• διὰ — SBLGNT
• διὰ — Westcott-Hort, Tregelles, Reader's GNT (NA27)
• + τῆς — Robinson-Pierpont

1. See how immediately, from the very beginning, he casts down their pride, and dashes to the ground all their fond imagination, in that he speaks of himself as called. For what I have learned, says he, I discovered not myself, nor acquired by my own wisdom, but while I was persecuting and laying waste the Church I was called. Now here of Him that calls is everything: of him th…

Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth; not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ's sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their ri…

We are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ, by the effectual application of it to us by his Holy Spirit.

It is taught among us that we cannot obtain forgiveness of sin and righteousness before God through our own merit, work, or satisfactions, but that we receive forgiveness of sin and become righteous before God out of grace for Christ's sake through faith when we believe that Christ has suffered for us and that for his sake our sin is forgiven and righteousness and eternal life …

Our teachers are falsely accused of forbidding good works. Their writings on the Ten Commandments and other subjects prove the contrary, for they have taught well and helpfully about true Christian estates and works. About these matters little has been taught in former times; instead, childish and needless works such as rosaries, the cult of saints, monasticism, pilgrimages, ap…

Wherefore, girding up your loins, serve the Lord in fear and truth, as those who have forsaken the vain, empty talk and error of the multitude, and believed in Him who raised up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and gave Him glory. In whom, though now ye see Him not, ye believe, and believing, rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.

I believe in the Holy Ghost; the holy Christian Church, the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. What does this mean? I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and …

If we believe that Christ redeemed men by His blood, we are forced to confess that all of man was lost; otherwise, we make Christ either wholly superfluous, or else the redeemer of the least valuable part of man only; which is blasphemy, and sacrilege. Man's salvation is wholly dependent on the working of God, not on the works or will of man.

Is the object of faith the First Truth? Is the object of faith something complex or incomplex, i.e. is it a thing or a proposition? Can anything false come under faith? Can the object of faith be anything seen? Can it be anything known? Should the things to be believed be divided into a certain number of articles? These articles: are they of faith for all times? The number of a…

What is faith? In what power of the soul does it reside? Is its form charity? Are living formata faith and lifeless informis faith one identically? Is faith a virtue? Is it one virtue? Its relation to the other virtues Its certitude as compared with the certitude of the intellectual virtues Article 1. Whether this is a fitting definition of faith: "Faith is the substance of thi…

When the Apostle says that man is justified by faith and freely, those words are to be understood in that sense which the perpetual consent of the Catholic Church hath held and expressed; to wit, that we are therefore said to be justified by faith, because faith is the beginning of human salvation, the foundation and root of all Justification; without which it is impossible to …

Since human beings are totally dependent on God as their creator and lord, and created reason is completely subject to uncreated truth, we are obliged to yield to God the revealer full submission of intellect and will by faith. This faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, the Catholic Church professes to be a supernatural virtue by means of which, with the grace of Go…

He that believes the Gospel shall be saved; he that believes not shall be damned. In the Gospel one learns that human doctrines and decrees do not aid in salvation. That Christ has suffered for us and is our only merit — whoever attributes to works what is Christ's dishonors God.

The Gospel is the good and joyful message that God has fulfilled what He promised to the fathers through His Son. It is not merely a story but a power of God unto salvation. It demands nothing of us but faith, and this faith itself is the gift of God. The Gospel sets before us Christ as the one in whom all promises find their Yes.

Nothing can be more intrinsically excellent than the text, "By grace are ye saved through faith." The whole of religion is comprised in these few words. It includes all that is wrought in the soul by what is frequently termed "preventing grace" — all the drawings of the Father, the desires after God. It includes both justification and sanctification.

Q. What is true faith? A. True faith is not only a knowledge and conviction that everything God reveals in his Word is true; it is also a deep-rooted assurance, created in me by the Holy Spirit through the gospel, that, out of sheer grace earned for us by Christ, not only others, but I too, have had my sins forgiven, have been made forever right with God, and have been granted …

Q. How are you right with God? A. Only by true faith in Jesus Christ. Even though my conscience accuses me of having grievously sinned against all God's commandments and of never having kept any of them, and even though I am still inclined toward all evil, nevertheless, without my deserving it at all, out of sheer grace, God grants and credits to me the perfect satisfaction, ri…

Q. It is by faith alone that we share in Christ and all his blessings: where then does that faith come from? A. The Holy Spirit produces it in our hearts by the preaching of the holy gospel, and confirms it through our use of the holy sacraments.

The cause or blame for this unbelief, as well as for all other sins, is not at all in God, but in humanity itself. Faith in Jesus Christ and salvation through him is a free gift of God. As Scripture says: "By grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not of yourselves; it is the gift of God" (Eph. 2:8). Likewise: "It has been freely given to you to believe in Christ"…

But all who genuinely believe and are delivered and saved by Christ's death from their sins and from destruction receive this favor solely from God's grace — which God owes to no one — given to them in Christ from eternity.

The Synod rejects the errors of those who teach that what is involved in the new covenant of grace which God the Father made with humanity through the intervening death of Christ is not that we are justified before God and saved through faith, insofar as it accepts the merits of Christ, but rather that God, having withdrawn his demand for perfect obedience to the law, counts fa…

We believe that for us to acquire the true knowledge of this great mystery the Holy Spirit kindles in our hearts a true faith that embraces Jesus Christ, with all his merits, and makes him its own, and no longer looks for anything apart from him. For it must necessarily follow that either all that is required for our salvation is not in Christ or, if all is in him, then those w…

We teach that sinful man is justified before God (that is, absolved from all his sins and from the sentence of death) only by the grace of God, for the sake of Christ, through faith alone, without any merit of his own. For "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" and "are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus." Christ took…

We believe a man to be not simply justified through faith alone, but through faith which worketh through love, that is to say, through faith and works. Not that the foundation and certainty of our salvation resteth upon works; for no man can do the works of God — for Christ hath said, "Without me ye can do nothing" (John 15:5) — but that faith without works is dead, and worketh…

We are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, by faith, and not for our own works or deservings. Wherefore, that we are justified by faith, only, is a most wholesome doctrine, and very full of comfort.

Man's only hope of redemption is through the shed blood of Jesus Christ the Son of God. Conditions to Salvation: Salvation is received through repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. By the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, being justified by grace through faith, man becomes an heir of God.

The longest and most important article of the Apology. Melanchthon defends the Reformation teaching that sinners are justified freely by grace through faith in Christ, apart from works of the Law. Faith is not merely knowledge but trust (fiducia) in God's promise of mercy for Christ's sake. Justification is forensic — God declares the sinner righteous by imputing Christ's right…

We believe that the salvation of sinners is wholly of grace, through the mediatorial offices of the Son of God; who by the appointment of the Father, freely took upon Him our nature, yet without sin; honored the divine law by His personal obedience, and by His death made a full atonement for our sins; that having risen from the dead, He is now enthroned in heaven; and uniting i…

Justification is a free gift, purchased by the blood of Christ and received by faith alone. Spurgeon thunders against any system that mixes human merit with divine grace. If justification is by works, then Christ died in vain; if it is by grace, then boasting is excluded. The sinner contributes nothing to his justification except the sin from which he needs to be saved. God dec…

Spurgeon delivers a passionate rejection of the doctrine that baptism itself regenerates the soul. Salvation is by faith alone in Christ alone. While baptism is a precious ordinance commanded by Christ, it is an outward sign of an inward reality — not the means of regeneration. Simon Magus was baptized yet remained in the gall of bitterness. The thief on the cross was saved wit…