By johninnc
John 19:30: When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.
The chant “no justice, no peace” has become nearly ubiquitous in our uncivil landscape. It is chanted, I’m sure, by some people of goodwill, but is also shrilly shouted from the lips of some of the more malevolent actors in our midst.
People have varying impressions of what constitutes justice and peace. Some use the chant “no justice, no peace” as being inseparable, meaning that the absence of justice will invariably be accompanied by the absence of peace, and the presence of justice will invariably by accompanied by the presence of peace. Others view it as a conditional “if-then” statement, implying that if their view of “justice” isn’t delivered, they will make sure that peace for others isn’t possible.
The “if-then” form of “no justice, no peace” is exemplified in the United States by people who are unwilling to abide by verdicts in trials. In our legal system, a person charged with a criminal offense has a right to a trial by a jury of his peers. This system does not always result in perfect justice, so a meaningful slice of our population has decided that mob justice is preferable. Think pitchforks and torches.
This is nothing new. Even when a trial has rendered a fair verdict, people think they should get to decide.
Luke 23:20-24: Pilate therefore, willing to release Jesus, spake again to them. But they cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. And he said unto them the third time, Why, what evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in him: I will therefore chastise him, and let him go. And they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. And Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they required.
Pilate went along to get along, attempting to mollify the savage bloodlust of the mob.
Fallen man is incapable of delivering perfect justice. Even when justice is offered, many reject it.
Perfect justice can only be found in God!
Let me explain, using an extensive excerpt from a previous post:
There is a God. He is the eternal creator, without beginning or end. He created everything, including you and me. He is perfectly holy, perfectly just, and perfectly loving. As such, He cannot allow anything that isn’t perfect into His presence.
You and I aren’t perfect. We have all broken God’s laws, and can’t do anything to fix that. Our efforts to work our way back to God are completely useless.
But, God loves us so much that He would rather die than spend eternity without us.
So, He gave his only begotten Son –Jesus Christ – God in the flesh – to reconcile us to Him.
Jesus had no sin of His own, but bore our sin so that we might be reconciled to God. He had no sin and we had no righteousness. Jesus took our sin from us. He made the complete payment for our sin, leaving us nothing to pay.
He did this by suffering a criminal’s death by crucifixion. He died on the cross, He was buried, and He was raised from the dead three days later, proving that His payment for our sins was accepted.
Anyone who believes in Jesus, and what He accomplished through His death and resurrection – that he paid the full price for our sins, leaving nothing for us to pay – has eternal life. Eternal life means that it can never be lost or forfeited. God no longer sees believers in their sins, but sees them as perfectly righteous.
God’s justice was satisfied by the once and for all sacrifice of Jesus.
2 Corinthians 5:21: For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
In opposition to the above gospel message, Lordship “salvation” (LS) advocates deny God’s justice in favor of a false gospel of eternal salvation by works. Lordship salvation is either an implicit or explicit denial of the finished work of Christ.
LS is the unsupportable and unbiblical belief that the PERFORMANCE of good works, the PROMISE of good works, or the EVIDENCE of good works MUST accompany faith in Christ in order to establish, or provide evidence, that such faith has resulted in eternal life.
The Bible says:
Romans 3:23-27 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
LS says: “I have to do my part to be justified.”
Christians (those who have believed in Jesus as Savior) have been justified by God upon belief in Jesus as Savior. They have eternal life that can never be lost or forfeited. Christians should oppose injustice in civic life. Christians should also defend the gospel against attempts by false teachers to override God’s perfect justice with whatever they think is right.
If you would like to know more about how to have eternal life according to our perfectly just, perfectly righteous, perfectly loving God, click here:
Notes From A Retired Preacher 
Hobbs, I didn’t take it that way. Although King may had have some good challenges, oftentimes these public figures do use it as some sort of measuring tape for whether one is a ‘real’ Christian or not. Funny thing is that often it depends on if you agree with their political viewpoint. We also tend to soften up over time when it comes to these public figures, forgetting some of their more radical teachings. I don’t judge him at all, I pray he definitely knew God’s grace, but I was just thinking out loud about how men seem to lean on other men’s words when we have such a famine in the land for the hearing of God’s Word (I know that speaks to Israel, but it’s certainly applicable to the world).
Holly, yes, there aren’t really any good points in that passage are there! I probably mistook the sense of condemnation it evoked for it being ‘challenging’. Such is the conditioning.
Hobbs, it’s funny to me men/women feel the need to pour over and examine men’s writings and pull out some supposed meat, when the meat of how to walk, how to treat the poor, the hungry, the naked, how to love others, etc., is all found in the strong meat of His Word (Heb 5:12-14).
We know you don’t pull truth from error.
Hobbs, you’re right. It is good news that eternal life is a free gift. All other views are bad news.
Yeah he makes some good points, we should make a stand for Christ, but it’s not guaranteed we will, St.Peter failed at least three times to make a stand so it happens to the best of us! And if we had to do it to be saved then salvation wouldn’t be a free gift. Thank the Lord it is!
I agree. A believer can fall for anything.
Jason, the message is garbled. If King was saying that one must be willing to die for Christ (or any other cause) to have eternal life, he was wrong. And, if he said a Christian cannot be a communist, that would mean that we would be able to judge whether or not a communist has eternal life, which is also wrong.
Believing in Jesus as Savior does not require serving Him, nor being willing to be martyred for Him. Eternal life does not require either.
I saw this paragraph in a sermon by Martin Luther King called, “Can a Christian be a Communist”?
“And then finally open the Book of Revelation. The word ‘witness’ means being willing to die for the cause of Jesus Christ. This morning, my friends, we must believe that there is something so dear, something so precious, something so eternal, that we’ll die for it. And if you haven’t discovered something that you will die for, you aren’t fit to live. You may be thirty, as I’ve said so often, at that moment some great principle stands before you, some great truth, some great decision, and you fail to take a stand because you are afraid that something will happen to you or that you will be killed and you want to live a few more years. Well, you might go on and live until eighty, but I submit to you that you were just as dead at thirty as you are at eighty and the cessation of breathing in your life is merely the belated announcement of an earlier death of the spirit”
In this sermon, King gave three reasons that a Christian cannot be a communist: godlessness, moral relativism, and statism. But he also said that communism challenges Christians on consumerism, greed, and lack of social justice.
What really concerns me is that in the quoted paragraph, King is caught red-handed preaching a martyrdom gospel similar to Wurmbrand. When he says that those who are unwilling to die are not fit to live, he is adding works to the gospel and is preaching exactly the statism that he rejected. And if social justice is not left in the practical area where it belongs, it becomes a “social justice gospel”. King concludes his sermon with an altar call, in which he equates accepting Christ as one’s personal Savior with “uniting with the church”. Like most Baptist preachers, King is a grace waffler, and it is sad to see.
Holly, as Keith pointed out, self-righteousness animates both the LS community and the social justice warriors.
I don’t fully comprehend the depth of His love either, but I am likewise grateful for it.
What a astute comparison to Loadship salvation.
And it wasn’t just at all for Jesus to be killed instead of Barabbas, but God’s way is not our way, and His thoughts not ours, although He is always perfect in all His ways including justice. I don’t fully comprehend the depth of His love, but I am so grateful for it.
Thank you for another good article John.
Dennis, there is a check box under where you register to post comments that you can check in order to be notified of new posts.
There is no set schedule as to when I post them.
I received this post, one only from you.
I would like to subscribe please, and receive all your posts.
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Blessings,
Dennis.
New Zealand
On Mon, 7 Sep 2020, 05:22 Notes From A Retired Preacher, wrote:
> johninnc posted: “By johninnc John 19:30: When Jesus therefore had > received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and > gave up the ghost. The chant “no justice, no peace” has become nearly > ubiquitous in our uncivil landscape. It is chanted, I’m su” >
Keith, I agree that political correctness/wokeness is rooted in self-righteousness from a secular angle, while LS is rooted in self-righteousness from a religious angle. Because of this commonality, it is natural that the two coalesce around certain points.
The crescendo of the rage and acrimony won’t be reached until the standards start to converge.
The rapture is growing closer each day, as is the advent of the soon to be, but short-lived one-world government and one-world religion.
John, interesting article.
At some level, every person is aware that he or she falls short of a righteous standard and is guilty because of what our first parents did in the Garden of Eden. People suppress this knowledge in a wide variety of ways. For example, political correctness or “wokeness” is simply a means by which many of those on the secular left try to adhere to a set of standards by which they think they are righteous, and denigrate those who they see as failing to measure up to those standards.
So it is with Lordship salvation, which is a prominent feature of those on the “religious right”. LS proponents have adopted a set of arbitrary standards to which they think they adhere and denigrate those whom they judge as not measuring up to the standards of LS, however they understand them.
It’s interesting that these seemingly opposing groups are beginning to coalesce in Critical Race Theory (CRT), which has made significant inroads into the SBC in recent years. Pope Francais has been pushing Marxism since he became Pope.
The rapture of the Church is growing ever closer each day.
Aristotle, we are glad that you enjoyed the article!
Great article!
Jason, focus on changed lives as evidence of eternal life is a dead end that makes assurance impossible.
And fundamental transformation of society through abusive tactics won’t make things any better.
Being transformed by a renewing of your mind (Romans 12:2) is God’s desire for believers, but focus on worldly fads will hinder that process.
LS loves Changed Lives. Changed Lives is similar to Fundamental Transformation of Society. It is iniquity.
Jason, I think there are some similarities between social justice advocates and Lordship “salvation.”
Most notable, to me, is the setting of arbitrary and shifting standards by both groups.
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Lordship Salvation is actually very similar to the SJW mindset already.
SJWs do not leave you alone. They do not allow you to live a normal life. They demand total commitment. LS is the exact same thing, wrapped in the Christian flag.
LD, yes!
Amen! Thanks be to God and his gift of eternal life through faith in Christ Jesus.