The Law and the Gospel

In the medieval Catholic Church, the focal point of the sanctuary was the altar, for it was there that the Lord’s Supper was celebrated. The pulpit was generally off to the side, for preaching was not nearly as important to the worship service as the priestly function of the Mass. But with the Reformation, these arrangements began to undergo a change. Many Protestants made the pulpit the focal point, not because they devalued the Lord’s Supper, but because they held that the sacrament must always be accompanied by the preaching of the Word of God. Preaching was to be at the center of worship. And, as we have seen, Christ was to be at the center of preaching.

In Martin Luther’s view, Christ-centered preaching involved the preaching of the gospel, the good news of salvation through Christ’s atoning work. But he did not advocate the preaching of the gospel alone—he also wanted pastors to preach the law of God. Why would he advocate the preaching of these two themes that seem to be antithetical to modern minds? Because he believed that unless the law was set forth clearly, people would not appreciate the gospel as they should. This conviction grew out of his own experience. He had been a promising law student prior to becoming a monk. Once he entered the monastery, he focused his studies on the law of God, seeking a way to be righteous. He was almost crushed by this study, for it revealed to him the purity and holiness of God as opposed to his own lack of righteousness. But he eventually came to see the pedagogical function of the law—that God uses it as a tutor to bring us to Christ. He understood that the law reveals our inability to meet God’s standards, driving us to cry out to Him for mercy. And so Luther became convinced that preachers had a duty to expose their sheep to these portions of God’s Word also. He believed that preachers must show the sheep their need before feeding them the gospel.

In a way, Luther was simply advocating the preaching of the whole counsel of God’s Word—the bad news of man’s failure to live up to God’s standard of righteousness and the good news of God’s provision of righteousness through Christ. In his eyes, it was the task of the preacher to declare both aspects of Scripture, that God might speak to unbelievers and thereby draw them to Christ.