Principal’s Ponderings
The Season of Change
October is always an exciting month! The weather begins to cool down, leaves change color, out annual Harvest Festival takes place, pumpkin spice everything pops up on the shelves, and irrigation water gets turned off (this is Idaho still, after all). October is always a big month of transitioning events that concludes with what is called Reformation Day, which is the same day as the well-known event called Halloween.
Reformation Day is honored as the day that Martin Luther nailed the 95 Thesis to the Wittenberg Castle church’s door in Germany and set the Protestant Reformation in motion, one of the biggest transitions in the history of the church. Martin Luther was a priest who said that the Catholic church in 1517 was pulling away from the Bible and was, instead, relying on traditions of men. He simply stated that the Bible is our central religious authority, and that people can be saved only by faith—not by their deeds.
Nailing this document to the castle door was his version of ‘Facebook,’ a way to publicly post information and then engage into a discussion. Unfortunately, the Church wanted nothing to do with his discussion on having the Bible (instead of the pope, a person) being the supreme authority in all matters. The story continues with the Church wanting to arrest Luther and charge him with heresy. Instead of stopping the discussion, they saw it flourish across Europe with new bible translations in the common language so anyone could read them. Previously only the church could read and interpret scripture. The story goes on with the creation of new Protestant denominations that focused on the Bible instead of tradition.
CBS has families from a plethora of different churches, most of them able to trace their roots back to the Protestant Reformation and the belief that, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). While Halloween is a controversial holiday, the opportunity to celebrate the sufficiency of scripture in October is not! I pray as we enter this month that we can take comfort in the Lord and that the scriptures that are divinely inspired by Him.