Are people so different today? Is justification really irrelevant now? Is the preacher’s only point of contact with the life-giving Gospel a by-product of Microsoft’s word processor? I do not think so.

How can we know the mysterious workings of God? We look to Jesus: Jesus does His job of Jesus-ing only the way He can Jesus. Jesus never did His Messiah work the way that people thought that He should, and nothing has changed. We are blessed that He is not a God created of our own image and imagination. All of this is revealed to us through the God’s word alone, and in that word we have comfort of what Christ has done for us.

While 500 years is certainly something to be celebrated, to always focus on the anniversary number could run the risk of forgetting the true meaning behind the reason we remember the Reformation as an important period in the history of the Christian church.

Christ is the answer to both the Who and the how of our extra nos salvation.

On Episode two of the Great Ideas of the Reformation series, we talk about Sola Gratia or Grace Alone.

A Christian is justified—saved from sin, death, and hell—by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

Can one still find a church that teaches that Christianity, and the Christian life, can be summed up as: "We are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone?"

What follows is a brief examination of each of these five theological slogans.

Being a Christian is hard because it’s easy.