I remember that Staupitz used to say: “More than a thousand times I have vowed to God that I would improve, but I have never performed what I have vowed. Hereafter I shall not make such vows, because I know perfectly well that I shall not live up to them. Unless God is gracious and merciful to me for the sake of Christ and grants me a blessed final hour when the time comes for me to depart this miserable life, I shall not be able to stand before Him with all my vows and good works.” This despair is not only truthful but is godly and holy. Whoever wants to be saved must make this confession with his mouth and with his heart. The saints do not rely on their own righteousness; they sing with David (Ps. 143:2): “Enter not into judgment with Thy servant, for no man living is justified before Thee”; and (Ps. 130:3): “If Thou, O Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand?” Therefore they gaze at Christ, their Propitiator, who gave His life for their sins. And if there is any remnant of sin in their flesh, they know that this is not imputed to them but is pardoned by forgiveness. Meanwhile they battle by the Spirit against the flesh. This does not mean that they do not feel its desires at all; it means that they do not gratify them. Even though they feel their flesh raging and rebelling against the Spirit and feel themselves falling into sins and living in them, they do not become downcast on that account or immediately suppose that their way of life, their social station, and the works they have done in accordance with their calling are displeasing to God. No, they fortify themselves with their faith.
Martin Luther | Luther’s Works, Vol. 27: Lectures on Galatians, 1535, Chapters 5-6; 1519, Chapters 1-6, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 27 (Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1999), 73–74.
RESOURCES
- Subscribe To The Heidelblog!
- Download the HeidelApp on Apple App Store or Google Play
- Browse the Heidelshop!
- The Heidelblog Resource Page
- Heidelmedia Resources
- The Ecumenical Creeds
- The Reformed Confessions
- The Heidelberg Catechism
- Recovering the Reformed Confession (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2008)
- Why I Am A Christian
- What Must A Christian Believe?
- Heidelblog Contributors
- Support Heidelmedia: use the donate button or send a check to
Heidelberg Reformation Association
1637 E. Valley Parkway #391
Escondido CA 92027
USA
The HRA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization
Tony Phelps
Tony grew up in Rhode Island. He was educated at BA (University of Rhode Island) and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He worked in the insurance industry for ten years. He planted a PCA church in Wakefield, RI where he served for eleven years. In 2015–18 he pastored Covenant Reformed Church (URCNA) in Colorado Springs. He is currently pastor of Living Hope (OPC). Tony is married to Donna and together they have three children.
More by Tony Phelps ›
This is the profound comfort of the Christian. Although the law condemns him, he trusts that his sin is not imputed to him, that the death he deserves has been paid for by the sacrificial death of Christ, and he has a justifying righteousness that is outside of himself, the perfect righteousness of Christ, that is his through faith. In despairing of his own righteousness, he clings to the righteousness he has in Christ alone.
Spot on Angela
Dear Rev. Phelps,
Thank you for this very encouraging post. Thank you as well for the many quotes you have posted in the past re: The Law and the Gospel.
it seems like he’s contradicting himself. In one sentence he says even though we experience sinful desires, we do not gratify those desires. in the next senance he says we fall into sins and live in them. it’s either one or the other.
Perhaps ‘gratify’ here means more than just ‘acting according to the sinful desire.’ Such as, being pleased by sinful desire, delighting in it. But the Christian life is one of ‘doing what I do want to do,’ per Romans 7.
Paul,
The core of the passage is this:
This confession is followed by this summary of the Christian life:
We are driven to a pious despair of ourselves and our own righteousness to Christ and his perfect righteousness, to forgiveness of sins, from which flows the Christian life. Where is the contradiction?
Where is the contradiction?
You present – “We are driven to a pious despair of ourselves and our own righteousness to Christ and his perfect righteousness, to forgiveness of sins, from which flows the Christian life. Where is the contradiction?”
It is here:
We are driven to a pious despair of ourselves – not to our own righteousness – but to Christ and His perfect righteousness – for forgiveness of sins – from which flows the true Christian assurance of eternal life now and in the future.
I must be missing something. You’ll have to explain more completely.