This is the beginning of a series of posts that will feature select quotes from Martin Luther concerning the careful distinction between The Law of God…and The Gospel. May these passages comfort and encourage you during these challenging and unprecedented times!
For not One word of God only, but Both, should be preached; new and old things should be brought out of the treasury, as well the voice of the Law as the word of Grace. The voice of the law should be brought forward, that men may be terrified and brought to a knowledge of their sins, and thence be converted to penitence and to a better manner of life. But we must not stop here; that would be to wound only and not to bind up, to strike and not to heal, to kill and not to make alive, to bring down to hell and not to bring back, to humble and not to exalt. Therefore the word of grace and of the promised remission of sin must also be preached, in order to teach and set up faith, since without that word contrition, penitence, and all other duties, are performed and taught in vain.
There still remain, it is true, preachers of repentance and grace, but they do not explain the law and the promises of God to such an end, and in such a spirit, that men may learn whence repentance and grace are to come. For repentance comes from the law of God, but faith or grace from the promises of God, as it is said, ‘Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God’ (Romans 10:17), whence it comes that a man, when humbled and brought to the knowledge of himself by the threatenings and terrors of the law, is consoled and raised up by faith in the Divine promise. Thus ‘weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning’ (Psalm 30:5).
-Luther on ‘Christian Liberty’ (1520)
Law, Grace, & Daily Living 