Dr Greg Bahnsen - Proverbs: Proverbs 11:20-21, 31 (Justice Shall Prevail) (Part 43)

This morning to Proverbs, the 11th chapter, where we'll read for our scripture reading this morning, verses 20, 21 and 31. Proverbs 11, beginning at the 20th verse. Hear now God's word. They that are perverse in heart are an abomination to Jehovah, but such as are perfect in their way are his delight. Hand upon hand the evil man shall not be unpunished, but the seed of the righteous shall be delivered. In verse 31, behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth. How much more the wicked and the sinner. And thus far the reading of God's word. What kind of world do we live in? What is the relationship between ethical ideals and reality? How do we characterize this world that we have to put up with? Is there any assurance in this world that justice will prevail, that the right will win out over the wrong? And we ask ourselves those questions for a number of reasons. You know, one of the members of our congregation had their ranch house broken into this week and burglarized. These people at this point anyway have gotten off scot free. Those sorts of things we read about in the paper all the time. And sometimes they come very close to our own experience. As this week we begin to ask, what really is the nature of this world in which we live? Is there a place for justice and for ethics? And does right have any advantage over wrong? Or do we just live in a world where it's dog eat dog and might makes right? How are we to see this world in which we live? Will justice prevail? This morning I want to preach on that subject. And the assurance we have from the Book of Proverbs is that yes, justice prevail, will prevail. In the ancient Greece, the only assurance people had was not that justice would prevail, but that fate would prevail. And I think the leading illustration of that outlook, that philosophical view in ancient Greece, comes from the pen of Sophocles, the well known play Oedipus Rex or Oedipus the King. You know, the story I, I trust the Fates had declared that this child Oedipus would grow up to kill his father and then marry his mother. And of course, both of those crimes were just outlandish, were despicable, detestable in the eyes of Greek culture. And so it shouldn't surprise us that the parents of Oedipus do what they can to live responsibly. I mean, in terms of the framework of the story anyway, to live responsibly to take steps to avoid such a wicked thing happening. And so Oedipus is raised by a shepherd, far away from his parents, so that it can never come about. It is hoped that he would fulfill the word of the Fates. And then one day, as Oedipus is in a coach and traveling along the road, he comes to a crossroads, the infamous crossroads scene where another coach meets him. And there's a dispute as to who should pass. And in the midst of the dispute, Oedipus gets out of the coach. He fights with the rider and the other coach. It turns out to be his own father. And he kills him. Not knowing that, Oedipus continues on to the city, where now, of course, the queen mother is a widow and in turn, marries her. I won't tell the whole story, but he ends up marrying his own mother. And then it is revealed to Oedipus, finally, that he has indeed murdered his own father. And he has gone to bed with his own mother. And Oedipus puts out his eyes. In ancient Greece, there was no assurance that justice would prevail, that those who take steps to live responsibly will have a reward for that. But fate prevails, and fate knows no justice. Fate is whimsical. The Fates make their decisions on the basis of whimsical, not on the basis of what is right or what is wrong. In ancient Eastern faiths, if we turn away from Greece to the Far east, if you look at Hinduism or Buddhism, the assurance is taught in these faiths that karma will prevail. Karma will prevail. And someone might think, well, there, you see, Outside of a Christian framework, you have the assurance we live in a moral universe. Because karma is something like the moral law of cause and effect. If you live your life in a certain way that is contrary to what karma would dictate. If it's bad karma for you, then that will be visited upon you. I mean, there's going to be consequences. If you live badly and if you live in a way that is well, if you live righteously and purely, then karma will reward you. But you have to remember that that's only the appearance of a moral universe. Karma does not bespeak a moral universe at all. In Hinduism, everything is ultimately one. The distinctions that we see in our experience are illusion. There are no ultimate distinctions between you and me, between the trees and the seas. There is no ultimate distinction between right and wrong. All distinctions are illusion because everything is one. Moreover, in Hinduism, the universe is an impersonal universe. If There are no distinctions, then you cannot ultimately distinguish between personality and non personality. And so what does Karma mean in the midst of that framework of thought? You see, Karma assumes a distinction between good and evil, but that distinction is not ultimate for the Hindu. And remember that in an impersonal universe, what Karma rewards and what karma comes down upon is totally arbitrary. And so we don't see justice prevailing. Even though Karma may suggest there's some morality to the universe, ultimately there isn't any. In Buddhism it's worse because in Buddhism the doctrine is taught anatta, there is no soul. In which case when karma is passed on, the one to whom it is passed on is not the one who has earned that good or bad karma. And so we do not have a just universe in ancient Eastern faiths. We come up to the modern day in the Western world. Modern evolutionary materialism, which is pretty much the prevailing line of thought in our culture. There is no basis for moral absolutes in a materialist universe. There's no basis for ideals, there's no basis for ethics. Might makes right. Justice. Said justice is whatever is in the interest of the stronger. And if you have any doubt that that is what our culture has descended to, then let me remind you of the statement of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Supreme Court justice, many years ago. I mean, even before the days of abortion and so forth, Holmes said that truth is the majority vote of that nation that can lick all the others. Truth is whatever the strongest nation on earth votes for. That's truth. That's how relative everything is. There are no absolutes, there is no final morality. And so is this a moral universe? I mean, is there any hope that justice will prevail? If you look at your own experience, what is present to your own senses, what you have observed in your own life, you may have serious doubts about justice in this world. My guess is each and every one of us could stand up if we were to have a testimony time and we could relate story after story after story of how the wicked were not rewarded according to their deeds and the righteous were somehow suppressed and put down or oppressed. We all know stories where justice doesn't seem to be the prevailing characteristic of the situation. It's not the bottom line in the story and thus the significance and thus the importance of what the book of Proverbs wants to communicate to us this morning. The book of Proverbs over and over again lays in the message that we should live by, that we should learn to see the world in terms of. And that's the message that we live in a personal moral universe. While justice shall prevail, justice shall prevail. Proverbs tells us that over and over again. Look at our reading for this morning, Proverbs 11:20, 21. Here we see a contrast laid out between, well, my translation says those that are perverse in heart and then those who are perfect in their way. You could translate that more literally. Those that are twisted in heart and those who are straightforward, perfect in their way. God sees a distinction between the twisted personality, the twisted ethic of people, and those who want to walk the straight and narrow, those who want to be straightforward in the way they walk. And there's an accompanying contrast that we see in these verses as well. Two corresponding and very strong attitudes on the part of God. The book of Proverbs says with respect to those who are twisted in heart, that they are detestable to God, they are hateful to God, and yet about those who are righteous, about the one who is straightforward, forward in his way, this is God's delight. And so there are those who are hateful to God and those who are delightful to God. God has very strong emotions about that sort of thing. And God made this universe. We live in a world where it makes a difference whether you are ethical or unethical. And verse 21 puts this very strongly. It begins hand upon hand in the Hebrew. We haven't lost this completely in our culture, but even more, in the ancient world, a handshake was a guarantee of veracity, that you'll stick to your word. You can count on this. And so some of your translations may actually have. You can depend upon this. That's the thrust of it. Hand upon hand. The evil man shall not be unpunished. That's God's promise. That's God's assurance that the evil man will not get off scot free. God will see to it that justice is done. But the seed of the righteous shall be delivered. The seed of the righteous does not refer to the physical offspring of the righteous. Or at least it doesn't refer simply or merely to the physical offspring of the righteous, but rather it refers to those who are of the same breed, those who are of the same kind as the righteous. The reason the seed of the righteous are delivered is because they are of that category. They are the righteous. The Bible often uses seed in that way. Remember how in John the eighth chapter, Jesus said to the Pharisees, you are of your father the devil. He did not mean that they were born through some occult sexual process. What he means is that they are of the kind, they are of the breed of the evil one. On the other hand, Paul tells us in Galatians 3:7 that those who are of the faith of Abraham are the seed of Abraham. It makes no difference whether you're a Jew or a Gentile. If you walk in the faithful steps of Abraham, you're of his seed, you're of his kind. Or if we could put it this way, you're of his breed. And so it turns out that the righteous will be delivered because they are the delight of God. And those who are detestable count on this. Proverbs says they will not go unpunished. Proverbs 11:31 behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth. How much more the wicked and the sinner. How do you understand that opening expression in verse 31, that the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth? It could be taken in one of two ways. It could mean the righteous will get rewarded for their righteousness. However, I don't think that is the proper interpretation. What it's saying here is that even the righteous are going to have to answer for their sins. Even the righteous are going to have requital demanded of them for what they've done wrong. And the reason why I suggest that that is the message here is that the Greek version of this proverb is quoted entirely in 1 Peter 4:18. If you'll turn to 1 Peter 4:18, I think you'll see how Peter uses it. It's more like a threat than it is a reassurance. It's not the promise of reward, but rather even the righteous will have to answer for their sins. First Peter 4 at the 18th verse and if the righteous is scarcely saved, where shall the ungodly and sinner appear? The thrust in the Greek translation of the Hebrew here is that even the righteous will scarcely be saved. They will have to answer for their sins. How much more should you expect that the wicked will have to as well? So the message of this verse is very simply that even the righteous cannot sin with impunity. Remember Moses, Was there a more godly man in his day, a more courageous man in his day, a more important leader of God's people. Can you imagine anyone of a grander stature than Moses? Think of the privilege that he had. Think of how God dealt with him. Think of how Moses was able to see God. And though not face to face, he did have a personal encounter with God where God showed him his backside. Moses was a godly and a very important and righteous Man. And yet Moses, when he sinned and rebelled against God, could not enter the promised land. I think that takes some of us back because we tend to grade on a curve. And our thinking is, well, Moses has done so well. God, I mean, one mistake. Come on, let him into the promised land. That isn't the way God deals. Even the righteous will be recompensed in the earth. Remember David. What about David, the man after God's own heart as he's described in the Bible? King David, who slew Goliath and brought the ark to Jerusalem? David, who established the land, the greatest of the kings of Israel. And when David sinned, God did not turn a blind eye to that, but sent Nathan to him to say, thou art the man, David, and God will hold you accountable. Even David could not build the temple of God because he had blood upon his hands. Even the righteous will be recompensed in the earth. But you see, the point of Proverbs is not to make the righteous tremble. Before that, the point is the next stanza, which says, how much more than the wicked and the sinner if God doesn't let his own people off the hook? If even the righteous are going to answer for their deeds, then, boy, you better expect that that's going to take place. For the wicked, they will be called to account hand upon hand. Count on this. God will not let them go free. Justice shall prevail in this world then. Proverbs 12:2. If we move through the rest of the book of Proverbs picking up this theme, you notice that we read there. A good man shall obtain favor of Jehovah, but a man of wicked devices will he condemn. This is almost platitudinal. It's just so basic. I hardly know what I can add by way of commentary. This is a basic religious presupposition of the Christian faith. Biblical revelation lays this out in so many ways, but very plainly stated in Proverbs 12:2. The man of wicked devices is going to be condemned, and a good man will obtain God's favor. We don't live in a world where karma and arbitrary morality prevail. We don't live in a world where the fates and their whim prevail. We live in a world where God's personal moral standards will prevail in the life of every individual. It's an indispensable principle. We read of it in Galatians 6, 7, where Paul says, God is not mocked. How would we mock God? I suppose there are a number of ways that the sin of mocking God could be described a number of varieties of that sin. But the one that Paul speaks of in Galatians 6 is thinking that what we sow we will not reap. Somehow thinking that we can live in a certain way and not reap the consequences of it, that we can plant strawberries and harvest corn. Paul says, forget it. If that were to happen, if that were to take place in this universe, then God would be mocked. The very character of God would be turned inside out. It would be a complete ridiculing of the Creator of this world. If we were to think we could live one way and not have to bear the consequences. God isn't mock what you sow, you will reap. And we know that from Proverbs 12:13, 14 because there to repeat the same theme, our words and our deeds will come back to roost in the transgression of the lips is a snare to the evil man. But the righteous shall come out of trouble. A man shall be satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth, and the doings of a man's hands shall be rendered unto him. Don't think that the way you speak will not have consequences. We tend to minimize our words. We tend to minimize the way we deal with other people. Proverbs says that in the sin of the lips is a great snare for the man who's sinning. It will trip you up. It will come back to haunt you when you speak improperly, when you speak unrighteously. The doings of a man's hands shall be rendered unto him as well. Our actions are going to bring about a set of consequences, and those consequences will not just be passed on to other generations, not be borne by our neighbors, but will be borne by us. In Proverbs 12:21, there shall no mischief happen to the righteous, but the wicked shall be filled with evil. I think a good commentary on that is Psalm 91:10. The Psalmist says, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy tent, for he shall give his angels charge over thee. The Bible assures us, in what appears to be rather categorical terms, that no evil will befall the righteous no mischief shall happen to the righteous. Proverbs says, and now we find out who's listening to the sermon. Because you say, I look out at your faces and I wonder, are you just drinking this all in, or does this disturb you a little bit? Does this make you a little confused? Do you begin to ask, wait a minute. No mischief shall come to the righteous. I'VE done a lot of mischief that's come to the righteous. I know a lot of people have undergone plague or suffering or injustice in the world, and they were good people. How can this be true? Is this axiomatically true? Is it the case that the righteous will not fall into bad times and adversity? Think of Job's friends. Isn't this the principle they used when they counseled Job? It says here, no mischief happens to the righteous. The wicked will be filled with evil. Job, you're filled with evil. You're a wicked man. It's cut and dry. The syllogism is clear. Qed it's proven. You've got to admit it. Job, stop hiding your sin. Because if you were a good man, no mischief would come to you. So quite clearly, I need to warn you, if you're going to read the word of God properly, if you're going to interpret it in a godly way, that you are not to read this verse somehow out of context, abstractly, narrowly, and shortsightedly. What we have here is a generalization that applies to all of history and to the whole of our experience and ultimately what God will do on the final day of judgment. But it does not apply to each and every transaction, each and every event in our lives. I mean, the entire history of man's philosophical reflection and some of the most troublesome questioning we have about human existence is tied up with this. Is it true that the righteous don't suffer? If they are righteous, why do they suffer? Why do good people have the unscrupulous in this world take advantage of them? Why do good people get sick? Why do tornadoes destroy the homes of Christian people? We ask such questions, and we need to understand that we are not being given some kind of abstract premise. That's the whole story, and that's the only thing we have to take into account. Instead, this is meant, when properly interpreted, to be a precious truth in the midst of adversity. If you have any doubt about that, see how godly people have understood this truth. How did Joseph take it when he was put into a pit and then sold into slavery by his own flesh and blood by his brothers? How did Joseph take it when his own family turned against him and was willing to kill him later, when he had the opportunity to exact his vengeance upon his brothers, and they were worried that he would because their father had died and they thought the protection of Joseph's loyalty to his father was gone? Joseph said, don't you understand? You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. And because he had confidence that this was a moral universe where a sovereign God was in control, Joseph didn't need to extract his own vengeance. He said, I trust the plan of God. God meant it for good. You know, what you intended is really quite puny and irrelevant in context of what God was doing. You were just the instrument of his bringing about good. In my life, I have to tell you, I preach that I find it very hard to live that way. I find it very hard to have that attitude. If someone cuts me off on the freeway, I want vengeance now. Not to mention the bigger offenses in this world that are, as I preach, perceive it, perpetrated against me. But Joseph said, God meant it for good. I trust his sovereign disposition. What does Paul say in Romans, the eighth chapter? All things work together for good? You say, well, yeah, well, there's that Pollyanna Paul. He never knew anything bad happening, right? There's that Paul who just had it nice and easy. His life never knew what it was to suffer for righteousness sake. Paul, oh no, you know, this Paul, who was stoned and left for dead, this Paul who was persecuted of the Jews, who had to go before a pagan court, who finally lost his life for being a Christian, this Paul who had Christians turn against him, was opposed by the Judaizers. This Paul who suffered so much, said, yet all things work together for good. In fact, in the very same chapter where he says that which might seem to be so mindless, you say, come on, Paul, you get realistic. In that same chapter, Paul says, you see, though day by day we are delivered to the slaughter, yet we are more than conquerors. Paul knew what he was talking about. God will not let the righteous be left on tenterhooks. God will deliver his people and all things will take place for their ultimate good. In Proverbs 21:12, if we can turn forward a few chapters, the book of Proverbs tells us, and I'm going to translate this according to the literal Hebrew, because I'm afraid most of our modern smoothed out English translations miss the point. At least as I see the point, the Righteous One considers the house of the wicked. The wicked are overthrown to their calamity. Literally. What the passage talks about is the Righteous One. That could be an individual person, a human being. But the language, I think is more striking. It refers actually to God, the Holy One of Israel, the Righteous One, as he's referred to in the Book of Job. As a matter of fact, the Righteous One considers the house of the wicked. He overthrows Wicked ones in their calamity. It's God we're talking about here. The assurance. See, that's one of those daily pills that we're supposed to take spiritually. We're supposed to let this get into our system and work its way out in our thinking and our emotions and our attitude. We're supposed to remember, the righteous one overthrows the wicked into calamity. That's the way he operates in history. Proverbs 21:16, same chapter. The man that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall rest in the assembly of the dead. I really love the way this carries across again, especially in the original, because the thought is of one who has no restraint. He just wanders about. He is the freewheeling, lawless individual. What the Bible tells us is that the man who wanders out of the way, he's going to have three things happen to him very ironically. He loves to wander and to be unrestrained. But he's going to come to rest. God will see to it that he comes to rest. He loves to be his own person. He loves to be an individual. He's going to come to rest in the assembly. He's going to be just one of many. He's not going to be that unique person that he thought he was. And so the one who loves to wander about in his lawless ways will be brought to rest in the assembly, literally, of the shades of the dead. God is not mocked. Those who live contrary to the way of life will forfeit their lives. Verse 18 of the same chapter. The wicked is a ransom for the righteous, and the treacherous comes in the stead of the upright. This is an amazing verse, and I wonder if you've ever thought about this before. It may be new to you. The Bible tells us that God treats certain individuals in history as expendable, and they bear the consequences of sin for the sake of the righteous. In this world, they don't atone for sin. They are a ransom. However, for the righteous, the wicked are the treacherous, come in the stead of the upright. And I think perhaps the most concrete illustration of this that we read of in the Bible is found in Isaiah 43:3 4, where the same thought is communicated. Isaiah 43:3 4. For I am Jehovah, thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Savior. I have given Egypt as thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in thy stead. Since thou has been precious in my sight and honorable, and I have loved thee. Therefore will I give men in thy stead and peoples instead of thy life. God has promised to deliver Israel. Israel has sinned. Israel is condemned to exile. But God says Egypt and Ethiopia and Seba will be the ransom for you, and I will give their men in your stead. And in history, that's exactly what happened. Cyrus defeated Egypt and Ethiopia and Seba and many others. In fact, the whole Gentile world may be summed up in those three illustrations. Perhaps, whether it's particular or as a general illustration, the fact is that God brought judgment upon them so that Cyrus would let the Jews go back. And so God does bring down evil upon the wicked in this world. He brings down consequences for for their sin, and he does so in the place of his own people, so that the wicked will eventually bear the consequences. In history of sin much more than God's people, they are a substitute God says for his people. In Proverbs 11:8 you get commentary that's similar to this. The righteous is delivered out of trouble, and the wicked comes in his stead. The righteous is ultimately delivered, God's people will be saved, and the judgment of God will fall upon the wicked instead. Proverbs 21:18 is not only, well, I think a rather novel idea to many of us, that God will bring upon the wicked the sins of this world and make them bear the consequences of their evil and ours as well, rather than his own people. But see Proverbs 21:18 also is a wonderful backdrop to understand the paradox of Christ's atonement. For we read in this verse that the wicked is a ransom for the righteous. The wicked will die in the place of the righteous. You might want to put it that way. Yet in the case of what Christ did, the righteous died in the place of the wicked. It was a complete reversal of God's way of doing things in his as 1st Peter 3:18 says, See the one who was righteous, the lamb without blemish and spot, the just died in the place of the unjust. And God made him to be sin for us, the one who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. Well, we need to hurry through these Proverbs 22:8. He that soweth iniquity shall reap calamity, and the rod of his wrath shall fail. Again, the image of sowing and reaping to remind us that the harvest will resolve our perplexity about justice in this world, we may have to wait till the day of harvest. And in biblical perspective, the harvest may be the final judgment. It may not be this year or next year or or even this decade where we see the wicked finally requited for their evil. It may be the ultimate harvest that is coming, but in the harvest we will see that God will bring justice to bear. Hosea, chapters 8 and 10 uses the same image of sinners sowing their sin and then reaping the consequences. You have sown the wind, Hosea says, you have reaped the whirlwind. Proverbs 23:18 tells us that a long term perspective may be necessary. This is not simply a New Testament invention out of embarrassment to rescue the Proverbs from the idea that justice doesn't really take place. It's right in Proverbs itself in chapter 2318 that we read for surely there is a reward, and thy hope shall not be cut off. Surely there is a reward. Actually the translation is surely there is a future. Surely there is a latter end. There is a day coming, a latter end, where God will balance the scales of justice. Psalm 73:17 Remember how David struggled with this? He said, God, why is it that these people are so wicked? They get along well in the earth, they're fatted, they seem successful, everything's going well for them. And finally in the 17th verse, he says, until I went into the sanctuary of God and considered their latter end, David was concerned that justice was not prevailing until in the tabernacle he could look at the latter end of the wicked. He said, surely God has put them in slippery places. When you consider the latter end of people, justice will be done. Proverbs 24:10 this is going to be rather hard. It's hard for me to take, maybe for you too. But Proverbs says, if thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small. Proverbs says, when adversity comes and you just can't handle that, and the injustice of the situation and the affliction gets you down, then your spiritual mettle is not what it's supposed to be. You have been tried in the crucible and found wanting. There's something defective in your spiritual life. What is lacking? How are you going to make up that deficiency? How are you going to be able to take adversity and not be weak? The Bible says, because you need to realize these truths that we're laying in over and over again. God will requite the wicked of men. God will reward the justice of his people. God is in charge, and he will not allow this universe to go on as though justice and injustice were indistinguishable in the day of calamity. You need to be strong, knowing the character of God. Proverbs 24:19 20 really says it all. Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious at the wicked, for there shall be no reward to the evil man. The lamp of the wicked shall be put out. Don't become bitterly absorbed with the apparent impunity of the wicked. In the end, they are not going to enjoy reward, but instead the lamp, the light of life, will go out. They will die. Proverbs 28:10 Whoso causes the upright to go astray in an evil way, he shall fall himself into his own pit. But the perfect shall inherit good. The wicked will have their own evil devices come back upon them. They'll fall into their own pit. And that's what's going to befall those who mislead others. You have to remember how our Lord had very harsh words for those who misled others. Matthew 5:19 he says, if we dare teach people, the breaking of the least commandment will be least in the kingdom of God. Don't mislead others by your teaching. In Matthew 18, our Lord says that those who present a stumbling block to the little ones, whether that be the children who follow him, or the weak in faith among God's people, Jesus says, it would be better that a millstone be hung around your neck and you'd be buried in the sea, than have to face God in those circumstances. In Matthew 23:15, Jesus condemns the Pharisees and the scribes, because not only do they go to hell, not only are they blind and going the wrong way, but they take others with them, and he condemns them for that. Don't mislead others. Don't be a stumbling block to others. And if you are, you better realize you're going to fall into the pit yourself. It's going to finally bring about your undoing. Then one more passage. This is really a common theme in Proverbs. Proverbs 28:18 Whoso walketh uprightly shall be delivered but he that is perverse in his ways shall fall at once. We're all going to know deliverance or destruction ultimately. And as the end of this verse says, the one who is twisted in his ways shall fall at once. Can either mean sudden destruction will come upon him, or it possibly can mean one way or another. That's another way to translate it. There he shall be destroyed. One way or another, he will not escape. And so there's good news for us this morning, friends. The good news is justice shall prevail. Not only in this world, but in the next. God is in control and justice shall prevail. That's the good news. But there's bad news too. The bad news is justice shall prevail. And that's pretty bad news when you recognize that we're unjust. Now, it's one thing to think about our persecutors, one thing to think about those terrible criminals out in the world, or those who break into our homes and take our possessions and get away with it. It's one thing to think about those who slander us behind our backs and don't see, seem to have to suffer for that. Then we want justice to prevail. But you see, that message that justice shall prevail is a message for us too. Because we sin against God, we are unjust. In fact, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. So Paul tells us in Romans the third chapter. And so that's not just good news, that's bad news. It's bad news because if God is a God of justice and not one thing passes his notice and not one thing will be forgotten or overlooked, what hope have we before the throne of God as we come before the bar of his eternal, unchanging, perfect justice? What hope is there for us? The ultimate justice of God, I think, would leave us no eternal hope whatsoever were it not for the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ in our place. See, we get an insight into the nature of the Christian religion this morning. We understand that the only hope we have of salvation is that God's justice could be satisfied without our having to bear the consequences of our sins. How can God be just and forgiving? You see, if he forgives, he says, ah, well, just forget it. To sin, to err, is human. That's what I expect of you. So you can enter my kingdom even though you're polluted and foul and detestable in my sight. Even though you've done all these wicked things. I'll just kind of pretend it didn't happen. What kind of God would that be? Certainly not a just God. But the good news is that God, in His justice, does save us. Not by forgetting our sins, not by just turning a blind eye to them, but by laying them upon someone else. God, in his justice, lays my wickedness and my transgression and my guilt upon his own son who knew no sin, so that he might take my place. So that God can not only welcome me into his kingdom, forgiven, cleansed and acceptable, but he can do so because. Because the price has been paid. Justice has been exacted. In fact, the atonement you see is such good news because God doesn't give up his justice to save us. God satisfies his justice to save us. And no other religion in the world has that kind of hope for man. That God need not give up one part of his character to realize the other part. God need not cease being just in order to be merciful. But God rather laid our sins upon the Savior because his justice could not be put aside. Christ had to die because that was satisfaction for the penalty of sin. If we're going to have peace in a universe where justice shall prevail without any doubt about that, if we're going to have peace in that kind of a universe, then no other Lamb but Jesus Christ will do for us. The only way to peace in a just universe is by the cross of Christ. Let's pray. Lord, we ask you to do two things this morning especially we ask that you would give us reassurance because we need it so often. That this universe is not amoral. It is not without moral distinction. It does not run on and on with injustice prevailing. We need the reassurance. As we look around us, Father, and as we hear so many competing worldviews and philosophies and religious outlooks, we need the reassurance that justice shall indeed prevail. But having heard that, Father, we need peace as well. Because if you are this holy and this just and this unchanging and you'd demands, then we need to be saved. We need to be delivered. We need your wrath to come down upon a substitute for us or there is no hope. We have no deliverance to anticipate. For your justice shall grind us down as well. And so we ask that you would comfort our hearts secondly this morning that you'd give us the reassurance that your justice does not. Does not mean despair for us, does not mean that we are lost. That your justice combined with your love means rather the death of your Son, our Savior. And we ask that you would give us a greater love for Him, a greater desire to live for him, to stand up for him in this unjust world and to declare that justice shall prevail and that it has prevailed in even in the person of your Son, who was not left to die, but was raised gloriously from the dead. The third day as a declaration that sin could not hold him. That after he had paid the price of our sin, he yet lives and lives to communicate comfort and courage to our hearts. Today we pray for these two things. In the name of Jesus, amen.