The Year D Project

For the last 18 years I have been teaching at a seminary that was founded to equip pastors in the German (i.e., German-speaking Swiss) Reformed tradition. For this entire new millennium, the seminary and the university in which it is now nested have been led by two successive presidents who have had the good sense to study carefully and honor the mission of the university's founders. For my part, since my first of two semester-long sabbaticals (in 2012), I have been laboring over the founding documents of the (German-speaking Swiss) Reformed tradition itself, many of which are now, in the Works of Oecolampadius series (B&N Press, 2017—2026), available for the first time in English.

Why claim such a distinction for the works of this too little known Reformer?

In 1512, when John Calvin was only three years old and five years before Luther's 95 Theses, Oecolampadius preached that the penitent thief on the cross was "justified by faith."
In 1516, Oecolampadius worked on Erasmus' team of scholars on the Novum Instrumentum Omne, the first edition of the (parallel) Latin-Greek New Testament on which the Reformers would come to base their interpretive work. Oecolampadius, who was asked to write the Epilogue to this seminal resource, was the only eventual Reformer to be part of this team.
In April 1517, Oecolampadius issued, On the Paschal Laughter, an astute and multi-lingual critique of the popular misuse of the sermon for comic relief after Lent.
From 1518 — 1522, Oecolampadius produced a number of translations of the Greek fathers, including Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom, whose style of exposition inspired both Zwingli, Capito, and Oecolampadius to reclaim serial lectio continua preaching.
In 1521, in order to counter the abuses of the confessional rite, Oecolampadius issued a liberating treatise asserting: The paradox, that Christian confession should not be onerous. Eventually regular, corporate confession in public worship would replace the private confessional.
In 1522, Oecolampadius was the first to translate the mass, read the scriptures, and preach in the vernacular, thus reforming both Word and Sacrament within a six-week span, some four months before Luther's September Testament (German New Testament) was published.
In 1523, Oecolampadius lectured through the Book of Isaiah to packed auditoriums, using all three sacred languages: Hebrew, Greek, and Latin; he also preached a continuous exposition of 1John more thoroughly than anyone in the Christian era, including Augustine, had done before. Both became landmark works of biblical interpretation that were applauded in Wittenberg and thus represent the height of Reformed scholarship in the early period of evangelical unity.
On March 19, 1525, Oecolampadius began his sermon, "On the Power of Christ over Satan," with the following: "The singular failing in which is all misfortune is ignorance of God and of ourselves." Eleven years later, in the same month (March 1536), the first edition of Calvin's Institutes was published, which began: “Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists in two parts: The knowledge of God and of ourselves.”
c. 1525-26, Oecolampadius drafted and circulated the Kinderbericht — the earliest children's catechism — from the Reformation; this would later, after his death, be developed into the Basel Confession of 1534.
In the final pages of his recent biography of Zwingli, Yale professor Bruce Gordon acknowledges that between Zwingli and Oecolampadius, the latter was the stronger theologian.

This series (as it stands thus far) concludes with a sampling of sermons, popular in their day, and other writings on the sacrament, but stops short of a comprehensive translation of all the works that arose during the controversy over the Lord's Supper, which eventually resulted in the famous rupture at the Marburg Colloquy (1529).

The aim of this series is no ivory-tower exercise, but an answer to the oft-posed questions: Where did the Reformed tradition come from? What are its origins and priorities? What does it mean to be Reformed? The series offers the most complete portrait of Oecolampadius, "the Reformer of Preaching," that we have in English; it arises from the primary sources in which key reforms were first made, several ahead of Luther himself. Though admittedly one of many pivotal characters among the first generation of Reformers, which includes Zwingli, Capito, Bucer, and others, Oecolampadius' series of "firsts" were truly groundbreaking and foundational for the Reformed tradition, of which Calvin himself was an heir and eventually became "the theologian."

Meanwhile, here are a handful of other resources that will shed further light on this consummate Reformer and on the origins and priorities of the Reformed tradition:

Saturday, October 3, 2026

What does it mean to share in Christ's sufferings? (Phil 3)

[The following is an alternative and much shorter ending to a recent sermon that was swamped by an attempt at raising a social justice issue. Regardless of the protective and therapeutic aim of the application of the text in the sermon in question — which in this case was to raise awareness of those who have suffered medical injury — such is often the effect of social justice preaching. The issue overtakes the text and the sermon, puts the listener on the defensive, and fails to frame the proposed remedial action in sufficiently convincing or inviting terms. If the sermon succeeded as a conversation starter, it evidently failed to persuade or meet with many takers of the hope that it set out to offer. Here, then, is perhaps a better way of resolving this troublesome sermon.]

So what does it mean to share in Christ's sufferings?

First, it means recognizing that Jesus already shares in yours. He knows your every sigh, your every moan, your every ache, your every heartbreak. Every painful thing you even wonder about, whether it counts. Yes, it counts, but not in a meritorious way. It counts simply in the sense that Jesus notices and, indeed, he bears all these things with you. When he says, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me," he is invoking the partnership that a yoke entails. A yoke of oxen is a pair. He walks beside you, sharing your load as you share his. Though we are called to take up our cross and follow Jesus, this does not so much mean following behind him, say, marching up Calvary; it means matching your step to his as you walk your earthly way, sharing the cross-shaped bar of the common yoke, the one you bear with Christ.

Second, it means waiting and persevering. To be patient means to be "long-suffering." It means taking a deep breath and refraining from rash, precipitous action. In a time when people are growing disgusted and weary of so many forms of injustice and seemingly no accountability, the Christian must be ever vigilant, but never a vigilante. "Wait upon the Lord" is a refrain that runs through the Psalter (esp. Psa 37) and the entire canon. Those who wait upon him will inherit the earth, they will mount up on wings like eagles, etc.

Third, to share in Christ's sufferings means com-passion, to "suffer with" others who are suffering. This does not mean seeking suffering for its own sake; it means listening to those in distress, offering whatever divine counsel (from Scripture) is given you in the moment, praying for, but also advocating for those in your sphere, maybe even being a "patient advocate" — patient in a double sense — and standing with them if in no other way than with the ministry of presence. Helplessness shared is not hopeless. But help where you can. Share what wisdom, what simple forms of healing, have come your way. You are not alone, because Christ shares your sufferings. Your presence with the suffering can comfort them with the very same solidarity, not only your own presence, but that of Christ.

How do you understand what it means to share in Christ's sufferings? However you understand it, take comfort in the fact that our bodies and souls are not our own, but they belong to Him who purchased them with his own blood, who owns them now by virtue of his own suffering and death. He will not throw away or cast out anyone for whom he paid such a price of redemptive, merciful, tender ownership, with the aim of setting you free. And in the resurrection, we shall be truly free and have everlasting comfort and peace.

UPDATE:

On further consideration, one could do a lot worse in bringing this sermon to a conclusion than to simply read the titles of the seven discourses that comprise Part III of Kierkegaard's Christian Discourses.

ANOTHER UPDATE:

https://x.com/ChildrensHD/status/2107914147987870139?s=20