1st & 2nd use of the law only

Thursday July 7th, Romans 12: For all have sinned; all fall short of God's glorious standard. Yet now God in his gracious kindness declares us not guilty. He has done this through Christ Jesus, who has freed us by taking away our sins. We want to rank sins, this one is worse than that one etc. When we do that we all tend to see the other persons sin as greater than ours, that is how we know we are ahead. God doesn’t work that way. In Matthew 5 Jesus radicalizes the law for those who think we should live under the law. He does this so they can see that what they are doing is just game playing. There are two uses of the law for Luther. One is to provide for a functional society where people can worship. The other is to convict people of their sins and to drive them to the acceptance of grace. Grace for themselves and grace for others. Rationalizing the law is a way of avoiding it, and ultimately the grace it brings us to.