condemns and punishes men. Tell him that his definition of Christ is wrong,
that Christ has given Himself for our sins, that by His sacrifice He has taken
away the sins of the whole world.

Make ample use of this pronoun "our." Be assured that Christ has canceled the
sins, not of certain persons only, but your sins. Do not permit yourself to be
robbed of this lovely conception of Christ. Christ is no Moses, no law-giver,
no tyrant, but the Mediator for sins, the Giver of grace and life.

We know this. Yet in the actual conflict with the devil, when he scares us
with the Law, when he frightens us with the very person of the Mediator, when
he misquotes the words of Christ, and distorts for us our Savior, we so easily
lose sight of our sweet High-Priest.

For this reason I am so anxious for you to gain a true picture of Christ out
of the words of Paul "who gave himself for our sins." Obviously, Christ is no
judge to condemn us, for He gave Himself for our sins. He does not trample the
fallen but raises them. He comforts the broken-hearted. Otherwise Paul should
lie when he writes "who gave himself for our sins."

I do not bother my head with speculations about the nature of God. I simply
attach myself to the human Christ, and I find joy and peace, and the wisdom of
God in Him. These are not new truths. I am repeating what the apostles and all
teachers of God have taught long ago. Would to God we could impregnate our
hearts with these truths.


VERSE 4. That he might deliver us from this present evil world.

Paul calls this present world evil because everything in it is subject to the