Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament

⁴ Whether then we accuse ourselves, or directly praise God, in both ways do we praise God. If with a pious intention we accuse ourselves, by so doing we praise God. When we praise God directly, we do as it were celebrate His Holiness, who is without sin: but when we accuse ourselves, we give Him glory, by whom we have risen again. This if you shall do, the enemy will find none occasion whereby to overreach you before the judge. For when you shall be your own accuser, and the Lord your Deliverer, what shall he be but a mere calumniator?

With good reason has the Christian hereby provided protection for himself against his enemies, not those that may be seen, flesh and blood, to be pitied, rather than to be feared, but against those against whom the Apostle exhorts us to arm ourselves: “We wrestle not against flesh and blood;” that is, against men whom you see raging against you. They are but vessels, which another uses, they are but instruments which another handles. “The devil,” says the Scripture, “entered into the heart of Judas, that he should betray the Lord.” One may say then, what have I done? Hear the Apostle, “Give not place to the devil.” You have given him place by an evil will: he entered, and possessed, and now uses you. He had not possessed you, had you not given him place.