“He therefore that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?” (Galatians 3:5).
The Hearing of Faith
“But if they had by a common consent taught with us, as they had begun, and diligently urged the article of justification-That we are justified, not by the righteousness of the law or our own, but by faith alone in Christ-verily this one article would by degrees, as it had begun, have overturned the Papacy with all its fraternities, indulgences, religious orders, relics, ceremonies, the invocation of saints, purgatory, masses, vigils, vows and every kind of other numberless abominations. But they, omitting the preaching of faith and Christian righteousness, have attempted to accomplish the object in another way, to the great injury of sound doctrine and of the Churches. Hence something like what is expressed in a German proverb, has happened to them, ‘They have driven away the fish, which the net would have enclosed, by trying to catch them with their own hands.’
Therefore the Papacy does not at this time totter and fall through the tumults of the sectaries, but through the preaching of the article of justification; which has not only weakened the kingdom of the Antichrist, but has also strengthened and defended us hitherto against its power….Now, the article of justification, which is our only safeguard, not only against all the powers and crafts of men, but also against the Gates of Hell, is this that we are pronounced just and are saved by faith alone in Christ, without works. If this be the true mode of justifying, as doubtless it is, or the whole Scripture must be abrogated; then at once it follows, that we are not pronounced just, either by monasticity, or by vows, or by masses, or by any works. Then in this case, without abrogating any external rite, without tumult, without any human force, without any impugning of the Sacraments, the Papacy will be cast down by the Spirit alone. Nor is this victory gained by us, but by Christ, whose grace we preach and make known.
And this which I say, facts also prove. For at the time when the papacy began to decline and fall, the sectaries did nothing whatever, neither could they; but they were silent. On the other hand, we taught and urged nothing, but the article of justification, which then alone lessened the authority of the Pope and destroyed his kingdom.”
-Martin Luther, A Commentary on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Galatians, trans. John Owen (London, UK: Seeley, Burnside, & Seeley, AD 1845), 212-213.