The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

unto many." “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound."
Thus the cloud of death which hung upon the horizon of our world
in its morning parts before the beaming of the Sun of Righteousness, and
then, transfigured by His ray, billows around His rising, purpling in His
glory. Nothing can magnify His brightness, but this cloud diffuses it. That
cloud lifts itself more and more with the ascending Sun, and at His full
noon shall have melted away forever.
Tenth Thesis. The necessity of the new birth for the pardon and
removal of original sin.
X. This natural consequence of original sin, to wit, condemnation and
eternal death, is actually incurred by all who are not born again. Conf.,
"His qui non renascantur." "Alle die so nicht wiederum neu geboren
werden."
1. If the natural tendency and consequence of original sin be death,
one of two results is inevitable. Either sin actually goes on and results in
death, or its natural tendency is in some way arrested. Our tenth Thesis
affirms that the only way in which it can be arrested is for its subject to be
born again. By nature we are born to sin, and through sin to eternal death.
By grace we are born again to a renewed heart, and through a renewed
heart to eternal life.
2. The relative innocence of any human being cannot in itself save
him. The innocence of any human being can only be relative. There is a
great difference in the character of unregenerate persons relatively to each
other, but there is no difference whatever in their nature. A thousand things
mould and modify character, but the corrupt heart is untouched by them
all. The phenomena of a corrupt heart are infinitely diversified, not only in
their number, but in their intensity. The young man whom Jesus loved,
and Judas who betrayed his Lord, were diverse in their character. The one
was lovely, the other as odious as it was possible for unregenerated
character to be. But they had alike an unchanged heart--their nature was
the same. The innocence of the young man, relatively to Judas, could not
save him. The so-called innocence of the best man falls infinitely more
short of absolute innocence than it rises above the deepest absolute
criminality