450 years ago this year there were big changes going on around the Church in Scotland.
The Reformation movement, which had started with Martin Luther in Germany, made it's way through Europe
to Scotland through people like Patrick Hamilton, George Wishart and most famously John Knox.
To sum up the Reformation in a few lines is impossible. On one level, the birth of the Protestant church could be seen simply
as a move away from the Roman Catholic theology and form of Church government and certainly in the 1560's many of the
changes were to do with stripping away what the Reformers regarded as "froth", so getting to the heart of the gospel
which was that the love of God was about grace offered to all through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
But, of course, it was far more complex than that, with major changes taking place at the time in society and
so there is a case for saying that the Reformation was as much about social change as it was ecclesiastical.
Having said all that, one tenet of the Reformation movement was "semper reformanda" - always reforming.
For it was recognised that the church was part of this dynamic love of God and whilst that love didn't change, life, people,
circumstances changed and so there had always to be a readiness to adapt and change.
We
might well argue that Jesus was part of a reformation of the church. He challenged the leaders of the day to think about what
it really meant to be the people of God and that challenge is the same for us today whatever denomination we belong to.
The constant love of God is offered to us new every morning, what we need to be doing is re-forming our lives
to do justice to that gift.
With best wishes
