It has been 508 years since Martin Luther wrote the 95 theses, and nailed them to the church door at Wittenberg, the act that launched the Reformation. There were precursors, including the Waldensees, Wycliffe, Tyndale, Hus and Jerome. But Luther made it permanent and global, in a way that no one had been able to do up to then.
The Reformation was first and foremost about justification by faith, which was the issue that most motivated Martin Luther. Luther could never find assurance of salvation, regardless the extremes to which he took his ascetic, monkish self-denial. When he learned from Scripture that salvation is by faith in Christ, it changed his entire outlook on life. The Reformation then broadened out into an emphasis on sola Scriptura on all issues, not just faith vs. works. Here is Ellen White on this process in Martin Luther’s life:
“[Luther] tried through works to obtain [God’s] favor, but was not satisfied until a gleam of light from heaven drove the darkness from his mind and led him to trust, not in works, but in the merits of the blood of Christ. He could then come to God for himself, not through popes or confessors, but through Jesus Christ alone.
Oh, how precious to Luther was this new and glorious light which had dawned upon his dark understanding and driven away his superstition! He prized it higher than the richest earthly treasure. The Word of God was new. Everything was changed. The book he had dreaded because he could not see beauty in it, was now life, eternal life, to him. It was his joy, his consolation, his blessed teacher. Nothing could induce him to leave its study. He had feared death; but as he read the Word of God, all his terrors disappeared, and he admired the character of God and loved Him. He searched the Bible for himself and feasted upon the rich treasures it contained; then he searched it for the church. He was disgusted with the sins of those in whom he had trusted for salvation, and as he saw many others enshrouded in the same darkness which had covered him, he anxiously sought an opportunity to point them to the Lamb of God, who alone taketh away the sin of the world. Early Writings, pp. 222-223.
Below is a PBS documentary on the life of Martin Luther, narrated by the Irish actor Liam Neeson, whose voice is very distinctive and famous: