Martin Luther's Views On Judgment And Repentance Story

There were no longer those two boys who used to visit the tree. The tree died with their friendship.

The earliest most famous Protestant reformer, Martin Luther went to the school of Erfurt to study law in 1501, but he quickly became more interested in theology. Luther was exposed to recent humanist writings and read extensively in classical Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. In 1505, he enrolled in an Augustinian monastery. He spent a decade educating and preaching and visited Rome. The Reformation was a religious uprising in Europe in the 16th century, prompted by dissatisfaction with the set Roman Catholic Church, which directed to the formulation of the Protestant branch of Christianity.

Martin Luther started the Protestant Reformation when he nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517. It contained a series of 95 complaints that the once monk had with the church. He was steadfast in his efforts to get the church to change. Even refusing to repeal his complaints when threatened with excommunication.

Martin Luther's "The Freedom of a Christian" discusses an in-depth look into the Christian faith, God's work in each individual. Refusing to believe in the established doctrine, Luther wrote this reforming treatise in response to Pope Leo's criticisms and to further explain the theological and ideological core of his thinking. Nevertheless, Luther centered his ideas around the concept that the joys and freedoms of a Christian were that in faith; humans, as sinners, should not look at ourselves, but instead at God's goodness. He goes on to elaborate that through the justification by faith, humans grasp the meaning of a whole Christian life. Throughout "The Freedom of a Christian", Luther expands on the threefold power of faith: faith frees

An effective piece of writing is one in which the audience takes a stance on the side that the author intended them to. Both Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail” and Jonathan Edwards’ “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” are considered effective pieces that target two different audiences, in different eras, in attempt to reach different effects. Martin Luther King Jr. and Jonathan Edwards alike attempted to write effective pieces to convince their readers of their personal stance on the appropriate topic. It is evident that one piece must be considered more effective than the other.

Effectiveness is the reason for most argument pieces. Edwards argues in “Sinners in the hands of an Angry God” that everyone must be completely devoted to God or else God will send them to hell. Martin Luther King’s piece “Letter from Birmingham Jail” he is responding to the clergymen’s criticism. Both “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by King and “Sinners in The Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathan Edwards persuade their intended audience on their subject and believe what they believe; one is more effective than the other.

Specifically, in this story, there are two types of trees mentioned, a Chinaberry tree and a pear tree. The Chinaberry tree resembles the dark side of nature, as nature continues to act as a mystery. When falling upon Mr. Larkin and his car, the Chinaberry tree is described as “tilting, dark and slow, like a cloud” (Welty 109). When watching this happen, Mrs. Larkin says to herself “You can’t be hurt,” as she feels that her love is strong enough to save her husband, but unfortunately, life does not work that way (Welty 109). By trying to protect her husband with these words, shows the theme of death and grief in the story. The problem Mrs. Larkin has throughout the story is being unable to understand why death happens and cannot seem to accept the loss of her husband. It’s important to take from this that humans cannot make sense of nature or sometimes of the events that occur throughout their lives, but as individuals, you can control your own actions, concluding, that there is no rational explanation for the tragedy in Mrs. Larkin’s life. Nature simply provides a point of departure for clarifying Welty’s concerns (Carson

Repentance was not an acceptable path to redemption due to its’ limited power. Athanasius argues that repentance is fine for a minor offence, but inadequate to turn men away from the death that they have brought on their own soul. For repentance does not “call men back from what is their nature – it merely stays them from acts of sin.” Men’s nature became subject to the rule of death, and repentance could not change

When we receive Christ we turn to God from self (repentance) and trust Christ to come into our lives to forgive our sins and make us what He wants us to be. God’s forgiveness implies that our sins deserve judgment, but in His love God has shown us grace, giving us freedom from sin and reconciliation in our relationship with God. If we accept this gift of Jesus who died in our place and bore the punishment of our sin, we receive a new life free from the judgment and rule of sin. Nothing we can do ourselves can take away our own sin or its consequences. We simply and only must believe what God says and receive new life in Him as a gift by trusting

The term justification derives from the Greek word dikaios (from the New Testament), which simply meant to regard as righteous and to count as righteous. This was a huge awakening for Luther as he read Pauls epistle to the Romans which states “The just will live by faith”. Luther realised that the crucial way to achieve spiritual salvation was not to be scared or frightened of God but instead to believe that faith alone would bring salvation. (Sola fides).This is a very different approach to the Roman Catholic Church who draw their teachings from tradition which are handed down from the pope, as well as scripture and its teaching regarding salvation through faith and good works, but with a greater emphasis on good works.

How Luther understands the righteousness of God was that he remembered reading the Bible in the Book of Romans when the Apostle Paul talked about the righteousness of God. He felt that God is righteous and punishes the unrighteous sinners. Since he lived as a monk he felt that a sinner before God with a conscience he couldn’t believe it for his satisfaction. He hated the righteous God who punishes sinners. He felt that God could accept only righteous people, but people can try so hard to be and live righteous that they might and never become righteous through their efforts. He felt that the law given by God only seemed to heightened the awareness that they can’t live up to the standard of the law expected by God. God’s righteous he feels only

Some people are selfless and that can be a good thing, until you are nothing because someone took everything you had. The tree in this story was not around the right person and so she gave away everything to him with little in return. Now it would not be that big of a deal if he just asked her for things once or twice, but he kept coming back until she was nothing and even then she offered herself to him. "I wish that I could give you something.... but I have nothing left. I am just an old stump”. The Tree states this, but after she says “well, an old stump is good for sitting and resting. Come,

It is a popular belief that the tree symbolizes a “faithless Israel” and that the Jesus cursing the tree was an “acted-out parable” (Rhodes). “The Old Testament often uses the fig tree as a symbol of national Israel” (Day).

Final paragraph: "Restorative justice cannot manufacture penitence and forgiveness. But by placing a concern for the healing of hurts, the renewal of relationships, and the re-creation of community at the heart of its agenda, it makes room for the miracle of forgiveness to occur and for a new future to dawn. Nothing could be more compatible with the message of the New Testament than this. For without diminishing the reality of evil, without denying the culpability of those who commit crime or minimizing the pain of those who suffer at their hands, and without dispensing with punishment as a mechanism for constraining evil and promoting change, the New Testament looks beyond retribution to a vision of justice that is finally satisfied only

* Option 2: Let the forest grow without thinning, then harvest all crop trees 60 years from now and receive $537,962.01 at harvesting, equivalent to $28,800.08 now