All for Love’s Sake Sean Lucas
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All Things New Sean Michael Lucas
There is a wonderful, yet spurious, quotation attributed to Martin Luther. The story is told that someone—perhaps a young seminarian—once asked Luther what he would do if he knew that the world was ending tomorrow. Luther allegedly replied, “Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would plant my apple tree.” That quotation was meant to insist on the pursuit of beauty and life, common grace for the common good, even when it must come to an end. The true thing, though, in that story was that Luther had an eye to the end of time. In fact, he was fairly convinced that he was living in those end times. And really, who could blame him for thinking that? After all, God was reviving and reforming his church, even in the face of the opposition of official Christendom represented by the Roman pope and his religious-political bureaucratic state. Surely, the sixteenth century was the end of the age, the final battle with the Antichrist, the time when Christ would return and make all things new.
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