On October 5, 1544, Martin Luther preached the dedication of the Castle Church at Torgau, Germany. This church lays claim to being the first Protestant church to be built, as all the other church buildings were converted Roman Catholic sanctuaries.
Lucas Cranach, Luther’s painter and engraver, designed the interior of this church, including the pulpit. It is a rectangular hall flanked by two galleries. The dedication also had a motet composed especially for the occasion by Johann Walter. Walter collaborated with Luther on hymns. They were the pioneers of Protestant hymnody.
At the dedication, Luther declared, “It is the intention of this building that nothing else shall happen inside it except that our dear Lord shall speak to us through His Holy Word, and we in turn talk to Him through prayer and praise.” He put an even finer point on this when he proclaimed, “We can spare everything except the Word.”
Probably few events in Luther’s life rival the representative status of the dedication service at Torgau. There we see a notable singularity of purpose. That singular purpose reveals Luther’s significance in both his day and, five hundred years later, in our day. That purpose may be expressed simply as the pure worship of the true God by the true people of God. This pure worship comes only when God’s Word is at the center of church life. Luther’s entire life was bent toward this one target. In fact, the entire Reformation could be summed up as aiming at this target.
- STEPHEN J. NICHOLS.