s God's imputation of righteousness for
Christ's sake, through faith. God declares to us in his Word that the
believer in his Son shall, for Christ's own sake, have God's grace
and eternal life. He who knows this is able to wait in hope for the
last day, having no fear, no disposition to flee.

8. But is it not treating the righteousness of the Law with
irreverence and contempt to regard it--and so teach--as something not
only useless and even obstructive, but injurious, loathsome and
abominable? Who would have been able to make such a bold statement,
and to censure a life so faultless and conforming so closely to the
Law as Paul's, without being pronounced by all men a minion of the
devil, had not the apostle made that estimation of it himself? And
who is to have any more respect for the righteousness of the Law if
we are to preach in that strain?

9. Had Paul confined his denunciations to the righteousness of the
world or of the heathen--the righteousness dependent upon reason and
controlled by secular government, by laws and regulations--his
teaching would not have seemed so irreverent. But he distinctly
specifies the righteousness of God's Law, or the Ten Commandments, to
which we owe an obligation far above what is due temporal powers, for
they teach how to live before God--something no heathenish court of
justice, no temporal authority, knows anything about. Should we not
condemn as a heretic this preacher who goes beyond his prerogative
and dares find fault with the Law of God? who also warns us to shun
such as observe it, such as trust in its righteousness, and exalts to
sainthood "enemies of the cross of Christ ... whose God is the
belly"--who serve the appetites instead of God?

10. Paul would say of himself: I, too, was such a one. In my most
perfect righteousness of the Law I was an enemy to and persecutor of
the congregation, or Church, of Christ. It was the legitimate fruit
of my righteousness that I thought I must be party to the most
horrible persecution of Christ and his Christians. Thus my holiness
made me an actual enemy of Christ and a murderer of his followers.
The disposition to injure is a natural result of the righteousness of
the Law, as all Scripture history from Cain down testifies, and as we
see even in the best of the world who have not come to the knowledge
of Christ. Princes, civil authorities in proportion to their wisdom,
their godliness and honor are the bitter and intolerant enemies