JUSTIÇA GENEROSA | Timothy Keller

[Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you John see you thank you so much John um yeah and actually the I'm covering essentially what I uh cover in the book which means if I'm absolutely obscure tonight if I go too fast if I jump J from argument to argument and leave out U important parts of the argument so at the end you're confused and offended please buy my book and give it a second chance or better yet borrow somebody's book I mean you know after all it's a good stewardship simple living all right uh don't let the publisher

hear me say that I am so sorry I I want to talk to you tonight actually about two uh important biblical Concepts justification by faith alone justification and Justice and I I see right now in uh the Christian church that people who are really into justification are not into Justice and people who are really into Justice are not really into justification I'd like to tell tell you why I think that's a huge mistake uh first of all let's talk a little bit about what I mean by justification by faith uh the re Reformation recaptured the

doctrine that you're justified by faith alone grace alone uh Thomas Odin uh has shown that this is not it wasn't a a a new doctrine that uh Luther and Calvin and people like that came up with in the during the Reformation that it was an ancient doctrine that the early church understood it that the F the you know the uh the early uh Christian authors understood it but it had been sort of lost during the Middle Ages and uh here's the doctrine of justification by other religions all other religions say live as you ought and

God will accept and bless you but Christianity says the gospel says no no accept God's acceptance and blessing receive his acceptance of blessing as a gift through what Jesus Christ has done on the cross and then and only then will you live as you ought not live as you ought ought and get the blessing get the blessing through Jesus Christ as a free gift and then live as you ought to two utterly different approaches I mean all the religions of the world go in that direction and the gospel goes in that direction and that's the

doctrine of justification you're not justified by your works and by your efforts by living as you ought justified by uh Faith through faith you receive the gift of uh God's what well what is justification it's not just pardon an awful lot of people think that uh uh justification means uh your sins are forgiven and it's true of course that's part of it uh we say that when you believe our sins are put on Jesus but that's not the whole justification is not just that our sins are put on Jesus but that his righteousness is put

on us uh the idea of for forgiveness is wonderful as it is is basically a negative concept it's basically saying uh you're you're not no longer liable to punishment the justification by faith is a positive concept it's getting a new status for free even though we didn't earn it uh one person puts it like this to speak forgiveness is to say you may go you've been let off your penalty but to speak justification is to say you may come you are uh you may come and you are welcome to all my love and presence or

put it another way there was an old uh I don't know if any of you watch there's an old um uh there's a TV show called NCIS it's a detective you know it's a Cops and Robber show uh and in the early years and nobody watched it but uh there's a really interesting story about a an older man uh a broken down man he's in his 80s he was a GI and he fought in World War II and he's accused of U he was accused of a crime and because he was accused of a crime

the uh the Navy uh uh has come to uh to uh take him and there's these big uh military police Navy guys and there's this nav Navy lawyer and they're coming and they're snarling and they're uh they're they're about to take him into into custody and then one of his friends as he's standing there like this one of his friends opens up his shirt and underneath his shirt there's a Congressional Medal of Honor he was the winner of a Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroism in eima that's the uh that's the story and when

those snarling big people you know staring at this guy accused criminal little poor broken God see that Medal of Honor you know they have to immediately uh they immediately have to snap to attention and salute they're saluting the the metal it was they knew they had to do it it's fascinating in himself nothing but the metal when the Bible says God made him this is 2 Corinthians 5:21 God made him sin who knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God in him what does that mean it means that Jesus Christ was treated

as if he'd done everything we done and that must mean now that when you receive Christ justification means now God accepts you and treats you as if you done everything Jesus has done as if you done everything on that Battlefield that Jesus did in the battlefield of the world it's in other words you're covered with his metals and now everything in the universe salutes you in spite of the fact that in yourself you're just a broken down little old thing that's justification justification ation by faith alone that's the reason why old Richard hooker uh he's

an old Anglican writer of 17th century listen to this let it be counted as folly or frenzy or Fury whatsoever it is our comfort and wisdom we care for no knowledge in the world but this that God has made himself our sin and that we might be made his righteousness we are in the sight of God the father as is the very Son of God himself see be let it be counted as folly or frenzy or Fury whatsoever this is the one thing this is the only knowledge we have this we can handle anything that

in the sight of God the Father we're righteous in Jesus Christ now what's all that got to do with Justice everything absolutely everything because what's happening now I see this and I think you see it too the people that are getting into Justice ah the church needs to do justice we got to work for the poor they're not talking about justification by faith alone they're not talking about penal substitution you know Jesus this atonement they're they're not talking like that they're not talking about the Holiness of God and the wrath of God being appeased by

the work of Jesus Christ on the cross and now righteousness no no they talk about how important it is to follow Jesus which is true of course how we have to be like Jesus which is true uh that we have to our communities have to be communities of the Kingdom which is true we have to show uh the the values of the Kingdom which aren't the values of the world yes yes but it's pretty clear for re for various reasons that people who are really into just justification are nervous about Justice they're afraid what uh

if you talk too much about Justice we won't be doing evangelism in fact I've talked to people who are really into justification by faith that say I don't understand all the Justice people always talking about human rights and uh and giving people their rights and it says no justification by faith alone talks about Grace it's all about Grace and I don't it's not about justice so people into justification are not giving their hearts to the work of doing Justice in the world and people who are doing the work of Justice very often are shying away

I want to show you how wrong that is first of all Justice is the sign that you've been justified by faith it's not the basis you're not justified because you're helping the poor but a heart poured out in Deeds of mercy and Justice to the poor is the inevitable sign that you have been Justified that you have been saved by grace You See It All Through the Bible even though H that's interesting I don't need that uh even even though I wrote a whole book on it I wrote a whole book on it because actually

to my surprise most people don't realize this which is to me one of the main things of the Bible in the Old Testament prophets Jeremiah Isaiah Amos all say that if you aren't intensely concerned for the quartet of the vulnerable do you know what the quartet of the vulnerable is the Widow the orphan The Immigrant and the poor the Widow the orphan The Immigrant and the poor if you're not intensely concerned for them it's a sign your heart is not right with God it's not just that you're disobedient your heart's there's something wrong with your

heart your relationship with God so Isaiah 29:21 says that when people show a lack of concern for the poor that's a signal that though they may honor God with their lips their heart are far from him that's verse 13 or take Isaiah 58 Isaiah 58 is pretty famous among especially amongst Justice types because it talks about it says is this not the fast we choose uh you should choose to to loose the chains of Injustice to share your food with the hungry to provide the homeless fer with shelter uh when you see the naked to

clothe him is not this the fast you what's that about what's fasting well uh the fact is that fasting was a sign of repentance the fasting uh in in Israel was a a religious observance and it was a way of showing that you knew that you it was a s of humiliation when you fasted you were humbling yourself you were you were saying to God I'm a sinner and I need your mercy and you know what Isaiah is saying when I see you fasting at the temple or in your house you're going through the religious

observance of fasting and yet you are not you're not sharing your food with the hungry you're not providing the homeless Foreigner with shelter you're not clothing the naked and so on when I see you fasting over here and not doing that that shows that there's a disconnect because if you really knew you were a sinner saved by grace if you really really really were humble before God you would not be treating people like that so he's really saying if your heart's right with God you'll care about the poor not just if you don't care about

the poor you're breaking the rules though you are is there's something wrong with your relationship Deuteronomy 10 is a place where God says if you see aliens if you see immigrants amongst you and foreigners amongst you people from outside do not abuse them which of course often happens it's a form of racism you know they're they're they're somebody else so we abuse them we explain to he says don't do that live lives ad just do not do that why because he says you were foreigners in Egypt and I brought you out what's he saying I

saved you by grace and now if you treat these people uh unjustly you are not remembering that you're saved by grace do you see the connection he's not just saying well if you oppress the the aliens that uh and the immigrants and and these these racial Outsiders if you oppress them you're breaking the rules no no you don't know you don't remember that I say You by Grace so is the New Testament different see in the Old Testament it says if see it links these if you're saved by grace if your sinner saved by grace

by sheer Grace then you're going to care about the poor if you don't care about the poor something's wrong with your relationship with God New Testament different h no listen Mark chapter what do you think I was going to say yes Mark chapter Mark 12 here this is Jesus talking about the Pharisees Mark 12: 38 and 40 he says he's talking about the Pharisees they they fores show make linky prayers but they devour widows houses how do I know that though here you're saying oh I'm I'm believer I have relationship with God you're praying over

here and over here you're exploiting the needy you're exploiting the powerless that shows there's something wrong with your relationship with God or U Luke 11: 38-42 he's talking about the Pharisees again he says full of greed and wickedness they neglect Justice and the love of God they should give to the poor see Jesus is doing the exact same analysis that that the that the Isaiah Jeremiah Amos and all everybody else does the way you know that your heart's right with God that you've got a relationship based on Grace is that you care about the poor

but the most striking of all is James the Book of James is so striking and so clear some of you know that James uh seems on the surface when you read James chapter 2 uh to be uh in conflict with Paul because Paul says you're justified by faith alone not by works you cannot make yourself right with God by living as you ought right you can't make yourself right with God by your good works and your moral effort you're justified by uh By Grace and Faith it's a free gift we right heard that then you

get to James 2 and James 2 says what good is it my brothers if a man claims to have faith but does not have Works can that Faith save him so Faith by itself if it is not does not have works is dead now when you first read that first time you're going to say hey that seems like a contradiction but did you you have to read it more carefully he says what good is it if a man claims to have faith claims to have faith but does not have Works can that Faith save him

what he's saying is not that the works save you but a faith that does not lead to works is dead it's not real it's not saving Faith pretty simple pretty simple you're saved by faith alone but not by a faith which stays alone you're saved by faith not by good works but you if it's real saving faith it will result in good works okay and oh suddenly and that's kind of garden variety uh Bible Doctrine uh James 2 and Romans 3 are not contradicting James 2 is just saying real saving faith will issue in works

but what are the works that James says are a proof that your faith isn't dead this is right out of the prophets you know what he says that you see James 2:14 and 17 is what I read you know Faith by itself if does not have works is dead then he says in verse 16 listen so if you have faith but look at others without adequate resources and do nothing about their physical needs what good is that faith of it is not accompanied by action is dead uhoh yikes how do you know you're born again

how do you know you're really saved by faith how do you know you really have accepted Jesus salvation and you're no longer trying to save yourself through your good works how do you know you've really been born again you care about the poor when you see people without resources your heart goes out them if it doesn't you maybe you're saved but actually you're lacking the evidence of Salvation justification leads to justice justice is the sign of justification it's it's like all through the Bible H why would that be in other words a life concern for

the poor and doing Justice for the vulnerable is the inevitable sign of justifying faith now why is that case I would like to give you three or four reasons and then I'm done the first reason is this the doctrine of justification by faith alone will eventually change your attitude toward Justice now here's what I want you to think about if you believe oh I think if I'm a good person God will accept me which is the way most most people in this in the country who believe in God that's what they think they say if

I you know if I'm a good person God will accept me and he'll take me to Heaven do you realize what a low view of the law of God that is if you think you can please God through moral efforts you you think you can do that then your understanding of the of the law of God the bar is down here and you can craw CL you know climb over it or jump over it or whatever but the doctrine of justification by faith goes like this God Is So holy and you fall so far short

because his law you know he says you have to love God with all your heart soul strength and mind and you have to love your neighbor as yourself you know and Jesus expounds the law you've heard it said Thou shalt not kill but if you just despise your friend your neighbor in your heart it's like you've killed him you've heard Thou shalt not commit adultery but if you lust after somebody you've committed adultery so the doctrine justification pushes your understanding the law of God and the justice of God up so high it says the only

way that you're going to be saved is if God himself comes and dies for you nothing less than the death of the Son of God can even save you that that pushes your understanding of justice and of the law of God way up here God will not Overlook his Justice he will not Overlook his law he had to go to the most unbelievable lengths to help to save us because of that what does that mean once you grasp the doctrine of justification by faith you realize that Justice matters to God that exploitation and evil and

Injustice matters to God now because you're saved by grace there's an enormous balance here because when you know you're saved by grace you cannot be condescending to perpetrators of Injustice because you knew you know that you were the perpetrator of the ultimate Injustice which was rebelling against God and yet God saved you so on the one hand you go out in the world saying hey Justice matters God is not going to overlook these things he cares about Justice and yet you're not going to have the the self-righteous Pride against perpetrators of Injustice that a lot

of people have an awful lot of the people who are the biggest Advocates of Injustice for the poor today are every bit as self-righteous to people they think are not with the program as the old phisical fundamentalists were and that's because I don't think justification by faith has has sunk in because justification by faith means I now have this I I have a high regard for the law I can't and I'm going to go out there and I want to do justice on the other hand I'm not going to do it in a self-righteous way

so first of all justification by faith gives you a higher view of Justice secondly justification by faith changes your attitude toward the poor radically changes your attitude toward the poor what does Jesus mean when he says blessed are the poor in spirit Matthew 5:3 blessed are the poor in spirit virtually most most commentators if you take a look they're going to say this uh they're going to say something like this here's a quote from one uh this means that God's blessing and salvation comes to those who ignite knowledge their spiritual bankruptcy it means to see

that you're deeply in debt to God and you have no ability to even begin to redeem yourself God's free generosity to you at infinite cost to him was what saved you okay what does it mean to be poor in spirit it means you know that you are in infinite debt you could never have gotten yourself out of debt and the only reason why you are saved spiritually speaking is God came in and uh intervene and gave you his free charity and just and just right got it now what does that mean if you're poor in

spirit what happens when you actually find an economically and materially poor person see if you're spiritually poor in spirit because you understand the doctrine justification by faith what happens when you see a materially poor person are you going to say hey pull yourself up by your bootstraps if Jesus had said that to you you'd be in hell are you going to say well I I don't mind helping some of the poor but I only want to help the deserving poor I only want to help the poor that I feel like didn't contribute to getting themselves

into this mess but if Jesus had looked over the lip of heaven and said I'm only going to give my blood to the deserving poor he could have saved himself a trip there isn't anybody like that down here and when you hear that when you hear that in your heart when you become poor in spirit then the way you treat the materially and economically poor is with no condescension at all when you look at them you know you're looking in a mirror now what if you don't believe the doctrine justification by faith what if you

say oh I the whole the whole idea of the Holiness of God and the wrath of God and the justice of God having to be appeased you know the justification by faith alone really makes the justice of God important well a lot of people say I I don't believe God does that I believe God loves people and I don't believe and I think if I live a good enough life God will accept me um and I believe I've tried very hard to live a good enough life and I believe God should accept me and he

ought to uh bless me and answer my prayers you see that's how I see things okay maybe that's how you see things you don't like justification by faith you believe that God isn't like that he's not that angry you know I've lived a pretty good life you're middle class in spirit you know what that means you mean it means you believe that you've earned a certain standing with God through your hard work you're in your spirit your middle class I've worked hard and I you know deserve what I get if you're middle class in spirit

first of all you're lost and secondly you're going to be condescending toward the poor Doctrine justification by faith just takes that out of you it just scour it out of you and you lose that condescension so first of all justification by faith the doctrine gives us this this High view of God's justice so we really care about Justice in the world secondly it changes your attitude toward the poor thirdly it changes the attitude of the poor in other words when the gospel gets a hold of the poor and not not the go not not religion

just religiosity remember religion says if you live a good life if you try hard if you pull yourself together if you uh you know if you uh uh you know you clean yourself up and you try hard enough then God will bless you or you'll do okay I mean that's the self-help you give the self-help thing to the poor and you're going to destroy them if you give the gospel to the poor you will transform them and here's why the biblical case is this in James 1: 9 and 10 there's a fascinating place where it

says the poor Christian this is a quote ought to take pride in his high position but the rich Christian ought to take pride in his low position because he will pass away like a wild flower and that seems like what and here's what it's saying it's just delightful it's and so wise it says every Christian in Christ is at the same moment a vile sinner who deserves death and Hell and a fully loved adopted child of God the same time in yourself you're lost in yourself you deserve nothing in Christ you're adopted you're loved you're

accepted okay right and here's what they're saying well-off Christians successful Christians Christians who have had a pretty good life and things have gone pretty well for them it would be good for you to dwell on your sinful condition it would be good for you to dwell on how you deserve nothing it would be good for you to dwell on that because out in the world you get nothing but a claim this will help pull you down it'll give you just the reality but if you're a poor Christian it says you ought to dwell on your

high status you ought to dwell on the fact that you're accepted you ought to dwell on the fact that you're a child of the king you're on the you ought to dwell on that because out in the world you get disain see the world makes your social status and your attainment a bottomline identity that's who who you are you are your social status you are your bank account but if the gospel demotes those things what it does is it takes down the people who might because they've accomplished something be proud we already talked about that

but it also lifts up the people who because of the failures that they've had in their life because they were they were thrown into the inner city and they grew up with all those failures Etc like that it lifts them up listen mirav wolf in an essay called shopkeepers gold some years ago was walking the streets of inner city Baltimore Sandown with Mark gornick who was a a pastor there and at one point and you know they they adopted new song Church there and new song Ministries adopted 12 blocks of of of a part of

the poorest part of Baltimore and they sought to um make it a space of God's peace they did every they did all sorts of housing Rehabilitation they planted a church they did a after school program they started a school they did a jobs program and everything you guys know what that's about and as he was walking along with mirav wol who's a theologian he suddenly said that the doctrine of justification by Grace contains untapped resources for healing the inner city and when vul first heard that he said that's nuts what are you talking about the

doctrine of justification by faith alone what's that got to do with the inner city and then he thought about it and this is what he realized he said imagine you have no job no money you live cut off from the rest of society in a world ruled by poverty and violence your skin is the wrong color quote unquote wrong color and you have no hope that any of this will ever change around you is a society governed by the iron law of achievement its gilded goods are flaunted before your eyes on TV screens and in

a thousand ways society tells you every day you're worthless because you have no achievement you're a failure and you know that you will continue to be a failure because there is no way to achieve tomorrow that what you have not managed to achieve today your dignity is shattered your soul is enveloped in the Darkness of Despair but the gospel tells you that you are not defined by outside forces the gospel tells you that you count even more that you're loved unconditionally and infinitely irrespective of anything you've achieved or failed to achieve that's the doctrine of

justification by Grace proclaimed in practice a dead Doctrine hardly see it changes the attitude of the poor it changes the attitude of toward the poor it changes your attitude toward Justice and when the church sees us doing Justice I mean pardon me when the world sees us the church doing Justice when the world sees the church pouring itself out for the poor when the church when the world sees the church doing that then the world will get interested in justification and the circle is closed justification leads to justice but in the world's eyes Justice will

lead to justification because they'll listen to us they'll come in and say whatat has changed you what has made you the kind of people that can do this you see it in Acts chapter 4 and other places when they see the sharing of of the economic sharing there's no needy among them and they preach the gospel powerfully let me close like this this is uh I've never been able to find out whether this story is true or not I've uh been I worked at it before I put it in the book but I couldn't so

I just had to put a little footnote and said uh it may be an illustration but it may be true I heard it from a couple people some years ago some years ago I heard a man relate the EXP experience of a wealthy older woman that he once had known she had never married and had no children to serve as heirs she had only one close relative a nephew who hoped to inherit her money he had always been in her presence a gracious and compassionate man but she had heard things from others that made her

doubt her impressions the disposal of her wealth was no small matter she had to be sure the person who received it would use it wisely and generously so she decided to take matters into her own hands one morning she dressed in tattered clothes appearing to be a homeless person and lay on the steps of his Urban townhouse when he came out he cursed at her and told her to leave her he would call the police and so she knew what his heart was really like his response to the poor woman revealed what he was really

thinking about his aunt all along he had been manipulating her Proverbs 14:31 says he who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their maker the god of the Bible says as it were I am the poor person on your step I'm the poor person in your neighborhood your attitude toward them reveals what your true attitude is actually toward me and a life poured out in doing Justice for the poor is the inevitable sign Justice is the inevitable sign of justification let's pray Our Father um we thank you we thank you that uh because you have saved

us that turns us into the Agents of social healing and it's it's we we're living actually in a time in the church's life in which these two things justification and Justice have been somewhat pulled apart from each other uh that's deadly I believe and I pray Lord that uh according to your word we must see how they interact and they how they interrelate and how they uh stimulate each other and we pray that you would help us to recover this in the church and that we be people who because we've experienced your grace are living

lives of Justice in the city we pray in Jesus name amen