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| > Sermon Archive > Sermons by Author > Dr. Wes Bredenhof > Justified by works of the law? | Previous Next Print |
| Order Of Worship (Liturgy) Psalm 96:1-3 Psalm 143:1 Hymn 28:1-4 Hymn 1 Psalm 96:6-8 Scripture reading: Romans 3 Catechism lesson and text: Lord's Day 2 and Romans 3:20 |
Beloved congregation of Christ,
Have you ever been in a love-hate relationship? It happens a lot of times in families, between siblings. There’s that one brother or sister that you just find it nearly impossible to get along with. You’re siblings, you have the same parents, have the same DNA, but you’d never otherwise be friends. And yet, he or she is still your sibling. When you were in school and someone was to start beating on your sibling, you’d stand up for him or her. Love-hate is that kind of ambiguous relationship.
Christians often have that kind of relationship to the law of God. On the one hand, we might be inclined to dislike or even hate the way it points out our sin and misery. Who wants to hear about how bad we are? On the other hand, sometimes we can be attracted to the law as an alternative to the gospel. We look at keeping the law as a way to measure up for God and keep our pride. Our law-keeping contributes either in part or in whole to our standing before God and we get to hold our head high. You can see why it might be tempting to love the law if you look at it that way.
The Bible teaches us a perspective on the law of God that does away with this love-hate relationship. That’s reflected in our Catechism in Lord’s Day 2. We confess that the law has an essential function in our only comfort in life and death. We need what it has to offer. But at the same time, we also have to be aware of the law’s limitations. This afternoon, we’re going to learn about this through the lens of what Scripture says in Romans 3:20. The question behind this verse is whether it’s possible for us to be justified by works of the law.
Justified by works of the law?
We’ll learn about:
- What the law cannot do
- What the law does do
As we begin to look at Romans 3:20, we need to be clear on some definitions. There are two important ones in this verse. Let’s start with “justified.” In this context, Paul is writing about our justification in God’s sight, before God. We have to think about God as a judge and we’re in his courtroom. We stand accused before him of having rebelled against him. We stand accused of having broken all of his commandments. Now if somehow we could be justified, that means more than being declared innocent by the Judge. In God’s courtroom, if we are justified, that means he declares us to be righteous. We are thoroughly morally upstanding in his view. Not only are our past sins forgiven, but we are also regarded as positively good in his estimation. So while justification involves a courtroom and we can relate to that, the Judge in this courtroom, when he justifies someone, he does something that no earthly judge does. He declares someone to be righteous. That’s justification.
The other term that needs our attention here is “works of the law.” The law here is a general term referring to God’s will for human beings. And “works of the law” are things human beings do where they believe they are following God’s will. In the original context of the letter to the Romans, that could be Jewish people following the ceremonial laws of the Old Testament, in addition to the moral law found in the Ten Commandments. Doing things like not eating pork and keeping the laws of clean and unclean. But it could also be Gentiles following the moral law as summarized in the Ten Commandments, and even further summarized by Christ in Matthew 22. So for them works of the law could be boiled down to loving God with everything in their being and loving their neighbour as themselves.
For us today, “works of the law” again are anything we’re doing that we believe is lining up with God’s will. If we’d think about it, we’d probably connect that to the Ten Commandments. So I didn’t steal, God says “you shall not steal,” therefore I’ve kept his law. I’ve done “the work of the law.”
Now we can bring those two terms together, “justification” and “works of the law.” And Paul does it in a negative way. He says no human being will be justified, will be declared righteous, by their doing works of the law. The law cannot bring you or anyone to justification before God. Think of the godliest Christian you’ve ever known. Even with all their good works, he or she could never be justified by God through those good works. We should dig a little deeper as to what the exact problem is here.
The problem isn’t the law itself. In Romans 7, Paul comes back to the law and he says in Romans 7:12, “So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.” That’s to be expected because the law is a reflection of who God is. God is holy, righteous, and good, and therefore his law is holy, righteous, and good. There’s nothing inadequate in and of the law by itself. So don’t hate on the law.
The problem is the one under the law. The problem is you and me and every other sinful human being. The problem is what Paul writes about earlier in Romans 3, quoting from the Old Testament. He writes, “None is righteous, no, not one…no one does good, not even one.” And Romans 3:20 is referring back to the Old Testament as well. It’s referring to Psalm 143:2, “Enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous before you.” In our natural state, without the Holy Spirit and without Christ, God looks at us and he sees sin. You have to remember: sin is not only what we do, it’s what we are. At the core of every human being is a sinful heart.
This is a problem because in order to be justified in God’s sight, you need perfect “works of the law.” You can’t have “works of the law” where you’ve kept 80% of the commandments. God wants 100% for justification. You need consistent “works of the law.” You can’t have “works of the law” where you’ve kept the commandments 95% of the time. God wants 100% consistent obedience for justification. You need both internal and external obedience to God’s law. So you can’t have a situation where you’re keeping the law outwardly, but breaking it in your heart. If it were hypothetically possible to be justified by works, your works would have to be solid inside and out.
So our human sinfulness makes justification by works of the law an impossibility. The law can’t work for sinners like this, under the condition of human sinfulness. Paul was once preaching in Antioch of Pisidia. He was addressing a Jewish audience. In Acts 13:39 he spoke about the law of Moses. He said the law of Moses could not free them. That’s what the ESV says. It uses the word “free.” But the Greek actually speaks about justification. In Acts 13:39, Paul said that by Christ “everyone who believes is justified from everything from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses.” That’s how the NIV translates it. What the law could not do because of human sinfulness, God did through his son Jesus Christ. What the law could not do, the gospel has done for us.
John Bunyan was the English Puritan who wrote Pilgrim’s Progress. He wrote a little poem about what we’ve just been learning about. It goes like this:
Run, John, run, the law commands,
But gives us neither feet nor hands.
Far better news the gospel brings,
It bids us fly and gives us wings.
Through Christ and what he has done for us, we will fly all the way to heaven. But it’s only through him, only through the gospel. So loved ones, don’t look to the law, for what only the gospel can provide you. Only the gospel can provide you the righteousness of Christ which can serve as the basis of your justification before God. Don’t look to your law-keeping, for what only Christ can provide you. Only Christ has paid for all your sins on the cross and only he has lived a perfect life in your place.
So what then does the law do? That’s the second thing we’re learning about this afternoon. Romans 3:20 says, “…through the law comes knowledge of sin.” That means the law is how we become conscious of the different ways we have offended God. The law is how we become aware of the different ways we’ve fallen short of God’s will. Through the law we come to recognize the different ways we’ve rebelled against God.
Again, Paul expands on this in Romans 7. He refers to the Tenth Commandment against coveting. That’s an interesting commandment to choose because it has to do with what happens in the heart. It has to do with desires. He says he wouldn’t have known what it means to covet, to have those wrong desires, if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” The law woke him up to the reality of the sin living in his heart. It does that for all of us.
Have you ever seen one of those mirrors that distorts reality? It’s usually curved one way or another and it’ll make you look wider than you really are, or it’ll make you look shorter or taller than you really are. Those kinds of mirrors don’t tell you the truth about what you look like. On the other hand, the law of God is a perfect mirror. When you look into this mirror, it gives you a perfect reflection of what you’re really like. Unlike physical mirrors, the law is a spiritual mirror, so it not only reflects what you’re like on the outside, but on the inside too. This mirror gets right to the heart of the matter. And your heart is the matter.
The law does this work as someone is going through the process of becoming a Christian. The law convicts the unbeliever of sin and makes him or her see that they’re under God’s judgment and in serious trouble. They deserve to go to hell and need to be rescued. Some time ago I saw a quote from a famous American pastor. He said, “No one has ever learned that he or she is a sinner by being told they are.” But Paul says in our text, “…through the law comes knowledge of sin.” Not only that, but look in the book of Acts. In Acts 2, when Peter was preaching on the day of Pentecost he called out the Jews on the fact they had crucified Jesus. They had killed the one God made both Lord and Christ. That was wrong. It was contrary to God’s law and Peter proclaimed it. The law convicted many of those who heard. It says in Acts 2:37, “Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’” Peter then urged them to repent and be baptized – and they were, about 3000 sinners came to know they were sinners because a preacher told them they were.
That has implications for evangelism. The word evangelism contains “evangel” in it. Evangel means “good news.” It means the same thing as “gospel.” So evangelism is “gospelism” – sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with people who don’t yet know him in a saving way. But that good news about Jesus is only good because it comes against a background of bad news. If you try to tell people about Jesus without referring to the most important fact about him – that he saves sinners, then you’re at the very least giving a distorted picture of who he is and what he’s done. In order to talk him about saving sinners, we have to talk about sinners. We have to talk about our sin and the sinful person we’re speaking with. You see, Jesus isn’t just an answer to some ambiguous question. He’s the answer to the clear and biblical question: how can a sinner be considered righteous in the sight of a holy God? So in our evangelism, when we share the gospel with people, we do have to speak about sin and why it’s a problem. We can use the law to do that. We can go through the commandments with people and ask questions like, “Have you ever stolen anything, even once?” “Have you ever wanted something that wasn’t yours?” “Have you ever used God’s name as a cuss word?” And so on. And as we do that, we get to the reality the law exposes: none is righteous, no, not one. We’re all sinners in need of a Saviour.
The law does that truth-telling work for unbelievers in evangelism, but it also does that for us as Christians. The law of God informs the consciences of followers of Christ. When we have done wrong and we know it, it’s because of the law of God. That leads us to daily confession of our sins to our heavenly Father. The law has made us aware of our sins, so we go to our Father and ask for his forgiveness through what Jesus has done for us.
This is also why we read the Ten Commandments every Sunday morning. It’s close to the beginning of our worship service, so that as we come into God’s presence we do so with an attitude of humility. The law of God shows us our sin and misery not only as individuals, but also as a congregation. Every Sunday it reminds us all of our need for God’s grace in Jesus Christ. However, it’s only going to do that when we pay attention to it. Because it’s one of the things we do every Sunday, it’s easy to fall into the trap of letting our minds wander while the law is being read. But imagine a situation where you’re a parent and you and your kids are around the dinner table. You take the Bible, open it, and begin reading. Then one of your children takes out their phone and starts scrolling through Instagram. They’re not paying attention as you’re reading the Bible. I think most of us would see that as being extremely disrespectful. And yes, it is disrespectful and in a really obvious way. But when we’re sitting in church and staring at the minister, but not really listening to what he’s saying as he reads the Ten Commandments, that’s just as disrespectful to God. It’s part of our worship service and our hearts are meant to be engaged with it. We should be allowing the law of God to do its work of making us aware of our sin and misery.
One practical suggestion here would be to actually open your Bible. If some of you find it easier to follow along with the written sermon in front of you, you might also find it easier to focus on the Ten Commandments by opening your Bible and following along. I’m not saying you have to, but some of you may find it helpful.
Now I have to make clear that Romans 3:20 doesn’t tell us everything the law of God does. If you look at our Catechism, in Lord’s Day 2 it’s telling us about our sin and misery. It’s telling us about the great demand God has for perfect love for him and our neighbour. But if we skip ahead to Lord’s Day 33 we find there’s another role for the law in the life of a Christian. The law is the guide for a Christian life. That reflects Scripture. Even just in the book of Romans, you could think of how Paul comes back to the law of God in this sense in Romans 12 and following. There the law isn’t a way to achieve our standing before God, but it does guide the way we respond to the standing we have as a gift through Jesus Christ.
So should we have a love/hate relationship with the law of God? If you were to ask Paul that question, I’m sure he would have said, “By no means!” We have to get rid of the hate and just strive to have it as a love relationship. That’s the kind of relationship Jesus has always had to the law, and if you’re one of his followers it has to be that way for you too. Even when the law brings the knowledge of sin, this is a good thing for us. Remember what it says in Proverbs 27:6, “Faithful are the wounds of a friend, profuse are the kisses of an enemy.” The law is your friend because it faithfully tells you the truth, even when it hurts. As it does that, it sends you running to Jesus. You know you have nothing in yourself by which you can stand before the holy God. You know the gospel tells you that everything you need you have in Christ. So keep looking to him alone. AMEN.
PRAYER
Heavenly Father, holy God,
Thank you for your good law. We thank you for what it does for us. We’re grateful that you don’t keep us in the dark about our condition apart from Christ. Through the law you tell us the truth about our sin and misery. That humbles us and it also makes us see how much we need your grace through Jesus our Saviour. Father, please let your law continue to do its work in our lives. Help us with your Holy Spirit to pay attention to it. Please help us as well when we do evangelism to remind people of what your law says. Please work with your Holy Spirit so that unbelievers we speak with will also see their sin and misery, that they would turn and find life in Christ.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Dr. Wes Bredenhof, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
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