# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1859_S359
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

A Comparison of Luther with Arndt and August H. Francke in This Regard, etc. 359

-lution which, now that Christ has blotted out the sin of all men and reconciled them to God, is to be spoken to all men. Hence Christ also says that when the disciples enter a house, they should enter it with the absolution: Peace be with you!

Luther continues: "So everything now depends on this, that your heart should accept this promise and hold it for true, that God, for Christ's sake, wills to be gracious to you. As we see here with the man sick of the palsy; the Lord first admonishes him to faith when he says: Be of good comfort, my son, doubt not, your sins are forgiven you. As soon as the man sick of the palsy believed this word, his sins were truly forgiven him. So we too come to the forgiveness of sins to this very day, when the minister of the church or another Christian says to you: God is not angry with you, only do not be angry with him; for on account of his Son Jesus Christ he has forgiven you all your sins. There you should believe this promise with all your might, and let yourself sooner be torn apart than that you should doubt it; for if you doubt, the absolution helps you nothing, even if God himself, with all his angels, were to speak that same absolution over you audibly with his own mouth.. So Word and faith must stand nicely together, for neither can exist without the other. Whoever believes and does not have the Word believes as the Turks and Jews do; they too say, indeed, that God is gracious and merciful, but they lack the promise, for God will not be gracious apart from Christ. So too, whoever has the Word and not faith — the Word accomplishes nothing for him either; so that Word and faith are joined together as in a marriage, and neither can be separated from the other. A fanatic believes that the Last Day will come within four weeks yet; such a faith is a plain lie, for there is no word behind it. A Turk believes he will enjoy the blessedness of his Mohammed, but it is a plain lie, for there is no word behind it. So too the pope believes that a Christian must advance himself toward heaven by his own works; but this is a false faith, for it lacks the Word and the promise. So it can well be that a person has a faith, but because it lacks the Word, it is no true faith, but a mere groundless delusion, from which nothing will ever come. But we Christians do not lack the Word, for we have the Word, by God's grace, rightly and purely. What we lack, however, is faith, in that we cannot hold so firmly to the Word as we should, whereas those others can believe firmly and strongly without any word at all. This is the doing of the devil and of original sin, which draws us away from the word of truth to the lie, so that we gladly believe it.. For consider: if I could believe rightly and perfectly that what Christ here says to the man sick of the palsy has also been said to me and to you in baptism, and is spoken daily in absolution and in public preaching — namely, that I need fear no wrath or disfavor from God — do you not think I would walk on my head for joy? Everything would become pure sugar to me, pure