He began life as the son of simple parents in Eisleben in Saxony, on November 10, 1483. His father made a living as a miner, and his mother had middle-class roots. At six months old, his family moved to Mansfield, where he began his schooling at age seven at the local Latin school, and Brethren of the Common Life at Magdeburg at fourteen. There he began his simple faith in Jesus Christ by opening his heart up to the Lord. He soon moved in with his relatives in Eisenach to continue his education, and grew up a pleasant young man. His father wanted Martin to succeed himself in wealth, and therefore sent his son to study law at the University of Erfurt in 1502.

By 1505, he completed his master's degree in law and had seen a Bible for the first time. However, within a couple months of his graduation, he had an enlightening religious experience, which involved an illness, an accident, and a thunderstorm in which he felt threatened his life. Because of this series of events, he decided that he wanted to give his life in service to God. After joining the Augustinian Monastery in Erfurt in order to become a monk, he earned the title of priest in only two years.

Several years after becoming a priest, his order sent him to represent them on a mission to Rome. He arrived in high spirits, expecting a religious experience like no other in the capitol of the Catholic Church. However, he soon became disillusioned as he learned more and more about the low morality of the priests there, which began changing his perspective of the Church for which he had devoted his life. In 1508, he was delighted to be appointed Professor of Philosophy at Wittenburg, and earned a Doctor of Theology in four years. At that point, he declared from then on to only preach the Word rather than unbiblical Catholic tradition, and to help others to understand the Word as well. He soon began lecturing, and continued a deep study of the Word for his own growth.

A great breakthrough came after meditating on Romans 1:17, which says, "For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, 'The just shall live by faith'." From this position, the Bible took on an entirely new meaning to Luther, and set him free from the terror of God that he had felt before. He grew in his understanding of what the Word truly says about our salvation, greatly helped by the writings of three men: Augustine, Bernard of Clairvaux, and Tauler the mystic. The more that Martin saw and learned about salvation, the more distance came between himself and the Catholic Church. In addition to the matter of salvation, Martin also despised the sale of "indulgences" in the Catholic Church, which involved the Pope charging a fee for permission to sin. All of Martin's learning came to a head on October 31, 1517, when he posted his famous ninety-five theses.

In His sovereignty, God had arranged the right environment for this change that Martin suggested, particularly with the invention of the printing press. His theses was in response to the presence of a friar named Tetzel, who had advertised indulgences regarding salvation, in direct violation of Martin's belief. Tetzel and his companions immediately told Martin to withdraw his theses, but Martin would not, and in fact, continued to confront Church doctrine and its servants. As his theses and succeeding pamphlets spread throughout Germany, he gained a large, supportive following.

He was not the first man who tried to cleanse the Church of its impurities, so how was his situation different? The difference lies in his complete devotion to what he believed, to the point of breaking with the Church. Many others, who had opposed the Church before, despite denouncing many practices of the Church, did not leave, for they still believed in the basis of the Church. However, Martin Luther saw that the Catholic Church was thoroughly wrong. His writings spread like wildfire throughout the country, and even beyond to Italy, England, and France. Students from various countries came to study under him. He met with tremendous opposition from the Church, who even named him an outlaw at the Diet of Worms.

Martin Luther, and others such as John Hess, knew the Church held the power to burn them at the stake. Still his protests led to the tremendous Protestant Reformation. While Martin would have protested against the Lutheran Church being named after him, Lutheranism might not have succeeded without the political support of the princes of Germany. These leaders used the people's support of Lutheranism in order to gain governmental sovereignty. As for Martin Luther, he continued to grow in his knowledge and love of the Word until his death in 1546.