unity is really quite a chore, huh?!! :-)
i wondered about that today.. 458 years ago, mr. bucer tried to submit to the king, the 'authority' of the land, what was on his mind, his heart. i like this guy! gutsy.. and someone that we can remember and be grateful for. maybe, just maybe, he helped others understand, and perhaps the 'seed' of god's truth, was planted then, and continues to grow and bless us today. thank you martin!!
oh! btw.. he wasn't perfect.. hehehehe... no-one is~
he was soooo zealous, but in his weakness to 'see truth' he compromised at times. a lesson for us today. truth stands on it's own. with or without our 'help'. our passion should never lead us to compromise or to gain what we want or what we think we need or want. our lives need to demonstrate god's love as best as we can, as HE fills our souls, daily..
the trinity is our model of true unity. i'm trying to understand this, and hold it inside my heart and learn what i can to love; even when there are disagreements and difficult times.
here's a scripture from matthew that makes me think... forgive us, lord, for sometimes, we truly don't know what we're doing.. but with your mercy, grace, perfect love.. you bring us through! i can be at peace with you and others~
matthew 24
4...Jesus told them, “Don’t let anyone mislead you,
5 for many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am the Messiah.’ They will deceive many.
6 And you will hear of wars and threats of wars, but don’t panic. Yes, these things must take place, but the end won’t follow immediately.
7 Nation will go to war against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in many parts of the world.
8 But all this is only the first of the birth pains, with more to come.
9 “Then you will be arrested, persecuted, and killed. You will be hated all over the world because you are my followers.
10 And many will turn away from me and betray and hate each other.
11 And many false prophets will appear and will deceive many people.
12 Sin will be rampant everywhere, and the love of many will grow cold.
13 But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
14 And the Good News about the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, so that all nations will hear it; and then the end will come.
Unity of the church is an eminently desirable thing. To compromise for the sake of unity leads not to unity, but to further trouble. Bucer made important contributions to the Reformation; but his zeal for unity remains an abiding warning against compromise of the truth of the gospel for purposes of attaining mere outward unity.
When Reformer Martin Bucer handed his book, The Kingdom of Christ, to John Cheke on this day, October 21, 1550, he was sure that England's King Edward VI would see it. The boy-king was under the supervision of men who were in sympathy with the Reformation. One of them was the royal tutor, John Cheke.
Luther, Calvin, Melanchthon, and Zwingli are names from the Reformation that almost everyone recognizes. Martin Bucer's name is not. And yet he was among the five or six most prominent reformers, and was the author of many scriptural commentaries. John Calvin was deeply influenced by his thought.
Martin Bucer began his religious career as a Dominican, but converted to Protestant views in 1521 after reading works of Luther and Erasmus. Excommunicated by the Roman Catholic church in 1522, he moved to Strasbourg where he became a Protestant leader.
With the success of Protestantism, a new problem arose: Whose Protestantism? Each leader interpreted the Bible differently. For example, Lutherans and Zwinglians could not agree on the exact nature of the Eucharist (Lord's Supper). Bucer labored to bring the two sides together, proposing formulas that he thought might be acceptable to everyone. His attempts met with distrust on every side. Luther scornfully said to him, "It is better for you to have your enemies than to set up a fictitious fellowship."
Bucer himself thought that "Those who do not make a whole-hearted effort to do the things that are pleasing to the Heavenly Father" should not "declare themselves citizens and members of the kingdom of Christ." In 1548 he refused to sign a faulty peace agreement and had to leave Strasbourg. Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, invited him to England and made him a professor at Cambridge University.
Bucer's sharp eye quickly saw the needs of his adopted country. Friends urged him to write a practical proposal for reform. He called it De regno Christi (The Kingdom of Christ). "It would seem fitting to write for Your Majesty a little about the fuller acceptance and reestablishment of the Kingdom of Christ in your realm," Bucer said in the preface. He defined the kingdom of Christ as God's total administration by which saints are saved and preserved.
Did the book make any difference? Edward died young and had little influence on England's future. However, when the young king wrote an essay on reforms, it echoed Bucer's ideas, listing the same abuses Bucer had named (including wastefulness, and official corruption); and suggested remedies that could have come straight out of Bucer's work. The Kingdom of Christ championed education and other topics. Edward also became a champion of schools.
Bucer died in 1551; but his story didn't end there. After Edward's death, the Catholic queen, Mary Tudor, considered even the memory of Bucer so dangerous that she had his bones dug up and burned. His tomb was destroyed. When Queen Elizabeth came to the throne, she promptly reversed Mary and had Cambridge restore Bucer's honors.
i love making these yummy cookies! the kids enjoy helping...
them... my kids like to name their little friend! bob was last year's orange friend, this year it's fred!! but he bit the dust too soon.. alas! bud decided to 'play' with fred and dress him up, then fred did the humpty dumpty! ;-( and all the cole peoples could NOT put fred together again~ the saga continues next october!
warm! oh yeah! make some hot cocoa and 'chill'!! ;-)
recipe
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