Am I Alone Wise?

How can it be that centuries of popes and church councils got the gospel wrong? In this brief clip, W. Robert Godfrey examines the question that haunted Martin Luther throughout the Reformation.

Transcript

Luther was really haunted by the question that never occurs to a modern American, and the question was this: Am I alone wise? Am I alone wise?—Because the leaders of the church were saying to him you aren’t only taking your own soul to hell, but you're taking the souls of all those followers, who are already identified with you to hell. Are you really the only one who’s wise? All the medieval councils, all the medieval popes, all the medieval bishops, all the medieval theologians are wrong, and you alone are wise? And what he concluded was: I am not acting because think I’m wise. I am acting because the word of God forces me to do it. The word of God drives me to teach what I'm teaching. I’m not teaching what Luther thinks, I’m teaching what the Bible says. I can’t do anything else.