Behold I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me. Ps. 51:5

The Psalm for Ash Wednesday is David’s psalm of repentance, psalm 51.  I’m preaching on this psalm this evening.  But today, and perhaps in the remaining days of this week, I would like to use Luther’s thoughts regarding psalm 51.

The real reason why a person is saved is that Christ and the believing heart are so united that what each possess becomes the common property of both.  But what does each possess?

Christ has a pure, innocent, holy birth.  Humans have an impure, sinful, cursed birth…There is no remedy for this sinful birth except through pure birth of Christ…

See, in this way Christ takes from us unto Himself our birth and sinks it into His birth and gives us His birth, as though it were our own.  Every Christian may rejoice and glory in this birth of Christ as though he, too, like Christ, had been bodily born of Mary.