Johann Von Staupitz

As an Augustinian monk, Martin Luther bore the guilt of his sin. He saw God as a just God who must punish sin. As a result, Luther often starved himself and whipped himself in an effort to cleanse himself of sin.

He may have died had it not been for the abbot at Erfurt, one Johann von Staupitz. Staupitz would encourage and reassure the young monk of God's grace. It would take time-and much study of Scripture-for the message to take root in Luther's heart and ultimately in Christendom. Staupitz reminded Luther of the article on the forgiveness of sins in the Apostles' Creed, of Paul's word that the sinner is justified by grace through faith, and of an incidental remark of St. Bernard (in a Sermon on the Canticles). Staupitz also prophetically assured Luther that God would use Luther's trials and temptations for a future usefulness in the church.

Unfortunately, Staupitz saw only the abuses of the Reformation. To his dying day he held fast to the unity of the Roman Church.

Staupitz belonged to the school of practical mysticism or Catholic pietism (think Tauler and Thomas a Kempis). Staupitz cared more for the inner spiritual life than outward forms and observances, such as he advised Luther to do. Staupitz trusted in the merits of Christ rather than in good works of his own, as the solid ground of comfort and peace. This would be the message Staupitz would share with Luther time and again which eventually took root in Luther's heart and in the Reformer's theology. The love of God and the imitation of Christ were the ruling ideas of his theology and piety. In his most popular book, On the Love of God, he describes that love as the inmost being of God, which makes everything lovely, and should make us love Him above all things. Staupitz believed that this love man cannot learn from man, nor from the law which only brings us to a knowledge of sin, which Lutherans for the most part would agree with. But Staupitz also believed that this love cannot be learned from the letter of the Scripture but from the Holy Spirit who reveals God's love in Christ to our hearts and fills it with the holy flame of gratitude and consecration. Luther would say that it is precisely in the Scriptures that we find God's love, aided by the Holy Spirit working faith in our hearts.