I suggest that in the Reformation we see the beginnings of a fundamental contrast to the medieval understanding of the relation between God and humankind. The divergence in their ethical understanding is a component in this yet deeper divergence. For the medievals, the salvation for which we long and which is the true end of all humankind is the Vision of God. For the Reformers, the salvation for which we long and which is the true end of all humankind is our participation in the Kingdom of God.
and later:
It will be easy now to summarize how the Christian's attitude toward society will be understood in this perspective. As Niebuhr puts it, obedient activity in the world, rather than contemplation, is here placed in the center. In gratitude we are called to obedient activity in a world that is God's world, though indeed, God's fallen world. We saw that the Vision of God is a form of avertive religion. The Kingdom of God perspective, by contrast, is a species of world-formative religion. Our response to social misery is not to turn away from our social world but rather to seek the reform of that world as an act of religious obedience. The social world in which we find ourselves is fallen. We are called in obedience to strive for its reform. For this social world is not part of the inevitable nature of things. It's the result of our human volitional endeavors; and it is in principle capable by endeavor of being reformed.
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