166. It is thought that when sins are remitted, they are wiped away, or washed off, as filth by water. Sins, however, are not wiped away, but removed; that is, the man is withheld from them when he is kept in good by the Lord; and when a man is kept in good, it appears to him as if he were without sins, and thus as if they had been wiped away. A man also can be kept in good, so far as he is being reformed. How a man is reformed, will be shewn in the following doctrinal chapter on Regeneration. Whoever supposes that sins are remitted in any other way is greatly deceived.