sanctification, in which I pleasurably tide. I
am an ignorant fool; but His wisdom carries me forward. I have
deserved condemnation; but I am set free by His redemption, a
wagon in which I sit secure. So that a Christian, if he but
believe it, may boast of the merits of Christ and all His
blessings, even as if he had won them all himself. So truly are
they his own, that he may even dare to look boldly forward to the
judgment of God, unbearable though it be. So great a thing is
faith, such blessings does it bring us, such glorious sons of God
does it make us. For we cannot be sons without inheriting our
Father's goods. Let the Christian say, then, with full
confidence: "O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy
sting? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the
law. But thanks be to God,[75] which giveth us the victory
through our Lord Jesus Christ." [1 Cor. 15:55 ff.] That is to
say, the law makes us sinners, and sin makes us guilty of death.
Who hath conquered these twain? Was it our righteousness, or our
life? Nay: it was Jesus Christ, rising from the dead, condemning
sin and death, bestowing on us His merits, and holding His hand
over us. And now it is well with us, we keep the law, and
vanquish sin and death. For all which be honor, praise, and
thanksgiving unto our God for ever and ever. Amen.

This, then, is the highest image of all, in which we are lifted
up, not only above our evils, but above our blessings as well,
and are set down amid strange blessings, brought together by
another's labor; whereas we formerly lay among evils, heaped up
by another's sin,[76] and added to by our own. We are set down, I
say, in Christ's righteousness, with which He Himself is
righteous; because we cling to that righteousness by which He is
well pleasing to God, intercedes for us as our Mediator, and
gives Himself wholly to be our own, as our High-Priest and
Protector. Therefore, as it is impossible that Christ, with His
righteousness, should not please God, so it is impossible that we
should not please Him. Hence it comes that a Christian is
almighty, lord of all,[77] having all things, and doing all
things, wholly without sin. And even if he have sins, they can in
no wise harm him, but are forgiven for the sake of the
inexhaustible righteousness of Christ that swalloweth up all
sins, on which our faith relies, firmly trusting that He is such
a Christ unto us as we have described. But if any one does