A quote from Pieper
"In
view of the Scriptural requirement of perfect sanctification, the
Christian will ask: 'Who, then, can be saved?' Christ tells him, 'With
me this is impossible, but with God all things are possible," (Matt.
19:25-26). Nothing makes Christians so conscious of their daily
deficiencies as the earnest striving for perfection. And when they
acknowledge and confess their daily shortcomings before God, they flee
for refuge to divine grace, knowing that the grace of God takes no
account of the Law and human works, of our daily success or failure in
sanctification and good works. Only by keeping Law and Gospel separate
could the Apostle, on the one hand, be fully assured of grace and
salvation, Romans 8:37-39, and, on the other hand, require unsparing
self-denial, 1 Cor. 9:27. The whole life of the
Christian thus becomes a daily repentance. The more sincerely
Christians daily endeavor to rid themselves of all they have and to
serve God alone in all their works, the better they learn to know the
abysmal sinful depravity which clings to them, and the more earnestly
they will daily implore the free grace of God in Christ. And since they
are no more under the Law, but under grace (Romans 6:14), they daily
begin anew their struggle to attain perfect sanctification, deploring
their many failures ('O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me
from the body of this death?'), but, at the same time, being assured of
their ultimate victory ('I thank God through Jesus Christ, our Lord,'
Romans 7:24-25). Striving after perfect sanctification, the Christian
thus leads a life of daily repentance (poenitentia quotidiana,
poenitentia stantium [daily repentance, standing repentance])."
- Franz Pieper, "Christian Dogmatics", 3:34
Show me how you are growing and getting better, and I will think of how much more I need to repent.
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