quickly became of movement, and here is where we encounter Protestant audacity. Luther was challenging assumptions that had become deeply embedded in the religious culture of his day. Assumptions about the supremacy of Catholic hierarchy, including the authority of the Pope the Bishop of Rome, the head of the church. Luther had the audacity to ask Should church traditions be judged by Scripture? I mean he dared to question Whether church authorities could be wrong. He dared to suggest that ordinary Christians needed direct access to Scripture And this audacity reverberated through Europe. It intensified rapidly. Church authorities came knocking on Martin Luther’s door and they demanded explanations. So there were debates and there was an investigation. And eventually Luther, well, he didn’t back down. He expanded his critique of the selling of indulgences. To challenging the very idea if one could purchase one’s salvation He also began to teach and to write that one, salvation was by grace alone, through faith in God alone. Two, he began to teach the priesthood of all believers, that Christians didn’t need to go through a priest. that there was only one mediator between God and man, and that mediator is Jesus Christ. So each person is their own priest. And three, he began to write and teach that the Bible ought to shape theology and practice above and over the edicts of the Pope and Church officials So by 1521, this would be four years after the famous nailing of the 95 theses upon the Wittenberg door. Luther stood on trial at the Diet of Worms. This was an official assembly convened by Emperor Charles V And there at the Diet of Worms, Luther was ordered to recant, to say, I was wrong, I’m just gonna go back to the monastery. shut up and be a loyal subject of the Roman Catholic Church But Luther didn’t. With the spirit of audacity, he famously replied, and let me quote to you Luther’s words. He said Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason, for I do not trust either in the Pope. or in counsels alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves, I am bound by the scriptures I have quoted, and my conscience is captive to the word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. Here I stand. I can do no other. May God help me. Amen. Whew A statement like that comes from a heart filled with with courage, because he was facing execution if he was condemned a heretic This is the way it worked in Western Europe at that time. You challenge the church, you get executed. But with courage, with conviction, with audacity Martin Luther stood and said, I cannot recant anything. My conscience is captive to the word of God. Here I stand. I can do no other. I mean I still hear it with conviction today. Well, Luther was condemned as a notorious heretic and was excommunicated His writings were condemned, and he was on the run. And so on his own, regarded as an outlaw, People began to follow him, and he eventually organized a new church that would bear his name, Lutheran And so today here in the U. S. , we have a number of churches that trace their roots directly back to Martin Luther and his teaching. We have the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, and there’s also the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. But when we reflect back on Luther’s, here I stand, I can do no other, we hear the spirit of Protestant audacity. One monk standing against emperors and bishops and theologians and political authorities, not because he trusted himself But because he believed truth was more important than security, that scripture The holy writ, the holy word of God mattered more than the whims of cardinals and bishops and even the pope. To stand on the firm ground of Scripture and to challenge the church of the Holy Roman Empire required, what Jewish people referred to as Chutzbah, which is a Yiddish word that means something like outlandish, outrageous audacity. Now, the Audacity of Martin Luther didn’t have the trappings of arrogance or pride Rather, he demonstrated the courage to challenge established norms because he believed the gospel was at stake Now, it’s also important to realize that although Luther served as the catalyst, the Protestant Reformation was never a one-man movement. The story includes many audacious figures. Holdrich Zwingli in Switzerland independently developed Reform convictions through his study of scripture. He challenged. practices that he believed lacked biblical support and he established a distinct stream of the Reformation And of course, there was John Calvin in Geneva. He became one of the most influential Protestant theologians. His writings, particularly the Institutes of the Christian religion, helped systematize Reformed theology and shape churches across Europe, eventually around the world, and there still are strong reform impulses throughout churches in the US There’s also William Tyndale in England. He displayed extraordinary courage by translating the Bible into English. His work allowed ordinary people like you and me to read scripture in their own language, and for all of his work, Tyndale was executed. The Reformation, which was sparked by Martin Luther, was a movement of people. People who loved Jesus, loved the gospel, loved Scripture, and were willing to risk their reputation. They risked economic security, family relationships, and even life itself for their convictions that they believed were rooted in Scripture. That is Audacity. And as Protestant theology developed from the Reform tradition The core tenets of Reformed faith were codified in five Latin phrases known as the five solas. These statements were not originally packaged together during Luther’s lifetime. Rather, they emerged as a summary. of Reformation theology. And so I think as we consider the president Reformation, I want to offer a bit of a of a theological definition which I think can be expressed in the five solas. So it starts with sola scriptura, that is scripture alone. This principle teaches that Scripture is the church’s highest authority. Now, the Reformers didn’t reject tradition altogether. They quoted the church fathers, they depended heavily on Augustine, but they insisted that all traditions must ultimately be measured against Scripture. which is good as far as it goes, but they couldn’t see that in the words of Hilary of Portier, Scripture is not in the reading, but in the understanding. In other words, scripture must be interpreted, and our interpretation by nature requires some kind of tradition. So I agree with the reformers in elevating scripture, but there is no way to understand scripture without tradition. I mean you give An individual, a Bible, with no understanding of church history, they’re gonna come up with a weird religion to maintain the Christian faith. We do hold Scripture as our highest written authority, but we are interpreting Scripture through the 2000-year Great Tradition. So Yeah, I agree scripture is important, but scripture alone. I mean, I heard one theologian one time say uh that sol la scriptura can become solo scriptura. You know, there’s traditions that will say, no book but the Bible, no creed but Christ, which is in fact a creed, it’s a creedal statement. But as important as scripture is, and I do believe it’s important, sacred, we also need tradition. We’re not going to understand it on our own. Okay, next sola is sola fide, which is faith alone. The reformers taught that people are justified with God through faith in Jesus rather than their own works. Now, good works, that is obedience and a holy life, that was important to the reformers, but they saw obedience as the fruit of salvation, not the basis of salvation The reformers emphasize that salvation originates in divine mercy rather than human merit, which is true. I believe that. Our salvation is God’s work in us and through us and through the church. But I would say here, I think the reformers misunderstood Paul a bit when he writes about faith and the law and just But I’ll set that aside for now. The next sola is solus Christus, which is Christ alone The Reformers taught that Jesus, because he was the sole mediator between God and humanity, was first and preeminent in all things. That salvation comes through Jesus, through his life and death and resurrection and ascension that that no other mediator can do what Jesus has done uh through his life, death, resurrection, and ascension. And I appreciate this part of Reformed theology, of the Reformed tradition. I appreciate this Jesus-centered approach to thinking about church life and doing theology. The next sola is sola dora gloria. Glory to God alone. And this is the final, the fifth and final sola, and it gathers together all of the other solas. So if salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, according to Scripture alone, then all glory belongs to God alone. Now, this sola, it seems intuitive to us now, but understand that there was so much prestige given to church leaders It was important for the reformers to establish that the work of the church is about bringing glory to God alone. It’s not about church leaders. To that I say amen. Now, this audacity that we see in the Protestant reformers, you can see all throughout the scriptures I mean, think about when Moses and Aaron confronted Pharaoh. This is in Exodus chapter 5, verses 1 and 2. uh when they stood before the pharaoh saying, Let my people go. Imagine the audacity of these two former slaves standing before the most powerful ruler in the world. the Egyptian Pharaoh, and demanded freedom for an enslaved people. Think about the audacity of Esther, who risked her life Esther 4. 16, I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish. Esther’s courage didn’t come with the certainty of success, but she had this this this deep willingness to act right in the face of danger How about the audacity of Nathan the prophet when he confronts King David? King David had sinned. He sinned by his sexual exploitation of Bathsheba and the murder of her husband. And in 2 Samuel 12, 7, Nathan says, you are the man. Nathan’s. Prophetic audacity consists in speaking truth to a king who had the power to execute him. And what about the New Testament? In the New Testament, uh when I think Audacity, I think of Peter. Peter was the audacious one among the twelve disciples. He was always the first one to speak, to say something, whether he had something to say or not, whether he had the right answer or not But how about the audaciousness of Peter when he steps out of the boat? You know, this is in Matthew 14. Jesus is walking on the water. And Peter says, Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water I mean that request is audacious. He asks to participate in a miracle in what only Jesus was doing And then after Jesus’ death and resurrection, ascension, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, Peter and the other apostles found themselves being questioned. By the high priest. And in Acts 5. 29, Peter says, we must obey God rather than any human authority. Much like Martin Luther when he gave his defense, Peter said, We are obeying God. We are bound by Scripture and Conscience to obey God. even if it would cost them something. And of course, all of this has been made possible by Jesus in his audacious death And because we have been washed and cleansed by the blood of Jesus, it says in Hebrews 4, 16, let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness. Instead of fearfully approaching God, Christians have the audacity now To approach God’s throne with confidence, not because of anything we have done, but because of the salvation that Jesus purchased for us in his own blood. Now, let’s pause for just a moment as we think about audacity. I’ve given you examples from the scriptures of audacious people. And we can see that audacity is a powerful motivator for reformation and change, but audacity is also dangerous. And history teaches us both lessons. Both the value of audacity and also the danger. I mean, without audacity. Corruption often goes unchallenged and institutions become stagnant. Yet audacity without humility becomes arrogance. Audacity without wisdom becomes recklessness. Audacity without love becomes division and can often cause pain And so we need to carefully consider this gift from the Protestant tradition. Because I think we still need Protestant audacity. I believe that that audacious spirit is still alive in the church today There is a Latin phrase in the Reformed tradition that says Ecclesia Reformata Semper Reformanda that is, the Church reformed, always reforming. The church in every generation must ask whether its practices align with the gospel and the teachings of Scripture The church must continually submit itself to Jesus and to keep Jesus at the center of all things. I believe that the church must always challenge our deeply held assumptions And to do self-reflection and ask, does our community of faith look like Jesus? And if not, we need a reformation. If not, we need a Martin Luther to stand up and say, this is not the Spirit of Jesus And so because of this reformed and always reforming tradition, I believe the spirit of Protestant audacity is never finished. And so what would it look like for you to step into Protestant audacity? I mean, most of us are not standing before emperors or high priests. Most of us are not posting invitations to theological debates on cathedral doors, though some of us are posting invitations to theological debates on social media. Nevertheless, we still face moments that require courage because it takes audacity to challenge injustice Takes audacity to tell the truth when it would be easier simply to spread falsehood. Audacity is required to resist cultural pressure Takes audacity to speak up for those who have no voice. Takes audacity for us to repent when things are wrong, and to call others to repentance It takes audacity to reform traditions that no longer look like Jesus. So we owe a lot to the Protestant reformers. I mean, the Protestant Reformation still remains one of the most consequential movements in Christian history It shaped theology, it transformed Europe, it changed the church, including the Roman Catholic Church. There was a counter-reformation. And I believe that the seeds of the Protestant Reformation gave birth to the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. And at its heart The very heart of the Protestant Reformation was a simple but daring conviction. When human tradition conflicts with God’s truth, the truth of God must prevail. That conviction required audacity. Well that’s all that I have for you for this episode. Thank you for joining me. Go in peace and be kind.

This transcript was generated with AI and may contain errors.