Which would you say to the hundreds of Alabama Baptists who volunteer at Sav-A-Life pregnancy centers across the state? Would you say they are detracting from the gospel message or that they are living out the gospel message by demonstrating God’s love?
Which would you say to the volunteers at Shelby County Baptist Association’s thrift store, which serves hundreds of needy families each month, or to the volunteers of Washington County Baptist Association’s food ministry who help feed hungry people? Are they detracting from the gospel or living out the gospel?
The question is important because in mid-August, well-known evangelical leader John MacArthur charged that those concerned with social justice issues threaten the gospel. MacArthur said, “I’ve fought a number of polemical battles against ideas that threaten the gospel. This recent (and surprisingly sudden) detour in quest of ‘social justice’ is, I believe, the most subtle and dangerous threat so far.”
A month later more than 4,000 people have signed on to MacArthur’s statement and it is being discussed widely in evangelical circles.
Faith and works
At least two questions emerge from MacArthur’s statement. First, are helping ministries — sometimes called “social justice” issues — an enemy of the gospel? Second, are helping ministries new for Bible-believing Christians, as MacArthur says?
The answer to both questions is a resounding “no.” There is no dichotomy or separation between faith and works in the Bible.
Certainly, the starting line for both is a personal faith in God through commitment to Jesus Christ as Savior. The finish line is becoming a disciple who receives God’s welcome of “well done good and faithful servant.”
Consider that both the Old Testament and the New Testament condemn those who want to believe right without doing right. In Isaiah 58:1–10, God describes a people whose beliefs result in religious activities and discussions alone.
Beginning in verse 6, He asks, “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?”
Jesus, in Matthew 7:21, warns that “not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven.” Even some who prophesied, cast out demons or performed miracles will be cast away because they did not do the will of the Father.
The late Vernon C. Grounds, long-time president of Denver Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary, once wrote: “Unquestionably, the Old Testament insists on social justice. Passionately it affirms the evidence of a right relationship with God is a right relationship with one’s neighbor — and this implies a willingness to struggle for (the neighbor’s) rights.”
Grounds added that the New Testament does not negate the Old Testament demands for social justice. Rather it fulfills and intensifies the demands of the Hebrew revelation.
Christian ethics
In Luke 4:18–19, Jesus described His ministry as being “to preach good news to the poor … to proclaim deliverance to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to release the oppressed to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
In Matthew 22:37–39, Jesus tied Christian ethics to Christian belief when He said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and most important command. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Jesus linked judgment to ethics when He insisted that believers are to minister to the hungry, the thirsty and the strangers, to the sick, the imprisoned and the naked (Matt. 25:35–36). This is putting love of God in action. When Christians care for “the least of these,” it is as if they were caring for Christ Himself.
None of this is about earning salvation through good works. Salvation is always “God’s gift — not from works, so that no one can boast” (Eph. 2:9). Instead, each shows that because one is rightly related to God, one works to bring all dimensions of life under His Lordship. That is exactly the point of James 2:14 in which the writer links faith and works together in a way that cannot be separated.
The New Testament ethic then is an imitation of Jesus Christ, an ethic of gratitude and faith and obedience, all grounded in love of God and resulting in love to others.
Grounds declared, “The imitation of Jesus Christ, Calvary-inspired and Spirit-enabled, means a life of service and sacrifice, a life of sensitive caring, a life of identification with the oppressed and disinherited and needy, a life of constructive [engagement] against any political and religious [forces that are frustrating to God’s will].”
Genuine religion
Jesus’ life alone confirms there is no escaping the conclusion that genuine religion expresses itself in concern for social justice — ministering to others.
Trying to separate faith and works is a false dichotomy. At best it evidences a lack of understanding that faith in Christ is more than repeating a type of magical incantation. Faith in Christ is evidenced in a relationship with the risen Lord that changes our hearts and changes our values to Christ-like values. If it is not that, it is nothing at all.
Historically, the church has understood that faith and works are inexorably linked together. In our own nation it was evangelical Christians who championed social justice issues like opposing pornography, prostitution, child labor, worker exploitation and more. It was Bible-believing Christians who worked for education for all, medical care and prison reform.
Today that work continues in efforts like Christian Women’s Job Corps and Christian Men’s Job Corps — both led by Woman’s Missionary Union. It continues in crisis pregnancy centers, Christian thrift stores, hunger ministries, jail ministries and more. It is seen as Christians work for policies and laws reflecting biblical values in society.
All of these and more are evidences of God’s love for His creation and the Christian believer’s love for God and for one another.
So to the countless Christian believers offering many kinds of “cups of cold water in Jesus’ name,” God bless you. Keep it up. What you are doing does not detract from the gospel at all. Instead it affirms the gospel as people see God’s love lived out among and through God’s people.
Share with others: