9:19, “For though I am free item all men, I have made myself a slave to all,” and in Rom. Both are Paul’s own statements, who says in I Cor.
If, however, they should be found to fit together they would serve our purpose beautifully. These two theses seem to contradict each other. A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.Ĥ. A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none. To make the way smoother for the unlearned-for only them do I serve-I shall set down the following two propositions concerning the freedom and the bondage of the spirit:ģ. As for me, although I have no wealth of faith to boast of and know how scant my supply is, I nevertheless hope that I have attained to a little faith, even though I have been assailed by great and various temptations and I hope that I can discuss it, if not more elegantly, certainly more to the point, than those literalists and subtile disputants have previously done, who have not even understood what they have written.
It is a living “spring of water welling up to eternal life,” as Christ calls it in John 4:14.Ģ. But he who has had even a faint taste of it can never write, speak, meditate, or hear enough concerning it. It is impossible to write well about it or to understand what has been written about it unless one has at one time or another experienced the courage which faith gives a man when trials oppress him. They do this because they have not experienced it and have never tasted the great strength there is in faith. Many people have considered Christian faith an easy thing, and not a few have given it a place among the virtues. MARTIN LUTHER’S TREATISE ON CHRISTIAN LIBERTY ġ.
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