{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/105/1050207.htm","path":"chr/ecf/105/1050207.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/105/1050207.htm","text":"Chapter 31 [XVIII.]\u2014The Old Law Ministers Death; The New, Righteousness.\nNow, since, as he says in another passage, \u201cthe law was added because of transgression,\u201d 840 meaning the law which is written externally to man, he therefore designates it both as \u201cthe ministration of death,\u201d 841 and \u201cthe ministration of condemnation;\u201d 842 but the other, that is, the law of the New Testament, he calls \u201cthe ministration of the Spirit\u201d 843 and \u201cthe ministration of righteousness,\u201d 844 because through the Spirit we work righteousness, and are delivered from the condemnation due to transgression. The one, therefore, vanishes away, the other abides; for the terrifying schoolmaster will be dispensed with, when love has succeeded to fear. Now \u201cwhere the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.\u201d 845 But that this ministration is vouchsafed to us, not on account of our deserving, but from His mercy, the apostle thus declares: \u201cSeeing then that we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, let us faint not; but let us renounce the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor adulterating the word of God with deceit.\u201d 846 By this \u201ccraftiness\u201d and \u201cdeceitfulness\u201d he would have us understand the hypocrisy with which the arrogant would fain be supposed to be righteous. Whence in the psalm, which the apostle cites in testimony of this grace of God, it is said, \u201cBlessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin, and in whose mouth is no guile.\u201d 847 This is the confession of lowly saints, who do not boast to be what they are not. Then, in a passage which follows not long after, the apostle writes thus: \u201cFor we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus\u2019 sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.\u201d 848 This is the knowledge of His glory, whereby we know that He is the light which illumines our darkness. And I beg you to observe how he inculcates this very point: \u201cWe have,\u201d says he, \u201cthis treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.\u201d 849 When further on he commends in glowing terms this same grace, in the Lord Jesus Christ, until he comes to that vestment of the righteousness of faith, \u201cclothed with which we cannot be found naked,\u201d and whilst longing for which \u201cwe groan, being burdened\u201d with mortality, \u201cearnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from Heaven,\u201d \u201cthat mortality might be swallowed up of life;\u201d 850 \u2014observe what he says: \u201cNow He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit;\u201d 851 and after a little he thus briefly draws the conclusion of the matter: \u201cThat we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.\u201d 852 This is not the righteousness whereby God is Himself righteous, but that whereby we are made righteous by Him.\n2 Cor. 4:1, 2.\n96:847 96:848\n2 Cor. 4:5, 6.\n96:849 96:850\nSee 2 Cor. v. 1-4.\n96:851 96:852","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. V: A Treatise on the...","type":"page"}