Martin Luther on Using the Law for Evangelism
Since it's Reformation month and I just found this out from Ray Comfort's "True and False Conversion" transcript, we can read this from Martin Luther's commentary on Galatians, "Satan, the god of all dissention, stirs up daily new sects. And last of all, which I should never have foreseen or once suspected, he has raised up a sect such as teach that the Ten Commandments ought to be taken out of the church, and that men should not be terrified by the Law, but gently exhorted by preaching the grace of Christ." Martin Luther while preaching salvation was by faith alone apart from everything else, however he did not dream of a faith that would be devoid of good works. No true faith is devoid of good works. While I don't believe that Christians can live sinless as they will still sin; however they DO NOT stay in habitual sin. This is what makes everything different.
Martin Luther presented the Law as something that leads people to salvation by faith alone in Jesus Christ. People sometimes or most of the time just DO NOT find it easy to accept the Gospel truth, that's why I can say salvation can be hard because of man's pride in themselves and refusal to humble themselves, therefore they find it easier to 'work for their salvation' instead. Also in this statement, people while they need to be gently exhorted by the grace of Christ, however they CANNOT be done with that if they don't realize the holy Law of God that they have offended it.
In fact, putting Martin Luther aside, the Baptists before him also had done that. In fact, Jesus had preached the Law first to sinners telling them how much they have offended God before He offered grace. He told the rich young ruler he lacked one so the latter can see how sinful he is (and he went away sorrowful and didn't want to get saved) and He revealed to the Samaritan woman how sinful she was before she responded to the grace of God. Also, you can see, many times, the evangelism of the Bible shows just how short we are of God's grace and that's the kind of reformation the modern churches need... to go back to fundamental preaching!