Custis Journey: August 2017

Friday, August 25, 2017

August 7: The Journey Begins

These two adventurers are ready to follow the footsteps of Calvin and travel the land of Luther!

The city of Geneva is in the western-most part of the country of Switzerland. It is surrounded on three sides by France. If you travel three miles north or three miles south of Geneva, you must cross a French border. So Geneva was the perfect place for John Calvin to spend his life's work in exile, always seeking from this refuge to call his beloved France to the Gospel.

Calvin had not wanted to live in Geneva. As a young man, suddenly famous for writing his first edition of Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin was traveling through Geneva intending to stay for one night only, seeking a place of rest and repose for further writing.

The city of Geneva had voted to outlaw Roman Catholicism in the city and adopt the Reformation only two years before this (1536). This was fruit of the amazing efforts of a handful of preachers (not Calvin) (more in just a moment about one of them.). Perhaps the most important of these preachers was a man named William Farrel. When Farrell heard that John Calvin was in Geneva for the night he went to his hotel room and begged him to stay and lead the Reformation in the city. When none of Farrell's arguments succeeded, he prayed aloud that God would curse the repose Calvin was seeking if he left the city. Calvin was so terrified by Farrell's prayer that he considered that God was calling him to minister in the city.

Geneva never became a restful home for Calvin, although he grew to love the people of Geneva, writing, "The welfare of this church it is true lay so near to my heart that for its sake I would not have hesitated to lay down my life."

When we arrived in Geneva, believe it or not, it was pouring rain and it rained pretty much all day. I was shocked. Shocked and soaked. Perhaps you can tell from this picture. This is from left to right: William Farrell with clenched fist, John Calvin with fingers in both Old Testament and New, Theodore Beza who was Calvin' successor in Geneva, and John Knox. All four men lived in Geneva at the same time in the year 1559.

Our tour guide was a Swiss policeman named Fabien who attends a church pastor Ed by a Master's Seminary graduate named John Glass. Here we are in St Peter's Cathedral where John Calvin ministered in Geneva.

St Peter's church in Geneva is not having its 500th birthday this year. More like 1000th birthday! The church was in Geneva long before Calvin came. The church is truly impressive. More pictures of the church tomorrow. Imagine that you are a persecuted Hugonaut, and you come to this Reformed city and find safety and refuge and enter this church for the first time.

(To be continued momentarily).

August 8: Geneva Tour (continued)

In the last picture posted above you can see in the background the pulpit (replica) in the exact spot where John Calvin preached his all his sermons for decades.

This evening the weather got nice and my dad and I walked off some jet lag around the city.

One of the handful of men whose powerful preaching turned Geneva to the Gospel was named Antoine Froment. Froment arrived in Geneva as a language teacher and promised to teach anyone French in 30 days or your money back. He was a gifted teacher and the people loved him. On January 1, 1533 Froment stood up on a table in a busy market just outside of town Molerd Place. He chose Matthew 7:15 as his text and preached on false teachers who are wolves in sheep's clothing. When the soldiers from the (still Roman Catholic) city came to arrest him, the crowd converged around Froment to protect him and helped him escape from the city.

Froment preaching on a table at Molerd Place.

Me in Molerd Place on our walk. Can you see I'm standing on the very same spot as Froment?

Have you ever seen a man-made rainbow? This little stub of a rainbow is caused by this gigantic fountain.

We also (moments later) got a real rainbow on our walk around the ramparts of Geneva.

There's graffiti everywhere.

Our walk around the ramparts took us unexpectedly into a parking garage!

August 8: Geneva Tour Continued Again

Drinking from a fountain almost next door to where Calvin lived in Geneva. The fountain dates back to Calvin's time.

QUOTE

"Faith is not true, unless it suggest and dictate the delightful name of Father; nay, unless it open our mouths and enable us freely to cry, Abba, Father."

-John Calvin, Institutes 3.13.5

NEXT UP: Geneva Free Day

August 9: Geneva Free Day

The people of Geneva are very strong.

I am still amazed at the great cathedral where John Calvin preached throughout his ministry in Geneva.

Outside:

Inside:

The plaque below was mounted to the wall inside the church by the Reformers to commemorate the Reformation in Geneva for future generations.

The plaque reads as follows:

The tyranny of the Roman antichrist having been slain, and its superstitions abolished in the year 1535, the very holy religion of Christ having been established in its truth and purity, and the church put back into good order by the favor of God, the enemies having been pushed back and made to flee, and the city herself by a great miracle having been given back its liberty, the senate and people of Geneva have erected this monument in this place as a perpetual memorial to attest to all future generations their gratefulness toward God.

The plaque is written in Latin, which very people today can read. I can't. So you might think that the church would put something up to mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation for visiting guests. They did. The only thing the church put up to mark the event is a series of cartoons mocking Protestants. Yes, you read that right. Here are a few of them:

Here's the Protestant informing his family that he disagrees with the pastor's sermon.

I have to admit I did have a little laugh over the next one. I've been having headaches recently, which the new specs seem to have solved and I'm thankful to the Lord for that.

And of course:

August 9: Geneva Free Day (continued)

How outrageous! In the church where Calvin preached the Gospel, a new monument is put in place which discourages anyone who comes from reading, pondering, or obeying God's Word!

If the weather yesterday was rotten, the weather today was terrific. It was a beautiful day in a beautiful city. We went back to the cathedral, did this and that around town, and then in the evening found the Academy of Geneva, founded by John Calvin in 1559 with Theodore Beza as its first rector.

When the city of Geneva voted to adopt the Reformation in 1536, they immediately made what amounts to high school mandatory and free for every young person. But the city continued for a long time without any seminary. This changed in 1559 when Calvin founded the Acadamy of Geneva. The school soon became known as the "school of death" because so many of its graduates suffered martyrdom for planting churches in France. The building is today a functioning school. The plaque below is original, placed there when the school was founded. The columned porch with arches is original too and dates back to Calvin's time.

See you next time!

QUOTE:

Calvin on the difference between the elect of God and pretenders in the church:

"It daily seems to happens that those who seemed to belong to Christ revolt from him and fall away: This, indeed, is true; but it is equally true that such persons never adhered to Christ with that heartfelt confidence by which I say that the certainty of our election is established: I deny not that they have signs of calling similar to those given to the elect; but I do not at all admit that they have that sure confirmation of election which I desire believers to seek from the word of the gospel."

-Institutes, 3.24.7

NEXT UP: Travel Day

August 10: Travel Day

Today was a travel day by air and by rail to Wittenberg. We made all of our connections, and arrived this evening in Wittenberg. We've spent the evening getting oriented to this small town, which has already been very revealing. The hotel where we are now staying stands inside the walls of the old city of Luthers time.

Dad with our high-speed train.

Here is the doorway from which the Reformation began.

Dad said that when he suddenly sees things like this, it is both overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time.

QUOTE:

"If I could believe that God was not angry at me, I would stand on my head for joy!"

-Martin Luther

NEXT UP: Ligonier Regional (One-Day) Conference in Wittenberg

August 11: One-Day Ligonier Conference in Wittenberg

Today we went to the one-day Ligonier Conference in Wittenberg.

This is a picture of all the speakers. The conference was very good. My favorite message was given by Dr Godfrey. He spoke on Luther and the Psalms, and his message was packed with wonderful things.

My dad and I skipped dinner, grabbed a loaf of bread, and went for a walk on our dinner break.

We walked outside the city to the nearby Elbe River.

From this picture if you look closely you can get a pretty good feel for the layout of Wittenberg. Start from the left. You can't miss the Castle Church where Luther posted the 95 Theses. But Luther didn't preach very often there, and when he did, he preached in Latin, not German, because this was this was the University of Wittenberg, and so it was used for school functions or else very formal events like Prince Fredericks funeral which Luther preached here.

Now look in the middle of the picture and you can't miss the twin towers. This is the town church where Luther preached regularly to the people of Wittenberg. In the task of preaching sermons which were delivered in this church, Luther worked out much of the theology of the Reformation.

Now look to the far right of the picture. This building is not as prominent as the previous two, but I'll still say you can't miss it. This was the Augustinian monastery where Luther lived as a monk for many years. However, as the Reformation took hold in Wittenberg, the monks started getting married and leaving the monastery. Because of this, Luther soon found himself living almost alone in the monastery. When Luther married, Prince Frederick gave him and Katy the monastery is a wedding gift. They became the new owners, and the monastery became the Luther home. The building is huge. It's like a large hotel, and throughout the Luther's married life, it was always filled with boarders and guests. The Luther home is extremely prominent in the view of the city from this direction. Basically the castle church anchors one corner of the city, and the Luther home anchors the other corner. Because of this, during Luther's lifetime the city leaders re-fortified the ramparts of the city wall around his home. In so doing, they had to demolish the tower in which Luther as a monk experienced his "Reformation breakthrough" while studying "the righteousness of God" from Romans 1:17.

In the evening we did the final session of the Ligonier Conference in a new location. The Castle Church! The place where Luther posted his 95 Theses. After we sang "A Might Fortress Is Our God," Al Moehler preached.

August 11: One-Day Ligonier Conference in Wittenberg Quote

QUOTE:

This was recorded from Luther's Table talk. Luther was talking at dinner about how much meaning is packed into even "one little word" of Scripture.

“Though I am a great doctor, I haven’t yet progressed beyond the instruction of children in the Ten Commandments, the Creed, and the Lord’s Prayer. I still learn and pray these every day with my Hans and my little Lena. Who understands in all of its ramifications even the opening words, ‘Our Father who art in heaven’? For if I understood these words in faith—that the God who holds heaven and earth in his hand is my Father—I would conclude that therefore I am lord of heaven and earth, therefore Christ is my brother, therefore all things are mine, Gabriel is my servant, Raphael is my coachman, and all the other angels are ministering spirits sent forth by my Father in heaven to serve me in all my necessities, lest I strike my foot against a stone. In order that this faith should not remain untested, my Father comes along and allows me to be thrown into prison or to be drowned in water. Then it will finally become apparent how well we understand these words. Our faith wavers. Our weakness gives rise to the question, ’Who knows if it is true?’ So this one word ‘your’ or ‘our’ is the most difficult of all in the whole Scripture. It’s like the word ‘your’ in the first commandment, ‘I am the Lord your God’ [Exod. 20:2].”

Stephen Nichols told us today that when Luther said this, his daughter Lena (who broke Luther's heart when she died as a child) was only two years old.

NEXT UP: Bicycle Tour in Berlin

August 12: Berlin Bicycle Tour

How big is Germany? Not much bigger than Oregon.

PUZZLER: Can you guess what this picture is? Can you guess what all of the capital letters stand for?

We did a bike tour of Berlin today, and it was a lot of fun. It was a bit drizzly at the start.

We liked the bikes so well that we kept them (rented them for longer), and we will use bikes to get around in Berlin from here on out.

Custisjourney has been experiencing some technical difficulties tonight, with slow internet, I think, being the main culprit. So I won't post the rest of my pictures tonight, which are mostly interesting sites from around Berlin, but I hope perhaps to put them into some later blogposts.

QUOTE:

For some years now, I have read through the Bible twice every year. If you picture the Bible to be a mighty tree and every word a little branch, I have shaken every one of these branches because I wanted to know what it was and what it meant.

-Martin Luther

NEXT UP: Museum Island