Preached in Wörlitz, November 24, 1532 In November 1532, Luther was invited by the princes of Anhalt, Johann, Joachim, and Georg, who had recently introduced the Reformation in their territories, to visit them in Wörlitz, where the Elector Prince
Joachim of Brandenburg was their guest at a great hunting party. Luther made the journey with Melanchthon and Cruciger, and the latter, one of the best recorders of Luther's sermons, took notes and prepared the transcript for the sermon here translated. A contemporary says that when Luther read the printed sermon he "was amazed at how he had spoken and praised the skill of Magister Caspar Cruciger who was so adept at catching his words and understanding his way of speaking, saying, 'I think he made it a better sermon than the one I preached.' " The hand of the editor is apparent not least in the length of the Text in German; WA 36, 352–375.
Here in a few words St. Paul has expressed the sum of the whole Christian life (I Tim. 1 [:5–7]): "The aim of our charge1 is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith. Certain persons by swerving from these have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make assertions."
Dear friends, you know how earnestly God has commanded everyone to hear and to learn his precious Word, for it cost him much to bring it to the world. He hazarded his prophets for this purpose, indeed, he even sent his own Son into the world and allowed him to be crucified and to die for this. He permitted all the apostles to be persecuted and all Christians to be afflicted for this purpose, and commanded the former faithfully to administer it and the others diligently to hear it. And if there were no other reason for doing this except that it is God's good pleasure and will and strict command, this one reason would be sufficient, for as creatures we owe it to our Lord and Creator to be obedient to him and do this with all willingness as to him who has given us and every day continues to give us so many good things that we shall never be able to thank him sufficiently.
But he does not leave it at that; he does not wish that it be imposed upon us only as a command or to demand it of us as bound in duty, but also promises that great fruits and benefits shall redound to us thereby and causes it to be proclaimed that in doing this one gives to him his greatest and highest service
[Gottesdienst]. For he is a great Lord, whom we serve, who has many and various kinds of service, and we can serve him in many ways; but this one way excels all the rest, for wherever a devout farmer or citizen or subject serves his master, he is also serving God. The same applies to a child, a servant, or a maidservant in the house, if they are obedient and faithfully do that which they should, likewise princes and masters, fathers and mothers, when they govern well and attend to their office. All this means to serve
God, for this is his will and command, which he requires of us.
Now, the whole world is full of such service, if only they [i.e., the persons just mentioned] would perform it, for everyone in his station has his work laid upon him by God, in which he not only should but can serve him daily and constantly. For we are his own people and he has so ordered things that his service should go on everywhere, and nobody can excuse himself by saying that he does not know how or wherewith he should serve God, or pursue other trumpery stuff and seek in his own way to serve God, a way which he has neither ordained nor commanded, and meantime neglect what he has been commanded to do, as we in our blindness have done hitherto.
But far beyond and above all these services He has especially exalted and extolled this service, both of those who hear and those who preach his Word, and so he has this chosen service above all others on earth to be his special service, for the other services are done unto men. Therefore he also ordained a special day of the week on which we are to attend only upon this service, even though we also serve God throughout the week in other labors which he has not bound to any particular time or special day. But this day he has specially marked out and strictly commanded that it be kept, in order that men may have time and leisure for this service, lest anyone should complain that he cannot perform it or come to it because of his work.
Moreover, he has also appointed special places, such as, among us, churches or houses, where we come together. Indeed, he has instituted and preserved the whole priesthood for this purpose, and furnishes and gives besides what is needed for the performance of this office, such as all sorts of arts and languages and - 105 diverse gifts. In short, he has given to all the world a special commandment to keep this [day] holy and high and so observe it that it may be understood how highly he esteems it and how precious and acceptable to him is the service in which his Word is handled.
It would be well if we were able to accustom people to understand that when they say they are "going to sermon"2 this means "going to divine service,"3 and that preaching means serving God, and that all who are assembled together are assembled in real and high service of God. Just as in former times the beloved apostles and ancient fathers expressed it—and it is from them the expression came and remained to this day—we say "go to mass" and "hear mass," as the pope himself strictly commanded in his decree that everyone should "hear" mass every Sunday. Nobody is accustomed to say "I am going to see a mass," but rather "I am going to hear a mass," and this really means the same as to go to divine service and hear preaching or God's Word, which is the best and most necessary part of the mass, not as the pope does with his secret sacrificial masses in which there is no preaching nor hearing of God's Word, especially in that part which they consider the greatest and is called the canon of the mass [Stillemesse]. For the little word
"mass,"4 which appears to have been taken from the apostles, means in Hebrew the equivalent of a tribute or statute labor, as a peasant or tenant brings his lord his portion [Mess], that is, his due tribute or service, or serves his lord, thus acknowledging him to be his lord and rendering his obedience. So here too they said, "I am going to mass," or "to hear mass," as much as to say, "I am going to give or pay God his tribute and present and perform his service in the highest and most acceptable service." Thus, to hear mass means nothing else but to hear God's Word and thereby serve God.
I say this to you in order to admonish you and show you why we should willingly hear God's Word and come to church [zur predigt gehen], not only because it is God's stern commandment, but also because it carries with it the highest promise that it is acceptable to God and the greatest and most loving service we can perform for him, and far excels all other service as the sun exceeds all the stars and the sabbath day or Sunday excels all other common days, in short, as much as God's kingdom surpasses the kingdoms of the world. For here all things are hallowed and especially chosen—the time, the person, the place and the churches—all for the sake of the Word, which makes all things holy to us. [I say this to you] in order that we may take heed and not become so slothful and sluggish, like those shameful, satiated spirits who allow themselves to think that now they have the whole thing and know it all too well and even better than anyone can preach it to them, or like those others also who are soon fed up and think,
"Oh, I've heard that often, why should I have to listen to the same thing over and over again?" They do not know and consider what a great and excellent thing it is and what a sublime service of God this is, which they so shamefully despise or so foully forsake and neglect, and thus provoke God to wrath because they so cocksurely cast his earnest command to the winds and allow his promise to be made void in them, and as much as in them is,5 impair or even hinder by their example this laudable service of God.
For even if it were true, which, God be praised, it is not, that you did know all things perfectly, as well as the Lord Christ himself, you still must see how diligently he applied himself to preaching and carrying on this work, which, he knew so perfectly beyond all measure and had no need of whatsoever, as we so greatly need it. Likewise, St. Paul, the great apostle, even though he was highly learned and a great and excellent doctor, nevertheless went about from place to place and preached day and night, never becoming weary or fed up, as if he knew it all too well. And God himself, who gave it, takes such pleasure in hearing and seeing it that he can never grow weary of it, and therefore devotes so much to it and so earnestly ordains and commands that it should be carried on and practiced in all the world until the last day. Therefore you, after all. should be far less weary of it, since, even apart from this, you so badly need it to fight against the devil and all temptations.
And even though you do not need it for yourself in every respect, you ought not to grow weary or surfeited with going to divine service for an hour of the day or week, considering that before you did not grow weary of attending false worship in the churches every day, even running from one church and altar to another, and still you did not say, as you do now, "Oh, it's nothing new, I've seen it every day." What you thought was rather, "Yes, I went to mass yesterday and today and every day, yet tomorrow I will go again." So now you ought to do this even more, because now you know that this is the only right mass and service of God, and say, "Even though I knew it all perfectly, which is not the case, I will nevertheless perform my service to honor God and in obedience to him and hear the preaching for love and in praise of him; that he, my dear Lord, may see that I am willing to serve him in this high service, which he esteems
- 106 so highly and to which he devotes so much; that, even though I derive no other benefit from it, I may at least take comfort in the fact that I have done the holiest work for him and performed the most acceptable service of God, and that all other service is to be counted as insignificant and common everyday work compared with this high feast."
Now, as for him who will neither heed this nor be moved to hold God's Word in honor and esteem and gladly hear and learn it whenever he can, I do not know how to advise him, for I neither can nor will drag anybody in by the hair. Anybody who despises it, let him go on despising it and remain the pot-bellied sow that he is until the day when God will slaughter him and prepare a roast for the devil in the eternal fires of hell. For such a person cannot be a good man, nor is it a human sin, but rather the devil's obstinacy, when a man can so despise that for which God himself has appointed a place, person, time, and day, and besides admonishes and pleads with him so solemnly through his command and promise, and lays all this at our doorstep free of charge. This is something for which you ought to run to the ends of the world, something you cannot pay for with any gold or silver. And yet it is such an easy service that it costs you no labor or work, no money or goods, only to lend your ears to hear, or your mouth to speak and read, and surely there is no easier work than this. For even though this may bring with it the peril that you will have to bear the cross and suffer for it, yet the work in itself is easier than even the easiest of labors. If you can sit day and night in a tavern or somewhere else with good companions, gossiping, talking, singing, and bawling, and not grow tired or feel that it is work, then you can also sit in church for an hour and listen in the services of God and his will. What would you do if he commanded you to carry stones or to go on a pilgrimage or imposed some other heavy work upon you, as was imposed upon us formerly, when we willingly performed everything we were told to do and into the bargain were fleeced of money, goods, and body with silly lies and frauds?
But now we have the damnable devil, who makes the people so blind and so surfeited and sated that we do not realize what a treasure we have in the dear Word and go on living so rudely that we become like wild beasts. Let us take it to heart then and remember, whenever we preach, read, or hear God's Word, whether it be in the churches or at home through father, mother, master, or mistress, and gladly believe that wherever we can obtain it we are in the right, high, holy service of God, which pleases him beyond all measure. Thus you will be warmed and stirred to love hearing it all the more and God will also grant that it bear fruit, more than anybody can tell. For the Word never goes out without bringing forth much fruit whenever it is earnestly heard, without your being the better for it. Even though you do not see it now, in time it will appear. But it would take too long to tell all the fruits now, nor, indeed, can they all be numbered.
Let this suffice as a foreword to St. Paul's message, to stir us to listen more diligently to God's Word, as indeed it is necessary to be reminded of this every day and in every sermon. And it also is pertinent to this text we have taken from St. Paul, for in it he reproaches these same shameful spirits who take hold of God's Word with their own wisdom and likewise soon allow themselves to think they know it well and that they no longer need to listen to it or learn from anybody else. They turn to unprofitable talk about whatever is new or strange and the mob likes to hear. They presume to be masters of the Scripture and everyone's master; they want to teach the whole world and still they do not know what they are saying or asserting. For this is precisely the plague that results; when the Word of God is not proclaimed with earnestness and diligence, the listeners become listless and the preachers become lazy; there the concern must soon collapse and the churches become desolate. Then inevitably there appear these false spirits, who offer something new, attract the rabble to themselves, and boast that they are masters of the Scriptures, and yet are always the kind of people who themselves have neither known nor ever experienced what they are teaching. This is already gaining ground among us and God's wrath and punishment for our weariness and ingratitude is coming down upon us.
Therefore he begins his epistle to his disciple Timothy by urging him to see to it that such teachers do not arise, who can blab and babble a lot about the law and bring up many new questions and doctrines of what one must do and how to be religious, in order that they may be seen and praised as being more learned than others. And yet they never get to the point where they teach anything that is sure and right; they never get hold of the middle, the beginning, or the end of anything, but just go on talking about how to be religious, how to do good works, how to serve God, and so on. But they themselves do not understand what this means. And if you ask them how to do this, they begin to mince and drip words, here
- 107 a piece and there a drop, here a work and there a work; this one says, be circumcised, another says, offer so much at the altar, go to a monastery, go on a pilgrimage, endow masses, and so on. And when this has been taught and performed they bring up something else; always something new. And yet they are incapable of instructing anybody with constancy and certainty or of saying: This is it or this is what it consists of! And meanwhile what they teach is supposed to be an excellent thing, and they can go on boasting and promising that they alone are the right teachers and criticizing and finding fault with others.
But the right master, Paul says, would be the one who grasps the main point and can rightly seize and put his finger on the sum total, that is, the state of the heart and conscience and the whole man. But they know nothing about this; they say the words all right, but the sum and the ultimate meaning of the law they corrupt altogether and meanwhile they go on preaching and babbling, out of the church window and in through the door, so that nobody knows where to stop or where to begin, what purpose it serves, or how he is to better and console himself, as we have jolly well seen and suffered from our dream-preachers under the papacy.
What, then, is the sum total of what should be preached? St. Paul's answer is: "The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith."
There it is; there you have everything in a nutshell, expressed in the finest and fullest way and yet briefly and quickly said and easily retained. This is how you must perform the law if you are going to take hold of it right and seize it by the head, so that you will know what you are to do and not to do, how to submit yourself to it, and not go looking and begging elsewhere and everywhere: You must have the love that flows and issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith. You just stick to that! All right preaching starts from there and remains there, which is something none of these rabblerousers and sated spirits can do. He does not do it, Paul is saying, with a doctrine of all kinds of works, in which everything is cut into pieces and peddled. What must be there is what the law really requires, and that is love, and the kind of love that flows like a rivulet, a stream, or a spring from a heart which is pure and a good conscience and sincere, unfeigned faith. If that's the way it goes, it's right; if not, then the meaning and sense of the whole law is missed.
Now these are deep and genuinely Pauline words, and besides they are very rich, so we must explain them somewhat in order that we may understand it a little and become accustomed to his language. In the first place, he says that the sum of the whole law, that in which it consists and is wholly comprehended is love. But "love" in German, as everyone knows, means nothing else except to be favorably and affectionately disposed toward a person from the heart and to offer and show him all kindness and friendship.
Now these other teachers also use this word. They preach and puff a lot about love. But they do so only from their own angle and turn it to their own advantage, just as the heretics, the godless, and the rascals also have love, but only among themselves and for those who are like them, but meanwhile they hate and persecute all good Christians and would gladly murder them if they could. But it is still a long way from being love when I select a person or two who please me and do what I wish and treat them kindly and favorably and nobody else. This is a crummy love [parteken liebe] which does not issue from a pure heart but is nothing but a filthy mess.
True love flows from a pure heart. God has commanded me to let my love go out to my neighbor and be kindly disposed to all, whether they be my friends or enemies, just as our heavenly Father himself does.
He allows his sun to rise and shine on the good and evil and is most kind to those who are constantly dishonoring him and misusing his goods through disobedience, blasphemy, sin, and shame. He sends rain on the grateful and the selfish [Matt. 5:45; Luke 6:35] and gives even to the worst rascals on earth many good things from the earth, and money and possessions besides. Why does he do this? Out of sheer, pure love, of which his heart is full to overflowing, and which he pours out freely over every one without exception, be he good or bad, worthy or unworthy. This is a real, divine, total, and perfect love, which does not single out one person nor cut and divide itself, but goes out freely to all.
The other kind of love—when I am a good friend to one who can serve and help me and who esteems me, and hate the one who disregards me and is not on my side—is false love. For it does not issue from a heart which is basically good and pure, the same toward all alike, but which rather seeks only its own and is stuffed full with love for itself and not for others; for he6 loves nobody except for his own advantage, regards only what will serve him, and seeks in everyone his own profit, not the neighbor's. If you praise
- 108 and honor that kind of a person, he smiles; but if you make a sour face at him or say something he doesn't like to hear, he flares up, begins to scold and curse, and the friendship is over.
On the contrary, he who has a pure heart should be so in accord with God's Word and his example that he will wish everyone well and do good to all, as God wishes him well and gives his divine love to him. If God can bestow all good upon Judas the traitor or Caiaphas, as well as upon his good children, why should I not also do the same? For what can we give to him which he has not more richly given to us?
Yes, you say, but he is my enemy and he does nothing but evil to me. Yes, my dear man, he is God's enemy too and he does far more evil to him than he can do to you or to me. But my love should not grow dim or cease because he is evil and unworthy of it. If he is evil, he will find it out; but his wickedness must not overcome me. On the contrary, if through love I can rebuke and admonish him or pray for him, that he may amend his ways and escape punishment, this I should do and do gladly. But to want to fly out at him and become his enemy and do evil to him besides, this will not do; for what good will it do me? It will not make me any better and it only makes him worse. But it will help me if I grant and show him all goodness
(provided he will tolerate and accept it) and pray for him and so on. Then I shall have peace and will not be bickering and biting at anybody, and perhaps he too will thus be helped to improve. Otherwise, when I take love and make it separative and selective, I receive as much ill will from those I hate as joy and benefit from the others whom I favor. This means then that the source or water has been muddled and made impure, so that love does not remain pure, just as did the Jews, against whom Paul is here speaking.
They chose and selected those whom they loved and concocted a filthy, false love; therefore their hearts also could not be pure.
But what is it that makes the heart pure? The answer is that there is no better way of making it pure than through the highest purity, which is God's Word. Get that into your heart and order your life by it, and your heart will become pure. For example, take this saying: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" [Matt. 19:19], and order your life by that, and you will see very well whether it will not wash it clean and scour out the selfishness and self-love which is there. For when he commands you to love your neighbor he excludes nobody, be he friend or enemy, good or evil. For even though he be a bad man and one who does evil to you, he does not on that account lose the name of neighbor but remains your flesh and blood and is included in the words: Love your neighbor. Therefore I say to you, if you look at him in the way the Word teaches and directs you, your heart will become pure and your love true, so that you will make no false distinction between persons nor will you look upon him as anything but another person who is good and does good to you.
It is true, of course, that the good man is more likeable and everybody naturally is glad to associate with him, whereas one shies away from rough, evil people. But this is still flesh and blood and not yet the true Christian love, for a Christian must not derive his love from the person, as the world does, as a young man is attracted by a good looking wench, a skinflint by money and property, or a lord or prince by honor and power. All this is a derived or borrowed love, which cleaves outwardly to the good it sees in a person and lasts no longer than this good lasts and can be enjoyed. This love, however, should be a flowing love, which flows from the inside of the heart like a fresh stream that goes on flowing and cannot be stopped or dried up. This love says: I love you, not because you are good or bad; for I draw my love, not from your goodness, as from another's fountain, but from my own little spring, from the Word, which is grafted in my heart and which bids me to love my neighbor. Then it flows out abundantly and is there for all who need it, touching both the good and the bad, friend and foe. Indeed, it is ready most of all for enemies, because they are the ones who have more need that I should help them out of their misery and sins and especially for the greatest good I can do them, namely, to pray for them and do whatever I can that they too may become good and be delivered from sins and the devil. Look! this is a love that flows out of the heart, not into it; for it finds nothing in it from which it can draw this love, but because he is a Christian and lays hold of the Word, which in itself is altogether pure, it also makes his heart so pure and full of genuine love that he lets his love flow out to every man and does not stop at anybody, no matter who the person is.
Look! this is the way to preach if you want to teach rightly concerning love, which is required by the law and of which these others know nothing and for which they have no regard, even though they talk a lot about the law and dispute at length about love. They do not see, it does not even occur to them, that this is the way we must love, that it must flow outward from the inside, that a man must have a pure heart.
- 109 This never occurs to them, even though they hear and read much about it and even preach about it. They operate with nothing but rambling and useless ideas, with purely dead dreams. Therefore, let everything else go for what it is worth, everything that is preached about works and the good life, whether it be circumcision, sacrifice, fasting, or whatever else. It is right only when it issues from God's Word, from a pure heart and sincere faith. This must be the source and spring, which must be there before all these other things.
You can see in every station of life how each person in his calling should do the work committed to him and practice the work of love. A servant, for example, who works and neither sees nor thinks any farther than this: My master gives me my wages and that's why I serve him; otherwise I have no regard for him. He does not have a pure heart or intention, for he works only to obtain a bit of bread. When this ceases his service also ceases. But if he were good and a Christian, this is what he would say: I'm not going to work because my master pays me or does not pay me, or because he is good or bad; but rather because the Word of God is there and it tells me: Servants, be obedient to your masters, as to Christ [Eph.
6:5]. Then it issues of itself from the heart, which has laid hold on the Word and esteems it, and he says:
All right, I will serve my master and take my wages, but the chief reason why I do so will be that in this way I shall be serving my dear God and Lord Christ, who has commanded me to do this and I know that this is well pleasing to him. There you see a true work performed out of a pure heart.
Or take a lord or prince or one who must govern, who reasons thus: God has committed the government to me that I should be the ruler; but if I am concerned only to hold on to my dignity, riches, and power, then my heart is not pure, even though I do the work of a prince in such a way that the world cannot complain of me nor the emperor and the lawyers criticize or rebuke me according to their laws, any more than they can rebuke a servant who serves for pay, no matter whether he is selfish or not. But in the sight of God his heart is impure, the work of no man pleases him, for the Word of God is not in it, but rather his own idol, his own glory, money, and power. But when he says in his heart: Because I am in the office to which God has appointed me and the Word has declared that he who rules or has an office should do so with diligence [cf. Rom. 12:8], therefore I shall administer the same with all faithfulness to the service and glory of God; then his governing issues and flows from a fine, pure, true heart, which delights both God and the world. And it is also a love which does not cleave to the person or to wealth and honor, but rather grows out of the heart and keeps in view God's Word, which, because it is true and pure, makes the heart pure also. Thus his government and all his works become nothing but service of God and acceptable sacrifice because they are performed according to the Word and solely for God's sake. This those windbags7 can neither teach nor demonstrate; all they know is to rant that one should be good, when they do teach their best, and produce only a legalistic sermon out of the laws of men like those which the emperor and his scholars preach. But how the heart is made pure, this is something they have never tasted nor have they ever thought of how God's Word is to be applied to all states and conditions of men.
Further, if you are in the spiritual estate and office, you will say: If I or any other preach in order to get a good fat parish, when I would otherwise just as soon let it go, I may very well be preaching the gospel, but my heart is not pure, but nothing but a nasty mess. And therefore, even though I preach at length and call it a good work and a precious office, I still do not understand it myself, for it does not come from the heart. On the other hand, however, the heart is right when a man says: Even though I should receive a living from it, I have not let it go at that, but rather, because God has called and commended me to this office in order to administer it faithfully and diligently to his praise and the salvation of souls, I do this gladly from the heart for the sake of the Word. In doing this I do not seek love, friendship, honor, and thanks from the people; it rather issues from the heart and performs this before it receives honor, money, or favor, although if these come and follow, I may have and receive them without sin.
You see, then, that the Word is the cause, foundation, ground, fountain, and spring of love from the heart and of all good works, if they are to please God, for they cannot do so unless the heart first be pure.
Even among men works are not acceptable when they are done without the heart in pure hypocrisy. So, if even the emperor and men require the heart, although they cannot see it, how much more does God require a heart which does everything for the sake of the Word? That is why he causes his Word to be preached, in order that we conform ourselves to it in all our life and action. Let us allow nothing to hinder or trouble us or make us weak or weary, even though we suffer loss, ingratitude, and contempt because of it, but rather go boldly on and say: I did not begin this for any man's sake and therefore I will not cease
- 110 because of men; I shall do it rather for God's sake, let happen what may. This will produce fine people, masters, princes, subjects, preachers, etc., ready to do all good works and to serve and please God with good will and love, for then the fountain and spring is good, not drawn and carried in from the outside.
Let this suffice for now as a brief treatment of the first point, namely, that the heart is made pure only through the Word and not, as the monks have dreamed, by doing battle oneself with evil or impure thoughts and thinking other thoughts, for whatever the thoughts are, the heart still remains impure if the Word of God is not in it, even though they put on a great show of a godly life, as Paul himself says of them. But this purity of which he speaks goes further than that outward, bodily purity, which the Jewish holy men practiced, through their many ablutions, washings, foods and drink, and that of our spirituals, with their fasting, garb, orders, and so on. It means rather a purity of the spirit, that a man knows through God's Word how to serve him in every calling.
Now comes the second part, concerning a "good conscience," namely, that love should issue from a heart which has a joyful, quiet conscience both toward men and toward God: Toward men in the sense in which St. Paul boasted that he had so lived that he had neither offended nor grieved anybody nor given a bad example, but that all who saw and heard him were compelled to bear witness that he had served, helped, counselled, and done good to all men. Moses, too, gloried in such a conscience over against his rebellious people in Num. 16 [:15], "I have not taken one ass from them, and I have not harmed one of them." Likewise, Jer. 18 [:20], "Remember how I stood before thee to speak good for them, to turn away thy wrath from them." And likewise Samuel in I Kings [I Sam. 12:2–3], "I have walked before you from my youth until this day. Here I am; testify against me before the Lord … Whose ox have I taken? Or whose ass have I taken? Or whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed? Or from whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes with it? Testify against me and I will restore it to you."
Look, this is the kind of glory and confidence every Christian should possess, that he may so live before every man and practice and prove his love, that none may bring any complaint against him to terrify and dismay his conscience, but rather that every man will be compelled to say, if he is going to speak the truth, that he has so conducted himself that nothing but improvement has resulted for those who would accept it, and can declare this before God against every man. This is what it means to have a good conscience toward men or against men.
Even though such a conscience will not be able to stand before God's judgment, any more than the purity of heart which consists in outward life and works of love can stand before him, for before God we still remain sinners, nevertheless we should have this kind of a heart in order that we may comfort ourselves before him and say: This God has enjoined and commanded, therefore I do it out of a pure heart and a good conscience, and I would not willingly do otherwise nor offend and hurt anybody; but rather what I say and do is what God has ordered and commanded me to do. No Christian must ever allow to be taken away from him this confidence of being able to boast and appeal to God's Word against the whole world. For any man who does not pay any attention to living his life in such a way that he can put everyone to silence and defend himself and prove before men that he has lived, spoken, and done well, that man is not yet a Christian and has neither a pure heart nor love within him. For if a person is thus inclined to rely on the doctrine of faith, as if when he has it he can do whatever he likes, whether it harms or helps his neighbor, this will do him no good. Otherwise this doctrine will get the reputation of giving license to every kind of excess and villainy. It is rather love from a pure heart and a good conscience, that no man can blame or accuse him of anything evil.
Even though these things are said about our life and our acts, and even though a Christian is quite another man before God, as we shall hear later, nevertheless he must earnestly endeavor to be blameless before the world. And when he fails to do this, he must interpose the Lord's Prayer and say, both to God and to men, "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us," that so his life may remain blameless at least before men and retain a good conscience, if not through perfect love and purity of heart, then at least through the humility which begs and asks forgiveness of men whenever he has not acted purely and perfectly enough toward them or has not been able to do so. Then your neighbor will be compelled to say: Very well, even though you have harmed me or failed to serve me as you should, yet because you have so humbled yourself before me, I will gladly forgive and pardon you, for I too am guilty and I want you to treat me in the same way. For humility's sake, I must admit that you are a good man, for you do not stubbornly and willfully insist upon offending me, but rather turn to love. So it can still be
- 111 called blameless, because it has been covered by humility and what was blameworthy has been set right, so that none can complain. This is the way the law should be interpreted and preached, in order both that love for every man may rightly proceed from a pure heart for God's sake and that the conscience may stand before the world. This is what those vain talkers should be preaching instead of their loose, lazy, and cold gibble-gabble.
But, in order that all this may be acceptable and stand before God, there is still one other thing that must be added, which is as follows: "and sincere faith."
For, as I have said, even though I have a good conscience before men and practice love from a pure heart, nevertheless there still remains in me the old Adam, the sinful flesh and blood, so that I am not altogether holy and pure and, Paul says in Gal. 6 [Gal. 5:17], "The desires of the Spirit are against the flesh; for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you would." And in Rom. 7
[:17–24] he says of himself that he must constantly battle and struggle with himself and that he cannot do the good which he would. The Spirit is willing to live purely and perfectly according to God's Word, but the flesh remains and resists and tempts us, so that we continue to pursue our own honor, greed, and good days and become slothful, fed up, and weary in our calling.
Thus there remains in us an everlasting strife and resistance, so that much impurity is always creeping in and thus dividing our person, and there can be no flawless purity, or a good conscience, or perfect love, except perhaps what may appear to be so to men. But before God there is still much in us which is faulty and culpable, even though for men everything were altogether perfect. For example, even though David can boast before men that nobody can reproach him and the holy prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, etc. boast and are confident that what they have done in pursuance of their divine office was right and well done, because it was God's Word and command, and that in doing so they acted with a pure heart and conscience; nevertheless, they could not glory in this before God's judgment. Rather they are compelled to say: If we are to strive in judgment before thee, then no man has such a good conscience or pure heart that he need not dread thy judgment and acknowledge his guilt. For God has reserved to himself the prerogative of having cause and claim upon every saint, so that no man is so holy that he cannot rightly condemn him as worthy of damnation. Therefore, even though before men both heart and conscience are pure and good, you must still remember that the heart must be pure and the conscience good before God, that he may not condemn them and they be as safe from his judgment as that of men.
And here the third part must be added, that is, faith. This is really the chief article and the highest commandment of all, which contains within it all the rest, in order that we may realize that when love is not perfect, the heart not sufficiently pure, and the conscience not at peace, and though the world cannot reproach us, God still finds in us that which is culpable, then faith must be added. And it must be a faith which is not hypocritical and mixed with confidence in our own holiness. For wherever this faith is not present the heart does not become pure before God and the conscience cannot stand when the searching judgment and reckoning begins. Then men will probably let me go in peace and, as far as they are concerned, I may be able to boast that I have served them, preached to them, helped, ruled, and directed them with all faithfulness. And I may say that if I have done too much or too little, I am sorry, for I wanted to do everything I should. Then I shall be safe and excused and they will have nothing more to require of me and will have to wipe the record clean. But here it says bluntly that I must have a pure heart and a good conscience before God, that he may not be able to accuse and condemn me. And this we do not find in ourselves, even though we may have something to boast of before the world.
Here, therefore I must have something else, something I can hold on to when it comes to the last gasp and my abashed and terrified conscience cries out: I may very well have done what I could, but who knows how often I have done too little, for I can not see and mark all things, as Ps. 19 [:12] says, "Who can discern his errors?" Therefore I can put no trust whatsoever in my own holiness or purity. I have the Word all right and it says: This is the way you must live and love and have a good conscience, and this is pure and holy; but what is lacking is that I can never conclude that this is the way my heart is and I never find within me a conscience which is as pure and good as the Word requires. For there is no man on earth who can say: I know that I have done everything and before God I owe nothing. Even the holiest of saints must confess: I have done what I could, perhaps, but I have failed far oftener than I know. So our conscience stands against us all, accusing us and declaring us unclean, even though we have passed with highest honors before the world or even now are passing. For the conscience must judge itself according
- 112 to the Word, which declares: This you should have done or this you should not have done. This it can neither avoid nor answer; the most it can do is to doubt. But when it doubts it is already impure, for it does not stand up before God but rather flounders and flees.
Here, therefore, the chief article of our doctrine must come to our help, namely, that our Lord Jesus Christ, who was sent into the world by the Father, suffered and died for us and thereby reconciled and moved the Father to grace, and now sits at the right hand of the Father, pleading our cause as our Savior and as our constant mediator and intercessor interceding for us who can not of ourselves have or obtain this perfect purity and good conscience. Therefore through him we can say before God: Although I am not pure and cannot have a good conscience, yet I cleave to him who possesses perfect purity and good conscience and offers them for me, indeed, gives them to me. For of him alone is it written, as St. Peter [I Pet. 2:22] quotes from Isa. 53 [:9], "He committed no sin; no guile was found on his lips." He bears with great honor the distinction of having no need of that part of the Lord's Prayer which says, "Forgive us our debts" nor of that article of the Creed, "I believe in the forgiveness of sins," but is free and secure in perpetual, pure, and perfect righteousness and purity, whom none, neither man nor devil nor God himself, can accuse or lay anything upon his conscience, for he himself is God and can not accuse himself.
This, then, is the faith which is neither reigned nor hypocritical, but which dares to come before God in the midst of this struggle and trembling of conscience and say: Dear Lord, before the world I may be innocent and safe, so that it cannot punish or accuse me; for even though I have not performed all things, I nevertheless beg every man to forgive me for God's sake as I in turn forgive every man. Thus I have satisfied them, so that they have no further just claim against me. But before thee I must verily down my peacock's plumes and confess that I am guilty of all things, and say as David said in Ps. 43 [Ps. 143:2],
"Enter not into judgment with thy servant; for no man living is righteous before thee." Therefore, if the law is to obtain, I cannot bargain with thee, but must straightway appeal from thy judgment seat to thy mercy seat. Before the judgment seat of the world I am content to be dealt with according to the law; there
I will answer and do what I ought. But before thee I would appeal to no law, but rather flee to the Cross and plead for grace and accept it as I am able.
For the Scriptures teach me that God established two seats for men, a judgment seat for those who are still secure and proud and will neither acknowledge nor confess their sin, and a mercy seat for those whose conscience is poor and needy, who feel and confess their sin, dread his judgment, and yearn for his grace.
And this mercy seat is Christ himself, as St. Paul says in Rom. 3 [:25],8 whom God has established for us, that we might have refuge there, since by ourselves we cannot stand before God. There shall I take my refuge when I have done or still do less than is meet and done much more of sin according to the law, both before and after my sanctification and justification. There my heart and conscience, regardless of how pure and good they are or can be in the sight of men, shall be as nothing, and they shall be covered over as it were with a vault, yea, with a fair heaven, which will mightily protect and defend them, the name of which is grace and the forgiveness of sins. Thereunder shall my heart and conscience creep and be safe.
For he himself caused it to be preached and proclaimed through his apostles [Acts 10:43], that through his name every one who believes shall receive the forgiveness of sins. Again, "He who believes and is baptized will be saved" [Mark 16:16]. And he himself says in John 3 [:16], "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." Therefore God himself has established the mercy seat and is pointing us from the judgment seat to the mercy seat. Others, such as the proud holy ones, the despisers and persecutors of God's Word, we may leave before the judgment seat; there they shall hear their sentence. Let them remain in their vicious circle until they too humble themselves; we, however, will not remain in that circle, but step out of it as far as ever we can, into that free circle and place where stands the mercy seat. And we appeal to it with full right, because we did not invent it with our own brain. It is rather his own Word which declares it and threatens stern, terrible judgment upon them who come with their own holiness, as if they could stand before God with that, and pay no regard to the mercy seat of Christ. For the sentence has already been pronounced, that they must come before the judgment seat, as Christ says in John 3 [:18], "He who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God" but "he who believes in him is not condemned." That is, he will not come before the judgment seat but before the mercy seat, where there shall be no wrath, where rather he shall be called a beloved child and everything
- 113 that is not pure within him shall be forgiven, yea, blotted out as a drop of water is consumed by the heat of the sun. For where the mercy seat reigns there is nothing else but utter forgiveness and remission of all sin.
Consequently, we must now learn to distinguish between the two parts which are called the law and the gospel, which is something that we are always teaching. The law brings us before the judgment seat, for it demands that we must be good and love out of a pure heart and a good conscience. Its purpose is to make us exercise ourselves in this; so far it must go and then stop. But when it comes and demands that you settle accounts and pay what it requires, there it cancels itself. For even if you have performed what it requires, this still will not stand before God, since before him there will still be much which is lacking and failing, which you have not done and which you do not even realize you have not done. Where will you turn then? The law keeps harrying you and accusing you through your own conscience, which testifies against you, and absolutely demanding the judgment upon you. Then you must simply despair and there is no help or counsel for you unless you know that you can flee from the judgment seat to the mercy seat.
For example take a bishop who has been pious and led a good life. He dies in his holiness, not knowing Christ except as a stern judge, as he has hitherto been preached and portrayed and as he actually is to such people, not because he wants to be, for in actuality he is nothing but pure grace and comfort, but because in their hearts they neither feel nor consider him to be anything else. Behold, that man is hindering and preventing himself from receiving any grace, and there is no one to help him on account of his ignorance.
He does not know the difference between the judgment seat and the mercy seat; in fact, he does not know about the mercy seat at all, and therefore must necessarily miss it and remain under the judgment seat.
But we teach that one should know and look upon Christ as the one who sits there as the advocate of the poor, terrified conscience, believe in him, not as a judge, who is angry and ready to punish, but as a gracious, kindly, comforting mediator between my fearful conscience and God, and says to me: If you are a sinner and are terrified, and the devil is drawing you to the judgment seat through the law, then come unto me and have no fear of any wrath. Why? Because, if you believe in me, I am sitting here in order that I may step between you and God, so that no wrath or displeasure can touch you; for should wrath and punishment befall you it must first come upon me. But this is impossible; for he is the beloved Son, in whom all grace dwells, so that when the Father looks upon him everything in heaven and earth becomes pure love and favor and all wrath disappears and vanishes away. And whatever he desires and asks of the Father must all be granted without a single doubt or denial. Thus through faith we are made wholly safe and secure, so that we shall not be condemned, not because of our holiness or purity, but because of Christ, because through this faith we cleave to him as our mercy seat, sure that in and with him no wrath can remain, but only love, pardon, and forgiveness. Thus the heart is made pure and the conscience good and secure before God, not out of regard for my own purity or life before the world, but for that lovely treasure which my heart takes hold of, which is my surety and rich store when I am lacking and cannot pay God.
But here is where the emphasis lies—that we must see to it that our faith is not false or, as Paul says, feigned, but rather sincere. For if this fails or proves to be false, then everything fails. For there have always been many, as there still are, who talk a lot about faith and pretend to be masters not only of the law but also the gospel, and say, as we also say: Faith is what does it, [but then they go on and say] but yet the law and good works must be added to it, otherwise faith does not avail. Thus they mingle together our life and works and Christ. This is not to teach faith purely and sincerely, but is rather faith so colored, feigned, and falsified that it is not faith at all, but a false semblance and shade of faith, because the confidence of the heart does not rest purely upon Christ as the only mercy seat, but is placed rather in our own holiness, as if this could stand before the judgment seat; wherefore before God it is quite rightly condemned and rejected, which is where it belongs.
For if faith is to be pure, unalloyed, and unfeigned, these two, Christ and my works, must be rightly distinguished. For, after all, everyone must realize that Christ and his work is not my work and life, but something separated from the law and all men's work, far more than one man is different from another. I cannot say that I and the emperor or the pope in Rome are the same thing, and yet I am much nearer and more like them as one mortal, sinful man is to another than to the Lord Christ, who is not only a pure, holy man without any sin whatsoever but also is the one God himself. Therefore let the law and your pure heart and good conscience suffice before men here on earth, but there where the mercy seat stands at the right hand of the Father and is the mediator between you and God, there no human work or merit shall have any
- 114 access or count for anything at all. For what have I or any other man contributed toward his sitting at the right hand of the Father? He was seated there without any of my work or thought whatsoever and without any co-operation of the law, for there is not a single letter about this in the law. Therefore he must be cleanly separated from all my being, life, and works and it must be inflexibly concluded that he is something other than our life led before men with a pure heart and good conscience, no matter how good it is. For when that life appears before God and I come before the judgment seat to which the law relegates me, I am condemned and lost. But Christ the mercy seat and those who cleave to him cannot be condemned or convicted.
Thus the judgment seat, the law, and all my life is separated and put on one side; there I and all the saints remain and let it all be judged and condemned in God's name. But my faith must flee to the other side and as a poor condemned man who acknowledges his sin leap over to the blessed mercy seat and cling to him who is pure and has no sin, of whom the Scriptures say, "He who believes in him will not be put to shame" [Rom. 9:33; Isa. 28:16], because he is standing there and interceding for me. And besides, he gives me all his purity and holiness, so that, clothed and adorned with it, I may be able to stand before God, and all wrath will be removed and instead pure love and grace will hover above me.
You see, that's the way faith remains pure and sincere. For it does not rest upon me and is not founded upon my works, as if that were why God should be gracious to me, as the false, feigned faith does by mingling together God's grace and my merit. Even though this false faith does talk about Christ, it still puts the heart's confidence in itself. Therefore it is only a painted color, which cannot endure, for in the end, if you go on believing that God should be gracious to you because of the life you have led, you will still come to the point where you must doubt and say. Who knows how well you have done? How can you be certain that nothing has been neglected or omitted? Then the foundation falls and slides from under you like sinking sand, and faith lies in utter ruin.
This is why it is aptly called a colored or painted faith, through which the heart looks, as it were, through a painted glass, through which a thing appears to be red or blue, as the glass is, and yet is not.
Thus they believe God is disposed to regard our works and merits and so they paint him according to their own opinion and dream, which in itself is false, and thus see both God and everything else to which they turn through a painted glass. But you will see him with pure and unclouded eyes if you clearly distinguish between these two seats, that heaven with its stars (grace and forgiveness through the Mediator), where
Christ reigns with his works, may remain pure [and clearly separated from] the earth with its trees and grass, where we and all our works belong.
I say that, if we are ever to stand before God with a right and uncolored faith, we must come to the point where we learn clearly to distinguish and separate between ourselves, our life, and Christ the mercy seat. But he who will not do this, but immediately runs headlong to the judgment seat, will find it all right and get a good knock on the head. I have been there myself and was so burnt that I was glad I was able to come to the mercy seat. And now I am compelled to say: Even though I may have lived a good life before men, let everything I have done or failed to do remain there under the judgment seat as God sees fit, but, as for me, I know of no other comfort, help, or counsel for my salvation except that Christ is my mercy seat, who did no sin or evil and both died and rose again for me, and now sits at the right hand of the Father and takes me to himself under his shadow and protection, so that I need have no doubt that through him I am safe before God from all wrath and terror. Thus faith remains pure and unalloyed, because then it makes no pretensions and seeks no glory or comfort save in the Lord Christ alone.
The man who can do this will be the justified man. All the others operate with a feigned faith. They talk a lot about faith but they mix things together, as a barkeeper mixes water and wine, by saying if you live in such and such a way God will be gracious to you, and they turn the mercy seat into a judgment seat and the judgment seat into a mercy seat. But nothing comes of it, for it will still remain the judgment seat.
Therefore, keep these two widely separated from each other, as widely as ever you can, so that neither can approach the other: on one side your life and holiness and the judgment seat, which demands and drives you to have a good conscience and live rightly toward men, but on the other side your sin before the mercy seat, where God will lovingly welcome you and take you into his arms like a beloved child with all your sins and frightened conscience and will no more remember any wrath.
See, if that is the way faith were preached, men would be justified and all the rest; a pure heart and good conscience through genuine, perfect love, would follow. For the man who through faith is sure in his
- 115 heart that he has a gracious God, who is not angry with him, though he deserves wrath, that man goes out and does everything joyfully. Moreover, he can live this way before men also, loving and doing good to all, even though they are not worthy of love. Toward God, therefore, he stands in a relationship of certainty that he is secure for Christ the Mediator's sake, that he does not wish to cast him into hell, but rather lovingly smiles upon him and opens heaven for him.
This is the highest security, the head and foundation of our salvation. Accordingly, I go out toward my neighbor with my life and do the best I can for him as my office or station requires and commands. And when I do less than is right, I go to him first and ask him to forgive me. Thus I have a good, sure conscience both before God and before men, so that henceforth neither he nor the world can punish me, nor hell swallow me up, nor the devil devour me. So a man is made wholly perfect toward men through love, but before God, not through the law, but through Christ, whom he apprehends by his faith as the mercy seat, who lays down his holiness and gives it to me, so that in him I have what I need for salvation.
This, then, is the right, pure doctrine, which should be cultivated and in which the people should be instructed so they can tell how they are to be justified both before God and before men, and so that they will not interchange and mix up faith and love or life toward God and life toward men. This is what those vainglorious preachers should be doing, since they want to be regarded as masters of the law, in order that it may be well known and observed in Christendom. For even when it is taught in the best possible way it is difficult enough to learn it well, especially for us, who have been so habituated and trained in the doctrine of works and pointed only to the law and ourselves. And besides this add our own nature, which is itself inclined in this direction. It is thus so rooted and strengthened by habit and the heart so strongly influenced that we cannot get away from it or think anything except that, if I have lived a holy life and done many great works, God will be gracious to me. Thus we must contend both with our nature and with strong habit. And it will be exceedingly difficult to get into another habit of thinking in which we clearly separate faith and love, for the muck still sticks and clings to us, even though we are now in faith, so that the heart is always ready to boast of itself before God and say: After all, I have preached so long and lived so well and done so much, surely he will take this into account. We even want to haggle with God to make him regard our life and for our sake turn his judgment seat into a mercy seat. But it cannot be done. With men you may boast: I have done the best I could toward everyone, and if anything is lacking I will still try to make recompense. But when you come before God, leave all that boasting at home and remember to appeal from justice to grace.
Let anybody try this and he will see and experience how exceedingly hard and bitter a thing it is for a man, who all his life has been mired in his work righteousness, to pull himself out of it and with all his heart rise up through faith in this one Mediator. I myself have now been preaching and cultivating it through reading and writing for almost twenty years and still I feel the old clinging dirt of wanting to deal so with God that I may contribute something, so that he will have to give me his grace in exchange for my holiness. And still I cannot get it into my head that I should surrender myself completely to sheer grace; yet this is what I should and must do. The mercy seat alone must prevail and remain, because he himself has established it; otherwise no man can come before God.
So it is no wonder that others find it hard to grasp faith thus purely, especially when the situation is made worse by these devil's preachers, of whom St. Paul speaks, who cry out against it and keep emphasizing the law by quoting such texts as, "Do this, and you will live" [Luke 10:28] and "If you would enter life, keep the commandments" [Matt. 19:17], etc. Which, of course, is right and true, if you understand it rightly. You must tell me the true meaning of these words. Otherwise I know well enough already that I must be good and keep the commandments. But how am I going to do this? Or what does it mean to be good? If you say it means to have a good conscience and a pure heart and to do all that God has commanded, this is right. But go ahead and do it or show me one man who can say he has. It will be a long time before you can produce for me a heart or conscience which God cannot reproach and condemn.
But the law demands, as has been sufficiently said, a heart which has a good conscience before God.
Where are you going to get it? This is the question and the point we are dealing with. Certainly not by preaching the judgment seat, but rather by having pure, unfeigned faith, which takes hold of Christ and in him finds and obtains all the law requires. Then everything is pure and of good conscience and is counted good and just before God, for though much is lacking in me, he stands there for me and has so much goodness that he can make up for my and all men's deficiencies.
- 116 So we show the way a man becomes good before God. But they, even if they do well in other matters, show only the way a man becomes good before men. And yet they want to elevate this and make it count before God. Thus they mix it all up in one brew, like those who neither know nor have experienced anything of "what they are saying or the things about which they make assertions." What good is all this shrieking: If you want to get to heaven, you must keep the commandments? You won't accomplish it that way, not by a long shot! For just look into yourself and search out the evil within you and you will find that you were born in sin and have lived in sin and are unable to produce what the law demands. Why then do you go on making the people gape by repeating these words: You must be good, then you will be saved; when nothing comes of it and you never show anybody how to achieve it? I hear well enough what the law demands, but how am I going to accomplish it? Then you point me back to myself again and say:
You must do good works. But how can I stand before God after I have long performed good works and been good before men, as you teach me, and be sure that God also considers me good? For there my own heart and conscience are against me and they say No.
You, however, should be teaching me what Paul teaches here and everywhere, that it must issue from pure, unfeigned faith, that before everything else one must come to the mercy seat and there secure and complete what we lack. This is the right understanding of the words: Keep the commandments. For what the law demands is that you be wholly good, before God as well as before men. When you have this, then go out among men and practice love and do good works. Then you get to the point of the matter and all such commandments are fulfilled. For when a man does this he gives and does what the law requires: first, before God, though not through what he does of himself, but through Christ, without whom we can do nothing before God, and secondly, through what he himself does before men. Then he is wholly good, inwardly, through faith or Christ, and afterwards outwardly, through his works; but yet in such a way that there is also mutual forgiveness of sins. So the Christian's righteousness consists far more in forgiveness than in his own works, which those loose talkers turn upside down and, without preaching forgiveness, emphasize only our works.
You see, then, that Paul is rebuking the error and ignorance of those who were extolling and preaching the law and yet neither understanding it themselves nor showing how what one can do about it or how it can be performed. They could do no more than babble the words: Keep the law, keep the commandments and be saved, do good works, and so on. Just as to this day they are scribbling books and spewing the churches full of this idle wish-wash, which they do not understand themselves. But never a word do they say about Paul's teaching here that the chief thing is that love should issue from a pure heart, a good conscience, and sincere faith. All they say is: Keep the commandments, but never penetrate the central meaning of Paul's teaching. Therefore they make it all wrong and false, both love and heart and conscience. For the main source is lacking, namely, sincere faith. But when this is not right then everything that should grow out of it will be wrong. And what they hand out is pure delusion and deception before your eyes, seen through painted glass, which looks like the real thing, but isn't. They think that because of the way they have lived before men, God should see it the same way they see it in their blind conceit. But if that were God's opinion, he might just as well have kept Christ and the whole message of the gospel to himself. What need would there be for him to set up such things, to send his Son down from heaven, and allow him to shed his precious blood in order to gain and give something which we ourselves already have? It would only be a fool who would bestow such treasure on something that nobody needs.
So you see that they are only teaching their own dreams, which they do not understand and which only confuse the people, because they cannot show how one can achieve what they set forth, but only point to ourselves, and thus men are strengthened in their old nature and habit, whereas they ought to lead people away from it. These are indeed disgusting, malevolent people, so that Paul not unreasonably rebukes and denounces them. And they must not have been ordinary people, for he himself says that they were teachers of the law and wanted to be praised and commended, even more highly than the apostles themselves.
Therefore let us hold on to this text, for it is excellently expressed and a pure, perfect teaching of how we are to be righteous both before God and before men, as the law requires, and how these three are to be brought together, a pure heart, a good conscience, and sincere faith, and out of them all our life should flow and continue. Then we shall have found and fulfilled the meaning of the law. But above all, it teaches us that we must look to Christ and bring him into it, who "is the end of the law" [Rom. 10:4] and of