So Paul says in Rom. 1:18, “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men.” and in Rom. 3:19, 20, “The whole world may be held accountable to God, for no human being will be justified in his sight.” Christ also says in John 16:8, “The Holy Spirit will convince the world of sin.”

2 This, then, is the thunderbolt by means of which God with one blow destroys both open sinners and false saints. He allows no one to justify himself. He drives all together into terror and despair. This is the hammer of which Jeremiah speaks, “Is not my word like a hammer which breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jer. 23:29). This is not activa contritio (artificial remorse), but passiva contritio (true sorrow of the heart, suffering, and pain of death).

3 This is what the beginning of true repentance is like. Here man must hear such a judgment as this: “You are all of no account. Whether you are manifest sinners or saints,2 you must all become other than you now are and do otherwise than you now do, no matter who you are and no matter how great, wise, mighty, and holy you may think yourselves. Here no one is godly,” etc.

4 To this office of the law the New Testament immediately adds the consoling promise of grace in the Gospel. This is to be believed, as Christ says in Mark 1:15, “Repent and believe in the Gospel,” which is to say, “Become different, do otherwise, and believe my promise.”

5 John, who preceded Christ, is called a preacher of repentance—but for the remission of sins. That is, John was to accuse them all and convince them that they were sinners in order that they might know how they stood before God and recognize themselves as lost men. In this way they were to be prepared to receive grace from the Lord and to expect and accept from him the forgiveness of sins.

6 Christ himself says this in Luke 24:47, “Repentance and the forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations.”

7 But where the law exercises its office alone, without the addition of the Gospel, there is only death and hell, and man must despair like Saul and Judas.3

8 As St. Paul says,4 the law slays through sin. Moreover, the Gospel offers consolation and forgiveness in more ways than one, for with God there is plenteous redemption (as Ps. 130:7 puts it) from the dreadful captivity to sin, and this comes to us through the Word, the sacraments, and the like, as we shall hear.5