Law, Grace, & Daily Living

Luther, Lockdown, Law & Gospel | Galatians 3:2

Right here we have one more difference between the Law and the Gospel. The Law does not bring on the Holy Ghost. The Gospel, however, brings on the gift of the Holy Ghost, because it is the nature of the Gospel to convey good gifts. The Law and the Gospel are contrary ideas. They have contrary functions and purposes. To endow the Law with any capacity to produce righteousness is to plagiarize the Gospel. The Gospel brings donations. It pleads for open hands to take what is being offered. The Law has nothing to give. It demands, and its demands are impossible.
Martin Luther, Galatians Commentary

Luther, Lockdown, Law & Gospel | Galatians 3:1

The apostasy of the Galatians is a fine endorsement of the Law, all right. You may preach the Law ever so fervently; if the preaching of the Gospel does not accompany it, the Law will never produce true conversion and heartfelt repentance. We do not mean to say that the preaching of the Law is without value, but it only serves to bring home to us the wrath of God. The Law bows a person down. It takes the Gospel and the preaching of faith in Christ to raise and save a person.
Martin Luther on Galatians 3:1

Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel | Galatians 2:14

The person who can rightly divide Law and Gospel has reason to thank God. He is a true theologian. I must confess that in times of temptation I do not always know how to do it. To divide Law and Gospel means to place the Gospel in heaven, and to keep the Law on earth; to call the righteousness of the Gospel heavenly, and the righteousness of the Law earthly; to put as much difference between the righteousness of the Gospel and that of the Law, as there is difference between day and night. If it is a question of faith or conscience, ignore the Law entirely. If it is a question of works, then lift high the lantern of works and the righteousness of the Law. If your conscience is oppressed with a sense of sin, talk to your conscience. Say: “You are now groveling in the dirt. You are now a laboring ass. Go ahead, and carry your burden. But why don’t you mount up to heaven? There the Law cannot follow you!” Leave the ass burdened with laws behind in the valley. But your conscience, let it ascend with Isaac into the mountain.
In civil life obedience to the law is severely required. In civil life Gospel, conscience, grace, remission of sins, Christ Himself, do not count, but only Moses with the lawbooks. If we bear in mind this distinction, neither Gospel nor Law shall trespass upon each other. The moment Law and sin cross into heaven, i.e., your conscience, kick them out. On the other hand, when grace wanders unto the earth, i.e., into the body, tell grace: “You have no business to be around the dreg and dung of this bodily life. You belong in heaven.”

By his compromising attitude Peter confused the separation of Law and Gospel. Paul had to do something about it. He reproved Peter, not to embarrass him, but to conserve the difference between the Gospel which justifies in heaven, and the Law which justifies on earth.
The right separation between Law and Gospel is very important to know. Christian doctrine is impossible without it. Let all who love and fear God, diligently learn the difference, not only in theory but also in practice.
When your conscience gets into trouble, say to yourself: “There is a time to die, and a time to live; a time to learn the Law, and a time to unlearn the Law; a time to hear the Gospel, and a time to ignore the Gospel. Let the Law now depart, and let the Gospel enter, for now is the right time to hear the Gospel, and not the Law.” However, when the conflict of conscience is over and external duties must be performed, close your ears to the Gospel, and open them wide to the Law.
Martin Luther on Galatians 2:14

Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel | Galatians 2:13

It is marvelous how God preserved the Church by one single person. Paul alone stood up for the truth, for Barnabas, his companion, was lost to him, and Peter was against him. Sometimes one lone person can do more in a conference than the whole assembly.
I mention this to urge all to learn how properly to differentiate between the Law and the Gospel, in order to avoid dissembling. When it come to the article of justification we must not yield, if we want to retain the truth of the Gospel.
When the conscience is disturbed, do not seek advice from reason or from the Law, but rest your conscience in the grace of God and in His Word, and proceed as if you had never heard of the Law. The Law has its place and its own good time. While Moses was in the mountain where he talked with God face to face, he had no law, he made no law, he administered no law. But when he came down from the mountain, he was a lawgiver. The conscience must be kept above the Law, the body under the Law.
Paul reproved Peter for no trifle, but for the chief article of Christian doctrine, which Peter’s hypocrisy had endangered. For Barnabas and other Jews followed Peter’s example. It is surprising that such good men as Peter, Barnabas, and others should fall into unexpected error, especially in a matter which they knew so well. To trust in our own strength, our own goodness, our own wisdom, is a perilous thing. Let us search the Scriptures with humility, praying that we may never lose the light of the Gospel. “Lord, increase our faith.”
Martin Luther on Galatians 2:13

Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel | Galatians 2:1-5

Some will object that the Law is divine and holy. Let it be divine and holy. The Law has no right to tell me that I must be justified by it. The Law has the right to tell me that I should love God and my neighbor, that I should live in chastity, temperance, patience, etc. The Law has no right to tell me how I may be delivered from sin, death, and hell. It is the Gospel’s business to tell me that. I must listen to the Gospel. It tells me, not what I must do, but what Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has done for me.
Martin Luther on Galatians 2:1-5

Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel | Galatians 1:16

We now hear what kind of doctrine was committed to Paul: The doctrine of the Gospel, the doctrine of the revelation of the Son of God. This doctrine differs greatly from the Law. The Law terrorizes the conscience. The Law reveals the wrath and judgment of God. The Gospel does not threaten. The Gospel announces that Christ is come to forgive the sins of the world. The Gospel conveys to us the inestimable treasures of God.

Martin Luther on Galatians 1:16

Luther, Lockdown, Law & Gospel | Luther on Galatians (Part 1)

We continue our series, ‘Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel’ as we feature select passages from Martin Luther concerning the distinction between The Law and The Gospel. For the next several weeks, we will consider what Luther highlighted in his 1535 Commentary on the book of Galatians. Hope these passages provide some relief during this time of pandemic, quarantine, and unprecedented uncertainty.

To paraphrase this sentence: “These false apostles do not merely trouble you, they abolish Christ’s Gospel. They act as if they were the only true Gospel-preachers. For all that they muddle Law and Gospel. As a result they pervert the Gospel. Either Christ must live and the Law perish, or the Law remains and Christ must perish; Christ and the Law cannot dwell side by side in the conscience. It is either grace or law. To muddle the two is to eliminate the Gospel of Christ entirely.”
It seems a small matter to mingle the Law and Gospel, faith and works, but it creates more mischief than man’s brain can conceive. To mix Law and Gospel not only clouds the knowledge of grace, it cuts out Christ altogether.”
Martin Luther, Commentary on Galatians

Luther, Lockdown, Law, & Gospel | ‘On Christian Liberty’

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)

Seeing Jesus in Proverbs 31

A layman’s commentary on Proverbs 31:1 – 9

Proverbs 31 opens with a discourse between a mother and an ambiguous king named Lemuel לְמוּאֵל. Scholars differ concerning the exact identity of this king and while Jewish tradition identifies him as Solomon, there really is no unified consensus. We do best however to avoid over speculation and instead consider the parallels we see with the King of Kings…the Beloved Son about whom all Scripture is written (Luke 24:25-27).

In the first two verses, The king’s mother refers to him as the “son of my womb” and then proceeds to give him wisdom. King Jesus is the promised “Seed of the woman” who became our wisdom from God.

Lemuel’s mother warns him not to give his strength to reckless women who ruin kings. Jesus became weak and gave his life to sanctify a faithless bride.

‘It is not for kings to drink wine, lest they forget God’s Law‘. Instead, give beer to those who are dying, ‘that they might forget their poverty and remember their misery no more…’ The King of the Jews drank sour wine as He was dying…that we might forget our poverty…and that God might remember our sin no more.

The epilogue concludes, ‘Open your mouth for the voiceless and the oppressed…advocate for the poor and needy…‘ We are the voiceless whom the Law has silenced. We cannot plead our case before God. Yet, He who ‘opened not His mouth‘ interceded for all those oppressed by sin and the devil. It is Finished.