Either Christ is in charge of His church through the gospel preaching or we are in charge of the church through the law. There is no middle ground. There must be a King. The only question is, "Is it Him or me?" Luther makes the dichotomy between Christ and the pope, but as easy as it is to reject the pope, what we should remember is that the little pope in every heart is the problem of every human. The legalistic dictator within us is the real way in which the Roman papacy does actually rule. We are very easily convinced that we need to keep a set of externally imposed rules and that those rules are the way of eternal life. After a tragic or painful episode in our personal lives, we easily say, "if I hadn't done...whatever it is, I would not have had all these problems." And so we think that controlling our actions is the source of real peace and contentment. No such thing is the case. Our lack of peace has a much deeper root in the depravity of our heart, perverted as it is by sin. Our peace and contentment can only come from the Prince of Peace. We have either the King of Peace or the pope of our own hearts ruling our life and faith; Christ with the life-giving gospel and the little pope with death-dealing law.

While we have peace and contentment of spirit because Christ confers upon us  these things earned by His blood by faith, we still find that the gospel of Christ does not cause the world to be content and at peace with us, but rather it stirs up anger and outrage against us and our preaching. This should never surprise us or destroy our confidence in Christ, the Head of the church. Such disturbances are indicative of God's merciful care for us in the things that are not of this world: His Word and life-giving sacraments. There can be no other prop or stay, no other human institution or earthly authority that will support us in the midst of worldly strife. We have Christ alone and none other. He is quite enough and all that we need.