Faith Not a
Good Work

[In Genesis, God's dealings with Cain and Abel indicate, even then, that God conferred righteousness by faith (Gen. 4:4-5). Luther elaborates in his lectures on Genesis.]

This text, then, applies to our doctrine of justification, according to which a man must be righteous before all works and is accepted by God without all works, through that grace alone which his faith believes and apprehends.

Nor does even faith justify as a work, but it justifies because it apprehends the mercy of God which is set forth in Christ. In this confidence in the mercy of God the true church goes about, with a humble confession of her sins and unworthiness, confidently expecting God to forgive her through Christ.

Source: Quoted in Ewald M. Plass, What Luther Says, A Practical In-home Theology for the Active Christian. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House. 1959 Edition, 10th Printing (1994), p. 490.