Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

Formerly we "were dead in trespasses and sins" (Eph ii.I), according to the Apostle. Therefore sin is spiritual death to the soul. Through mortal sin man loses God. God is the infinite and incomprehensible Good; to lose God is therefore an infinite and inconceivable calamity. As God is the greatest Good, so sin is the greatest evil. Punishments and afflictions are not real evils, because much good may come out of them. On the other hand we should esteem them good because they come from God, the highest Good, from whom naught but good can come. Christ Himself, the highest Good, suffers such afflictions, and He could not be a partaker of what is really evil. They lead also to the highest Good, that is, eternal life. Through suffering Christ entered into His glory; and through much tribulation must we Christians enter eternal life (Acts xiv.22). Sin is the greatest evil, because it draws us away from the highest Good; the nearer we approach God the farther we get from sin; the nearer we come to sin, the father do we withdraw from God. How salutary then is true repentance, which releases us from sin and leads us back to God. - Johann Gerhard, *Sacred Meditations* III