What is one way we can wrongly apply the lessons of the Reformation?

David Eddy explains in this video that people can wrongly apply the lessons of the Reformation when they attempt to mirror the lives and teachings of the Reformers and use that as their primary source for instruction instead of grounding themselves in Scripture. If we only desire to go back to the times of the Puritans, we will miss the opportunities that are open to us today.

While we certainly can learn many, valuable lessons from the Puritans and the Reformers, we shouldn’t rely on them for our sole source of all knowledge. We need to make sure that we’re grounded on Scripture, which was the heart of the Reformation, rather than on outward forms of the Reformation.

Mark 7:8 (NKJV) – “For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men —the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.”

I think the way I look at it, and as I looked at the question in preparation for this, the way I looked at it is I think some of the real problems of the Reformation that we see in the church today is in some ways Not so much a lack of complete Reformation Is that it the pendulum swung only it swung too far in a certain direction? So instead of where before it was you went through the church, you were happy to pray to the saints, you talked to the priest instead of to God for repentance and things like that. Now suddenly it was all about your relationship with God. But then in the years past that it became a selfish pursuit of God instead of a You know a fearful pursuit of God a desire to be right with God It was more of a desire for God to get behind what you're doing and make it happen And so I think that that's a lot of what kind of the Reformation built the foundation for that and in some ways we're paying the price for some of those with the pendulum swinging too far in the selfish self-centered relationship with God instead of a, you know, priesthood of the believer type of relationship with God.

The biggest danger is, is that the Reformation, and a lot of people that are really pro-Reformation, at least in English-speaking countries, are really pro-Puritan. You see a resurgence in Puritan studies and things like that. And I love the Puritans. I think they're fabulous. And I love the Reformers.

But we're no longer living in that time. And if we have a desire to go exactly back to that time, we're going to miss the opportunities that are uniquely open to us today. I think it's great that people are looking back at that. And I think one of the key things that you see, especially in the Puritan practical theology, is the theology of family life and family devotions. And the Father as the spiritual leader of the home and some of those things have become incredibly powerful and certainly has been a big part of my own life and desire and so I think that that's that those are things where the we can gain some things but to only go back to the Reformation and use that as kind of our source book for all things is in some ways not all that different than the Roman Catholic Church that took the Church Fathers, the doctors of the Church through the history of the Church as the source book for all things.

I think we need to make sure we stay really grounded on scripture and have the heart of the Reformation rather than the outward form of the Reformation.