We should think of Luther as a great Reformer of Christianity, not just as an Anti-Semitist. The Orthodox Christian Church was recovered by Luther's effort to purify it from the dirt of "Salvation by deed" dorcrine of Medieval Cathoric Christianity.
http://www.ourredeemerlcms.org/beggars.htm

Traditionally Reformed theologians have accepted the cultural mandate as orthodox:
"Reformed theology also emphasizes the cultural mandate, or the obligation of Christians to live actively in society and work for the transformation of the world and its cultures. Reformed people have had various views in this area, depending on the extent to which they believe such a transformation possible. But on the whole they agree on two things. First we are called to be in the world and not to withdraw from it. This sets reformed believers apart from monasticism. Second, we are to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and visit the prisoner. But the chief needs of people are still spiritual, and social work is no adequate substitute for evangelism. In fact, efforts to help people will only be truly effective as their hearts and minds are changed by the gospel. This sets reformed believers apart from, mere humanitarianism. It has been objected to reformed theology that anyone who believes along reformed lines will lose all motivation for evangelism. "If God is going to do the work, why should I bother?" But it does not work that way. It is because God does the work that we can be bold to join Him in it, as He commands us to do. We do it joyfully, knowing that our efforts will never be in vain."
http://www.eefweb.org/info/THEOLOGY.HTM

"But this is not only the conquest of the world through the winning of souls. Reformed theology provides a good question to Francis Schaeffer's question-"How shall we then live?" Because God is sovereign in all things, it follows that we are to develop a full, biblical worldview. As his servants, we have the responsibility to subject every area of life, thought, and experience, to the Lordship of Christ. This is commonly referred to as the cultural mandate.

This approach is distinct to Reformed theology because we are commanded to live in the world but not oriented to the world. We cannot live as Chicken Little did, running around in a panic announcing the sky is falling. Nor are we to develop Christian ghettos, barricading ourselves in because it is 'icky' out there in the world. Rather, with great confidence in our sovereign King, we go out on His marching orders and proclaim the gospel of the kingdom of God, making disciples of all nations.

B.B. Warfield said, "He who believes in God without reserve, and is determined that God shall be God to him in all his thinking, feeling, willing in the entire compass of his life-activities, intellectual, moral, spiritual, throughout all his individual, soclal, religious relations is by the force of that strictest of all logic which presides over the outworking of principles into thought and life, by the very necessity of the case, a Calvinist.""
http://www.christkirk.com/Greyfriars/positionpapers/davehatcher/reformedtheology.htm

2007年5月13日