When it first came out, I read a little book entitled: Why I Am a Lutheran: Jesus At the Center by Daniel Preus. Pastor Preus's book is a layman's guide to the heart of Lutheran teaching. Jesus is that heart. True Lutheran theology always begins with Jesus Christ and what He has done for our salvation. Human capacity for spirituality is not at the center of the Lutheran confession. Lutherans tend not to ask what humans are capable of spiritually except from a christological perspective. What that means is that Lutherans want to know the depth of the riches stored up for us in the person and work of Jesus. What He has done for our salvation, the bloody depths to which He was willing to be subjected for our sake, the incredibly valuable ransom price paid by God's only Son for poor sinners, tell us how deep and hopeless our plight without Him. Lutherans want to say, "Look how much it costs God to rescue us! Why is the price so enormous? Because the problem of sin is also enormous."

We are all susceptible to overestimating our spiritual powers as though we can do enough, pray enough, have faith enough, sacrifice enough, put to death our old nature so completely, that God would look with favor upon us and our works. We make this horrible overestimation because old Adam, at work in our miserable lives, perverts our sight. Most often, this overestimation of our spiritual strength is merely a comparison between ourselves and other miserable sinners, "Yes, of course, there are people who are more wicked than me." Like the psychologist who remembers how much better off he is than others after counseling several deeply neurotic clients, says, "Thank God, I'm normal;" we humans are more than capable of finding ways of comparing ourselves favorably against other persons. We easily pervert the great Lutheran hymn: "Chief of Sinners:" "Chief of sinners though I be, I'm just glad you're worse than me!" Such thinking leaves Jesus out of the center of our faith.

"I believe that this Son of God and of Mary, our Lord Jesus Christ, suffered for us poor sinners, was crucified, dead, and buried, in order that He might redeem us from sin, death, and the eternal wrath of God by His innocent blood; and that on the third day He arose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father almighty, Lord over all lords, King over all kings and over all creatures in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, over death and life, over sin and righteousness.

"For I confess and am able to prove from Scripture that all men have descended from one man, Adam. From this man, through their birth, they acquire and inherit the fall, guilt and sin, which the same Adam, through the wickedness of the devil, committed in paradise; and thus all men along with him are born, live, and die altogether in sin, and would necessarily be guilty of eternal death if Jesus Christ had not come to our aid and taken upon himself this guilt and sin as an innocent lamb, paid for us by his sufferings, and if he did not still intercede and plead for us as a faithful, merciful Mediator, Savior, and the only Priest and Bishop of our souls.

"I herewith reject and condemn as sheer error all doctrines which glorify our free will, as diametrically contrary to the help and grace of our Savior Jesus Christ. Outside of Christ death and sin are our masters and the devil is our god and lord, and there is no power or ability, no cleverness or reason, with which we can prepare ourselves for righteousness and life or seek after it. On the contrary, we must remain the victims and captives of sin and the property of the devil to do and to think what pleases them and what is contrary to God and his commandments.