# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1859_S357
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

A Comparison of Luther with Arndt and August H. Francke in This Regard, etc. 357

2. As to the second point, in which the distinctive feature of the Lutheran preaching of the forgiveness of sins consists — namely, how Luther describes the way and manner of coming to the forgiveness of sins — this appears, among other things, from the following passages of his first sermon in the Kirchenpostille on the Gospel for the nineteenth Sunday after Trinity: "This power all men have who are Christians and baptized, for by it they praise Christ and have the word 'sins are forgiven' in their mouth, so that they can and may say, whenever they wish and as often as necessary: Behold, man, God offers you his grace, grants you all your sin, be of good comfort, all your sins are forgiven you, only believe it, and it is certain — and whatever words anyone wishes to use for it. This voice shall not cease among Christians until the Last Day: your sins are forgiven you, be joyful and of good comfort! This a Christian always has in his mouth and speaks the word publicly by which sins are forgiven. In this way and manner a Christian has the power to forgive sins. Therefore when I say to you: Your sins are forgiven you — hold this for certain, as though God himself had said it. For who would dare do this, if Christ himself had not come down and put it in my mouth and said that we should forgive one another's sins? — as when he says in John chapter 20: Receive the Holy Spirit, etc. And in another place, Matthew 18, he says: Where two of you agree together, etc.; for where two or three are gathered together in my name, etc. The word does it and cuts right through. Now if there were no man on earth to forgive sin, and there were only law and works, oh, what a poor and wretched thing it would be for the troubled conscience! But now, since God fills the mouth of every believer, so that he can say to another: Your sins shall be forgiven you, wherever you are; then the golden year has begun. On this we should stand boldly and defy sin, so that I can say to my brother, who is stuck in the anguish and distress of sin: Be joyful and of good comfort, my brother, your sins are forgiven you; although I cannot give you the Holy Spirit and faith myself, yet I can proclaim it to you; if you believe it, then you have it. Those to whom he grants it praise and glorify God, just as they also do here in the Gospel. That is to say: God has given men the power to forgive sin, and this increases the kingdom of Christ, fetches and sets right the conscience; this we now do through the Word. God grant that we may grasp it thus as well."

From this it is evident that Luther makes the attainment of the forgiveness of sins rest on the hearing of the Gospel or of absolution, while at the same time, in order to exclude all working of one's own, he places everything on the gift of God according to his free mercy.

In the second sermon of the Kirchenpostille Luther writes: "Let this be said first, what Christian righteousness is and wherein it consists. Do you ask further: whence it comes, or by what it is brought about or