I'm a day late. Still, Augustine's feast calls for some sort of commemoration. So: a word from the great Augustinian theologian, Martin Luther:
"When I awoke last night, the Devil came & wanted to debate with me; he rebuked me & reproached me, arguing that I was a sinner. To this I replied: Tell me something new, Devil! I already know that perfectly well; I have committed many a solid & real sin. Indeed there must be good honest sins--not fabricated & invented ones--for God to forgive for his beloved Son's sake, who took all my sins upon him so that now the sins I have committed are no longer mine, but belong to Christ. This wonderful gift of God I am not prepared to deny, but want to acknowledge & confess."
And a word or two from the original Augustinian theologian:
"All have sinned & fall short of the glory of God, & are reckoned as righteous by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forth as an atoning sacrifice by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness.... that he might be just & the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus" (Rom 3.23-26).
"And you, who were dead in your trespasses & the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Christ, having forgiven us all our trespasses by obliterating the debt-sheet that stood against us with its legal demands. He took this debt-sheet away from our midst, when he nailed it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers & authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them on the cross" (Col 2.13-15).
"Our Savior Christ Jesus abolished death & brought life & immortality to light through the Gospel" (2 Tim 1.10).
