Martin Luther's Writings: January 2004
January 10, 2004
Sacrament of Baptism Part Six18. In this place, then, belongs the common question whether baptism, and the vow which we there make to God, is something more or greater than the vows of chastity, of the priesthood, or of the clergy. Since baptism is common to all Christians, it is supposed that the clergy have taken a special and a higher vow.
I answer: From what has been said, this is an easy question to answer. For in baptism we all make one and the same vow: to slay sin and to become holy through the work and grace of God, to whom we yield and offer ourselves, as clay to the potter [Jer. 18:4–6]. In this no one is any better than another. But for a life in accordance with baptism, for the slaying of sin, there can be no one method and no special estate in life. This is why I said that each man must test himself that he may know in what estate he may best slay sin and put a check upon his nature. It is true, then, that there is no vow higher, better, or greater than the vow of baptism. What more can we promise than to drive out sin, to die, to hate this life, and to become holy?
Over and above this vow, a person may indeed bind himself to an estate which will be suitable to him and helpful for the completion of his baptism. It is just as though two men went to the same city, and the one went by the footpath, the other by the highway, just as each thought best. So he who binds himself to the estate of matrimony, walks in the toils and sufferings which belong to that estate and lays upon himself its burdens, in order that he may grow used to pleasure and sorrow, avoid sin, and prepare himself for death better than he could do outside of that estate.
But he who seeks more suffering, and by much exercise would speedily prepare himself for death and soon attain the goal of his baptism, let him bind himself to chastity or to the spiritual order. For the spiritual estate, if it is as it ought to be, should be full of torment and suffering in order that he who belongs to it may have more exercise in the work of his baptism than the man who is in the estate of matrimony, and through such torment quickly grow used to welcoming death with joy, and so attain the purpose of his baptism. Now above this estate there is yet a higher one, that which rules in the spiritual order: the estate of bishop, priest, and so forth. These men should be well practiced in sufferings and works, and at every hour be ready for death—to die not only for their own sake, but also for the sake of those who are their subjects.
Yet in all these estates the standard, of which we spoke above, should never be forgotten, namely, that a man should so exercise himself only to the end that sin may be driven out. He should not be guided by the number or the greatness of the works. But, alas! how we have forgotten our baptism and what it means, what vows we made there, and that we are supposed to walk in its works and to attain its purpose! So, too, we have forgotten about the ways to that goal and about the estates. We hardly know to what end these estates were instituted, or how we are to act in them for the fulfilling of our baptism. They have been made a sparkling show, and little more remains of them than a worldly display. As Isaiah [1:22] says, "Your silver has become dross, your wine mixed with water." On this mayGod have mercy! Amen.
19. If, then, the holy sacrament of baptism is a matter so great, gracious, and full of comfort, we should diligently see to it that we ceaselessly, joyfully, and from the heart thank, praise, and honor God for it. For I fear that by our thanklessness we have deserved our blindness and become unworthy of recognizing such grace. The whole world was, and still is, full of baptism and the grace of God. But we have been led astray into our own anxious works, and then into indulgences and other similar false comforts. We have thought that we are not to trust God until we are righteous and have made satisfaction for our sin, as though we would buy God's grace from him or pay him for it.
In truth, he who does not see in God's grace how it bears with him as a sinner and will make him blessed, he who looks forward only to God's judgment, will never be joyful in God, and can neither love nor praise him. But if we hear and firmly believe that in the covenant of baptism God receives us sinners, spares us, and makes us pure from day to day, then our heart must be joyful, and love and praise God. Thus God says through the prophet, "I will spare them as a manspares his son" [Mal. 3:17]. Wherefore it is needful that we give thanks to the Blessed Majesty, who shows himself so gracious and merciful toward us poor condemned worms. And the work itself we must magnify and acknowledge.
20. At the same time, however, we must also beware lest a false security creep in and say to itself, "If baptism is so gracious and great a thing that God will not count our sins against us, and as soon as we turn again from sin everything is right by virtue of baptism, then for the present I will live and do my own will. Afterward, or when about to die, I will remember my baptism and remind God of his covenant, and then fulfil the work and purpose of my baptism."
Baptism is indeed that great a thing, that if you turn again from sins and appeal to the covenant of baptism, your sins are forgiven. But watch out, if you thus wickedly and wantonly sin [and go presuming] on God's grace, that the judgment does not lay hold upon you and anticipate your turning back. Beware lest, even if you then desired to believe or trust in your baptism, your trial [anfechtung] be, by God's decree, so great that your faith is not able to stand. If they scarcely remain who do not sin or who only fall because of sheer weakness, where shall your wickedness remain, which has tempted and mocked God's grace?
Let us therefore walk with fear, that with a firm faith we may hold fast to the riches of God's grace and joyfully give thanks to his mercy forever and ever. Amen.
January 08, 2004
Sacrament of Baptism Part Five16. It follows, then, that baptism makes all sufferings, and especially death, profitable and helpful, so that they simply have to serve baptism in the doing of its work, that is, in the slaying of sin. It cannot be otherwise. For he who would fulfil the work and purpose of his baptism and be rid of sin, must die. Sin, however, does not like to die, and for this reason it makes death so bitter and so horrible. Such is the grace and power of God that sin, which has brought death, is driven out again by its very own work, namely, by death itself.
You find many people who wish to live in order that they may become righteous and who say that they would like to be righteous. Now there is no shorter way or manner than through baptism and the work of baptism, which is suffering and death. Yet so long as they are not willing to take this way, it is a sign that they do not properly intend or know how to become righteous. Therefore God has instituted many estates in life in which men are to learn to exercise themselves and to suffer. To some he has commanded the estate of matrimony, to others the estate of the clergy, to others the estate of temporal rule, and to all he has commanded that they shall toil and labor to kill the flesh and accustom it to death. Because for all who are baptized, their baptism has made the repose, ease, and prosperity of this life a very poison and a hindrance to its work. For in the easy life no one learns to suffer, to die with gladness, to get rid of sin, and to live in harmony with baptism. Instead there grows only love of this life and horror of eternal life, fear of death and unwillingness to blot out sin.
17. Consider now the lives of men. Many there are who fast, pray, go on pilgrimage, and exercise themselves in such things, thinking thereby only to heap up merit and to sit down in the high places of heaven; they no longer learn to slay their evil vices. But fasting and all such exercises should be aimed at holding down the old Adam, the sinful nature, and at accustoming it to do without all that is pleasing for this life, and thus preparing it more and more each day for death, so that the work and purpose of baptism may be fulfilled. And all these exercises and toils are to be measured not by their number or their greatness, but by the demands of baptism. That is to say, everyone is to take upon himself so much of these works as is good and profitable for the suppressing of his sinful nature and for the preparation of it for death. He is to increase or diminish these works according as he sees sin increasing or diminishing. As it is, people go their way and take upon themselves this, that, and the other task, doing now this, now that, according to the appearance or reputation of the work. Afterward they let it drop just as quickly and thus become altogether inconstant, till in the end they amount to nothing. Indeed some of them so rack their brains over the whole business, and so abuse nature, that they are useless both to themselves and to others.
All this is the fruit of that doctrine with which we have been so infatuated as to think that after repentance or baptism we are without sin and that our good works are to be heaped up for their own sake or as a "satisfaction" for sins already done, but notfor the blotting out of sin as such. This is encouraged by those preachers who preach unwisely the legends and deeds of the blessed saints and hold them up as examples for all. The ignorant easily fall for these things, and effect their own destruction out of the examples of the saints. God has given every saint a special way and a special grace for living according to his baptism. But baptism and its significance God has set as a common standard for everyone. Each of us is to examine himself according to his station in life and is to find what is the best way for him to fulfil the work and purpose of his baptism, namely, to slay sin and to die in order that Christ's burden may thus grow light and easy [Matt. 11:30] and not be carried with worry and care. Solomon has this to say of it, "The toil of a fool only wearies him, because he does not know the way to the city" [Eccles. 10:15]. For even as they are worried who wish to go to the city and cannot find their way, so it is with these men also; all their life and labor is a burden to them, and yet accomplishes nothing.
January 07, 2004
Sacrament of Baptism Part Four14. Those who presume to blot out and put away their sin by "satisfaction" are the same sort of people. They go so far as to disregard their baptism, as if they had no more need of it beyond the fact of having once been baptized. They do not know that baptism is in force all through life, even until death, yes—as said above—even to the Last Day. For this reason they presume to find some other way of blotting out sin, namely, by works. So for themselves and for all others, they create evil, terrified, and uncertain consciences, and despair at the hour of death. They do not know how they stand with God, thinking that by sin they have now lost their baptism and that it profits them no more.
Guard yourself, by all means, against this error. For as has been said, if anyone has fallen into sin, he should all the more remember his baptism, how God has here made a covenant with him to forgive all his sins, if only he will fight against them even until death. Upon this truth, upon this alliance with God, a man must joyfully dare to rely. Then baptism again goes into force and operation. Then his heart again becomes peaceful and glad, not in his own works or "satisfaction," but in the mercy of God promised to him in baptism, a mercy which God will keep forever. This faith a person must hold so firmly that he would cling to it even though everything and all sins attacked him. For he who lets himself be forced away from this faith makes God a liar in his promise in the sacrament of baptism.
15. It is faith like this that the devil attacks most of all. If he can overthrow it, he has won the battle. For the sacrament of penance (of which we have already spoken) also has its foundation in this sacrament, inasmuch as sins are forgiven only to those who are baptized, to those whose sins God has promised to forgive. The sacrament of penance thus renews and points out again the sacrament of baptism. It is as if the priest, in the absolution, were saying, "Lo, God has now forgiven you your sin, as he long since promised you in baptism; and now he has commanded me, by the power of the keys,13 to assure you of this forgiveness. Therefore you now come again into that which baptism is and does. Believe, and you have it. Doubt, and you are lost. So we find that through sin baptism is indeed hindered in its work, in the forgiveness and the slaying of sin. Yet only by lack of faith in its operation is baptism canceled out. Faith, in turn, removes the hindrance to the operation of baptism. Thus everything depends on faith.
To speak quite plainly, it is one thing to forgive sins, and another thing to put them away or drive them out. The forgiveness of sins is obtained by faith, even though they are not entirely driven out. But to drive out sins is to exercise ourselves against them, and at last it is to die, for in death sin perishes completely. But both the forgiveness and the driving out of sins are the work of baptism. Thus the Apostle writes to the Hebrews [12:1], who were baptized and whose sins were forgiven, that they should lay aside the sin which clings to them. For so long as I believe that God will not count my sins against me, my baptism is in force and my sins are forgiven, even though they may still in a great measure be present. After that follows their driving out through sufferings, death, and the like. This is what we confess in the article [of the Creed], "I believe in the Holy Ghost, the forgiveness of sins," and so forth. Here there is special reference to baptism, in which the forgiveness takes place through God's covenant with us; therefore we must not doubt this forgiveness.