Generous Justice: How God's Grace Makes Us Just

In Chapter 1 “What is Doing Justice?” Keller says just as tithe is the right or due of the priests, the poor and needy have rights to have their needs met. Any neglect shown to their needs is not called merely a lack of mercy or charity but a violation of justice. The Bible introduces God as a father to the fatherless, a defender of widows (Psalm 68:4-5). Giving justice and defending to the poor and weak is one of the main things he does in the world. He identifies with the powerless and takes up their cause. Because most of the oppressed are those who are poor and powerless, God gives them particular attention and has a special place in his heart for them. Justice is more than merely giving the poor small, perfunctory gifts, but turning the their life to a life of delight. Justice includes generosity.In Chapter 2 “Justice and the Old Testament” Keller says Jesus has fulfilled the ceremonial laws of Moses, including clean laws of touching, diet, dress; sacrificial system and temple worship ordinances. However, the basic principles in the Old Testament remain the same. Christ only changed the way in which Christians exhibit their holiness and offer their sacrifices. Today, people are required to offer God their entire lives as sacrifices (Romans 12:1-2), as well as the sacrifices of worship to God and the sharing of their resources with others (Hebrews 13:5). Although the Bible does not guarantee that no one will ever fall into poverty, God promises that He will richly bless His people so that if they are kind and good to the needy around them by being openhanded and freely lending everything he needs, there would not be a poor man among them, that no one will suffer from permanent, long-term poverty. The money we have is as much a gift of God as the manna was a gift to the Israelites in the desert. The Biblical laws for the use of land criticize the statism that disregards the precious treasure of personal rootage as well as the untrammeled individualism which secures individuals at the expense of community. The three causes of poverty, according to the Bible are oppression, calamity, and personal moral failure. Taken in isolation no one factor – government programs, public policy, calls to personal responsibility, or private charity – is sufficient to address the problem.In Chapter 3 “What did Jesus Say About Justice?” Keller says Jesus wants his followers to be profoundly generous to the poor, spending more money on them than on the rich and the friends. Genuine concern for the poor is not a means of getting salvation but rather the sign that you already have salvation. Whatever a person does to the poor is done to Jesus. The Bible sees sexual immorality and material selfishness as both flowing from self-centeredness rather than God-centeredness. Gospel preaching that targets some sins but not the sins of oppression cannot work among most people in the world, people who are poor peasants and workers. Our first responsibility is to our own families and relations (1 Timothy 5:8), and our second responsibility is to other members of the community of faith (Galatians 6:10). However, our responsibility also includes doing good to all people, including strangers such as foreigners.In Chapter 4 “Justice and Your Neighbor” Keller says Jesus said that loving God and neighbor is the way to get eternal life. To this, the expert in the law asked who his neighbor is. Using the story of good Samaritan, Jesus says that anyone in need is our neighbor. We should not refuse to help others by saying that they are not yet in extreme poverty because we would not wait until we are in extreme poverty before doing something to alleviate our suffering. We should not say I cannot help anyone because we mean I cannot help anyone without burdening myself, cutting in to how I live my life. We should not refuse to help others because they are ungrateful and wicked because Jesus saved us not even though we are ungrateful and evil people. We should not refuse to help the poor who fell into poverty because of their own selfish, indolent, or violent behavior unless they continue in those evils. Even if they do persist in the same evil, we should still help the family members of those evil people. Jesus is the great Samaritan who came down and saved us out of his compassion on us, the spiritually dead.In Chapter 5 “Why Should We Do Justice?” Keller says two basic motivations for doing justice that the Bible gives are first joyful awe before the goodness of God’s creation and second the experience of God’s grace in redemption. The fact that humans are created in the image of God shows that every human being deserves respect. God gave to humans management and authority over the earth but not the ownership. God gave the poor the right to receive favor and good will from the rich as the rich have received favor and good will from God. A person who experienced of God’s grace can no longer have pride and haughtiness and aloofness toward the poor. In Chapter 6 “How should we do justice?” Keller says doing justice requires constant, sustained reflection and circumspection, thinking through how to do justice in every area of life.Vulnerable people need multiple levels of help. Keller call these layers relief, development, and social reform. Relief is direct aid to meet immediate physical, material, and economic needs. Development is giving an individual, family, or entire community what they need to move beyond dependency on relief into a condition of economic self-sufficiency. When John Perkins explained his philosophy of ministry, he always named three basic factors. One he called “relocation,” though others have called it “reneighboring a community.” This means the helper should live within the community and thus have firsthand knowledge of the needs of the neighborhood and real accountability to the residents. Perkins also spoke of “redistribution,” something others have called “reweaving a community.” This means that financial capital, social capital, and spiritual capital that are invested into the community should stay within the community for the benefit of the community. By “financial capital,” we of course mean the ability to attract businesses that not only provide goods for customers, but also keep wealth and financial capital in the community itself. By “social capital,” Perkins meant the training and retaining of local leadership. “Spiritual capital” refers to the spiritual and moral influence of the churches in the neighborhood. There is a third important factor in John Perkins’s strategy for rebuilding poor communities. He names it “racial reconciliation.” This includes empowering the resident of poor communities to control their own destiny as well as inviting professional helpers from outside to play a role. The new bonds with others in Christ are stronger than our relationship to other members of our own racial and national groups. The gospel gives believers critical distance from their own culture, enabling them to critique their own cultural idols. When these new insights are established in the consciousness of a Christian, a church, and a community, the resulting unity of relationships becomes both a means to reneighboring and reweaving and a direct witness to the world of the reality of the gospel. Besides relief and development (both individual and corporate) there is social reform. Social reform moves beyond the relief of immediate needs and dependency and seeks to change the conditions and social structures that aggravate or cause that dependency. Doing justice and generosity should not be the means to evangelism nor be considered the same thing as evangelism nor be considered something detracts from evangelism. Instead, they should exist in an asymmetrical, inseparable relationship. Doing justice and generosity is inseparably connected to preaching the gospel because the gospel produces love and concern for the poor and the deeds of justice and generosity give credibility to the preaching of the gospel. In other words, justification by faith leads to doing justice and generosity, and doing justice and generosity make many seek to be justified by faith. The most loving thing anyone can do for one’s neighbor is to help him or her to have a saving faith in God, to have a saving relationship with Him that will result in eternal life with Him. Christian church, like any other institution or organization, cannot do all things well, and thus should do the work of relief and some development inside and around its community for their own members, neighborhoods and cities and let its members to do the work of development and social reform through appropriate organizations and institutions.In Chapter 7 “Doing Justice In the Public Square” Keller says there is no consensus on what justice is. People assume the other side know they are simply being unjust, but the reality is nearly everyone thinks they are on justice’s side. Justice is not a matter of common sense because people have differing opinions about what freedom and equality, what things that define justice, are. The causes for which justice is invoked are always matters of deeply held beliefs, rooted in particular view on matters of faith such as human nature, happiness, right, and wrong. There are competing visions of justice in our society which can fall into three categories: maximizing welfare, respecting freedom, and promoting virtue. Attempt to talk about justice in the supposedly neutral terms of freedom and equality that we can all agree on did not work because our ideas of justice are rooted in views of life that are nonprovable faith assumptions. The forbiddance to bring religious beliefs into public argument has made debate or discourse over normative matters barren, unsatisfying, and shallow. We can’t agree on what justice is because we are not allowed to talk about our underlying beliefs publicly. We are locked in endless disagreement, largely because we live with the illusion that we can achieve moral and religious neutrality. Many great political and influential figures in the past used religious language to argue for their cause. Prohibition of bringing personal morality into public policy is thus absurd. Our law is itself a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Although Christians should not be strident and condemning in their language or attitude, Christians should not be silent about the Biblical roots of their passion for justice. Christians’ work for justice should be characterized by both humble cooperation and respectful provocation. Common grace of God gives skills in science, scholarship, crafts, government, art, and jurisprudence to nonbelievers as well. Christians and non-Christians have common values that can form a connection between them. Believers should let their coworkers know of how the gospel is motivating them, yet also they should appeal to common values as much as possible. At the same time, they should be respectfully provocative with them, arguing that their models of justice are reductionistic and incomplete. Christians should talk about how their beliefs are different than those of non-Christians even if they have the same basic social goals. Valuing things is always based on beliefs about the purposes of life, human nature, right and wrong, all of which are moral and religious. As Aristotle and other Greek philosophers reasoned, unless we can determine what human beings are here for, it is impossible to determine how we should live. Many prominent thinkers and scientists say that human being does not have inherent worth. Therefore, even atheist and agnostic philosophers acknowledge that the concept of human rights requires a religious dimension. Many nonreligious people believe in human dignity and human rights. However, it is just that any such belief is religious in nature. In Chapter 8 “Peace, Beauty, and Justice” Keller says the Jewish description of the creation is unique in that God created the world as a craftsman or an artisan with much care and planning. God created all things in an interdependent, harmonious relationship to one another. Just as rightly related physical elements form a cosmos, so rightly related human beings form a community, and this interwovenness is what the Bible calls shalom, or harmonious peace. Shalom means peace resulting from right, perfect, and joyful relationship in all dimensions – physical, emotional, social, and spiritual. When there is crime, poverty, and family breakdown, there is no shalom in the society. However, when people share with others, work together for good and functional public services, school, and flouring businesses, the community experiences shalom. Broken relationship with God resulted in war, crime, family breakdown, oppression, injustice, hunger, sickness, aging and physical death. Doing justice means bringing shalom to the community, especially for the poor and the weaker members of the society. Perceiving the goodness of God in His sacrificial love makes doing justice and other things that honor and please God a delight to people. God identifies with the poor not only symbolically but also literally in the incarnation and death of Jesus. He had little the world valued and the little he had was taken. Though He was rich, for the sake of us He became poor, so that we through His poverty might become rich (2 Corinthians 8:9).In section titled “Justice Includes Generosity” in chapter 1, “What is doing Justice?”, the author seems to say that generous giving to the poor is a requirement from God. Mercy, compassion, or charity are not a requirement, but justice is. Therefore, generous giving must be justice, and justice unconditionally includes generous giving. Thus, the author equates justice with generosity or generous giving of time and resources. The author went further by saying that those who do not actively and generously share their resources with the poor are robbers. I must disagree with what the author said above. When generous giving to the poor or generosity becomes justice, it means the rich have the legal obligation to give to the poor, and the poor have legal right to demand goods from the rich or even take goods from the rich without their knowledge. When the rich accuse the poor of stealing from them, the poor would be able to say “It is justice for us to receive generosity from you. Therefore, it is not stealing but merely exercise of justice and practice of our rights.” Instead of calling generous giving to the poor justice, I believe generous giving to the poor is a righteousness. It is a righteousness that God demands from the rich. However, God did not give the poor the right to demand or steal from the rich. God merely gave the poor the right to ask for what they need from the rich, and the right to receive from the rich whatever the rich give them. If mercy, compassion, and charity to the poor by the rich are a requirement, an obligation on the part of the rich, some people may argue that generous giving to the poor can no longer be called mercy, compassion, or charity by the rich. I think they have a solid ground to argue that case, but indisputable truth that remains unchanged is that the generous giving to the poor through the rich is mercy, compassion, and charity by God. The author said, “We do justice when we give all human beings their due as creations of God.” It is equally true to say, “God does justice when He gives all human beings their due as creations of God.” Then when the poor receive goods, or rather when human beings receive life, health, wealth, and peace from God, are they receiving their due from God? If so, human beings do not have to give thanks to God because they are only receiving their due from God and God merely doing what His Justice requires Him to do.I agree with what Keller said regarding what Christians should do to help the poor. I could feel the enthusiasm he has for helping the poor while reading the book. I also give due respect to the efforts he has made. It seems to me he has done appropriate research for writing on this subject. He has proposed well-thought-out ways to help the poor. His mention of inputs from many other people, particularly those from Abraham Kuyper and John Perkins, were especially helpful. These various inputs helped considering the task of helping the poor in a more balanced and multifaceted way. Most importantly, he has a first-hand experience of helping the poor which gives him invaluable knowledge and know-off from which he can draw and helps him critically assess the benefits and shortcomings of inputs from others. I believe more improvements can be made upon the helping ministry that he and others have built upon. However, due to lack of first-hand experience, it is difficult for me to propose any valuable improvements.

In any literary undertaking, the premise of the book must be set out fairly soon, perhaps within the first dozen or so pages. True to this format, Keller satisfies our curiosities. He does so in the introduction to the book, where he begins by answering the questions that his friends and associates have asked him, "Who are you writing this for?" and, "How did you come to be interested in the subject of justice?" (pg x) It is these questions that become the main subject of the book, and on which this review will consider.As is the case with the church today, there has been much concern over the subject of social justice throughout her history. Keller does an admirable job in showing us, through the Bible, how God's people were to render justice, most specifically to the disadvantaged of their own nation. However, he quickly takes those verses to bring us into the controversy that the church has reached in the debate over the concept of "Social Justice."And, indeed, there is a controversy over this subject between conservatives on the one side, and the more liberal wing of the church on the other side. Almost immediately, many will jump to Keller's defense as a modern-day conservative, evangelical. Yet, in spite of Keller's more conservative position on a host of subjects, Keller takes the side of the more liberal wing of the church, and defends THEIR view of social justice. So, while he may have a collage of conservative credentials in his portfolio, it is clear that he speaks for the liberal wing regarding this subject.It is toward this end that Keller seeks to influence minds to move toward the more liberal view of social justice. It is incumbent upon conservatives to acknowledge and understand that this is Keller's main purpose in writing this book - his intentions are to promote social justice. If you don't know what that means, or understand the argument on both sides regarding how social justice impacts the gospel message, then you probably won't appreciate this review. But, suffice it to say that this view which Keller promotes is antithetical to the historical, conservative, and evangelical position held today.According to Keller, a key moment in the development of his social justice views came from his involvement in a discussion he had during the 1960's. Though Keller is not forthcoming in details, we are led to believe that he was extremely sympathetic toward the plight of blacks, and that this was the time when he first came to realize "that most older white adults in my life were telling me things that were dead wrong." (pg.xvi)On pg. xvii he relates his experience that he had with a black person (Elward Ellis) whom he met during his years at seminary. Keller was flatly told by Ellis that he was a racist. Like most of us today, Keller was initially taken aback by such an accusation. Not one to offend, Keller allowed his guest to explain further:"Oh, you don't mean to be, and you don't want to be, but you are. You can't really help it....When black people do things in a certain way, you say, `Well, that's your culture.' But when white people do things in a certain way, you say, `That's just the right way to do things.' You don't realize you really have a culture. You are blind to how many of your beliefs and practices are cultural."This is a very serious accusation and one that is often repeated even today, therefore we need to examine it most carefully, and because it is the main thesis which Keller bases his book upon. Is what Ellis told Keller a true statement? Is his comparison accurate, or is it an apples-to-oranges type of comparison?To begin with, this accusation is centered on a key premise that cultures are nothing more than "a way of doing things." You know: "You go this way, I'm gonna go that way, and we will meet at Peoria, Illinois. The path that you take will be different, but your path is not evil or wrong, and neither is my path righteous or correct. It is simply a path." But is this an accurate analogy of what is happening between two cultures?Inherent in that question is the assumption that cultures are nothing more than a way of "doing things", and the accusation is that "doing things" is a result of culture. But the truth is that culture is not just an accumulation of "things that we do." In addition to the accumulation of the "things that we do", culture is developed by what is predominantly viewed as "the right thing to do", with emphasis being placed on the word, "right."In other words, culture takes into account those things that are right, and also those things that are wrong. In a very real sense, then, culture is not only what we wear, and what forms of entertainment we engage in, but they also are the accumulation of what a society values, and how the members of that society have agreed to live between each other, by placing those things that are valued highly as "good", and supported and practiced; and those things that are viewed as wrong and immoral, as "bad", and being shunned and suppressed within that culture.I'd like to take a moment here to characterize those who share similar views to Keller's. I speak only in general terms, because we all recognize that while Conservatives tend toward Fundamentalism, not all Conservatives are Fundamentalists. The same can be said when viewing those on the more Liberal side of the spiritual spectrum.Keller belongs to a rising group of Christians that are typically referred to as "Emergent." Now, Keller would most likely reject that label, and with good cause. However, just as Autism is not defined as a specific disease, but is more accurately understood as a syndrome that slides the scale from Asperger's on up to full-blown Autism, so too can Emergent be viewed on a scale from "Missional" to full-blown Emergent.What this means is that in order to discuss and critique books written by those in the Emergent spectrum, it is important to understand that their world-views do not embrace the same ideals that those outside of that spectrum embrace. It's difficult to understand someone coming from a differing world-view, and I've heard it argued that you only waste your time when you do so. However, there are always many that stand on the sides, trying to understand which way to lay anchor, and it is toward that end that people like me and Keller write what we do, in order to sway those individuals to our way of thinking.Because Keller comes from a differing world-view, he will certainly understand and interpret the Bible differently than you or I might, and how you understand the Bible is a key aspect of what you will emphasize in your life and in your actions. And, of course, Keller's book is about actions - more specifically, the actions of social justice.People tend to skew events to reflect their own world-views, and this is something that all people must guard against, even me. What it ultimately comes down to is, how you view the subject of social justice will have a lot to do with how you view the Bible, and also what it is that you believe should be emphasized. Keller emphasizes those things in the Bible that speak about social issues, because he believes that Christ's purpose for coming was to bring balance and relief to life's difficulties and that is accomplished by His people valuing the same things that He did - the relief of the downtrodden.And so, to get back to Keller's experience with Ellis, you should notice that what Ellis told Keller is not correct. If we examine such cultural differences as how black men, in great numbers, abandon their families and children; or why it is that our jails are disproportionately filled with black men; or why does the Chinese government promote abortion of females, or suppress their citizens' rights; then it becomes more apparent that there is a wide gulf between cultures on these specific issues, and that that gulf is not independent of our moral beliefs.This is not to say that Black Americans, or Chinese people, are any more immoral than White Americans are (indeed, they are no worse, nor better), but that these are simply areas of morality that have been shown to exist within those cultures that are different than that in the White culture, and cannot be simply laid down to "Well, that's your culture." But it is to say that Ellis' claim that cultural differences are simply differences in "how we do things" is just plain foolish.So then, it must be remembered that there are differing components to culture - some that deal with matters of no moral concern, such as what you eat, or the spices you use, or the utensils that you employ in your eating, or the way that you dance, or the type of music you listen to. When Ellis told Keller that the main differences between two cultures have nothing to do with moral concerns, he was just plain wrong. This means that Keller blurred the issue of culture by confusing those components, or he was woefully ignorant of the various component parts of culture.Why do I emphasize this distinction in the differing components of culture? Firstly, because Keller blurred that distinction; secondly, because Keller has attempted to build this scenario for white people (which, ironically, will be the majority of his readership) that portrays whites as living in a post-racial era where they are all still racist. Imagine that! You thought that White America had moved beyond racism, and had come into an era where Whites and Blacks were seeking reconciliation and coming to terms? Not in Keller and Ellis' world. As a matter of fact, even if you THINK you aren't racist, you are!Equally, you'll notice that Keller fails to acknowledge that Black people, or Chinese, or any other ethnic group can be racist. This is a common practice of those on the left spectrum, to portray White people as the singular source of all social inequalities. If minorities act evilly, it's only in reaction to the evil that Whites have done to them.We should really make no mistake about it, Keller's thesis in this book is a promotion of social justice, but in order to do that, Keller must advance the notion on two fronts:1. The Biblical front - God commands us to in His Word, and,2. The Secular front - We are all still racist, and need to rectify this by making amends. We make amends by delivering social justice (redistribution of the wealth).By removing this distinction regarding the notion of culture having a moral component, Keller seeks to sway people into action by accepting the idea that minorities are in an inferior social position solely, or primarily, because of a lack of equal justice.Another clue to where Keller stands on this issue is to consider his reading list. All too often, we are finding a new suite of Christian authors who are promoting false concepts which they learned from the authors whom they personally read and quote from; and they in turn then recommend those same authors to their readership. As Keller mentions this author, or the next, most people will not feel compelled to examine the author, or the book, but simply to take his word for it that the author is a Christian who walks the mainstream. If all of those authors are mainstream Christians, then it ought to be evident that Keller's argument carries much more authority and validity. At least that is the purpose of citing other's works - to give your own work more validity.As it stands, those whom he quotes typically agree with him philosophically on this issue (as we should expect), such as Walter Rauschenbusch's book, "The Social Gospel and the Atonement." Some of the works that he cites seem a shock, because they are not even written by Christian writers, and are written from a philosophy and world-view which is decidedly secular and antithetical to Christian thinking, such as Elaine Scarry's little book, "On Beauty and Being Just". Scarry, not being Christian, writes from a purely anti-God position.Take for example, his citation of Craig Blomberg's survey of the Mosaic laws of gleaning. How much stock should real conservatives place in a man who would allow the gospel to be co-opted by a Mormon, when he wrote the book, How Wide the Divide? An Evangelical and a Mormon in Conversation. Are conservatives getting an honest assessment by someone who would otherwise be considered a false teacher?To be sure, the Bible is quoted often. In Keller's case, either the word "justice" is used, or the concept of justice is displayed in the verse. However, as you examine the scripture texts that Keller utilizes for his argument, and when you consider the context of the admonitions upon which those Biblical texts are issued under, you begin to realize that the context which the Bible uses is much different than the context upon which Keller has based his argument.The context which Keller presents in his argument is that Israel was commanded to perform "Social Justice" to the entire world. Yet that is NOT the context of the Bible. Any honest reading of the Bible shows that Israel is only commanded to perform justice toward her own people, within their own political borders. God is not commanding Israel to go outside of her borders to other people and nations, and establish social equity with them.It should also be noted that Keller actually admits in a couple of places that those Biblical commands are only meant for Israel to conduct social justice toward those within the political borders of the nation (on pages 21, 22, 23, 29, and 57).He fully acknowledges the differences in that context on page 23, where he says,"Israel was a nation-state in which every citizen was bound to obey the whole law of God and also was required to give God wholehearted worship. This is not the situation in our society today."The context of the Bible in regards to this question cannot be denied. Yet Keller insists that the context can be expanded to include the whole world. But, the reader should clearly note that Keller gives no Biblical justification for this expansion. If anything, it becomes abundantly clear that this book is the result of Keller's personal feelings regarding this issue, and has nothing to do with any Biblical mandate regarding social justice to the world.In Keller's mind, when the Bible says, "Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every person" (Mark 16:15), what it REALLY means is, to "go into all the world, and provide for everyone's immediate felt needs, and then you earn the right to preach the gospel to every person." Oh, but if you preach the gospel, don't offend anyone with controversial messages, like "homosexuality is a sin", or "you're going to hell if you don't repent."Throughout this book, Keller repeatedly fails to recognize that all of the commands to God's people to practice Justice and Mercy are always intended to be directed solely toward God's people, and only within their immediate sphere of influence within those political borders. In other words, God instructs His people to practice Justice and Mercy solely toward God's people - not to the whole world.More specifically, the command is made in order to show God's people that among the people of the world, there are none that are any more important to God than His own people. This was the manner in which God chose to promote His image to the world; as God presented Israel, and the values and morals she practiced, as a picture to the world of who He was. Israel was God's mirror, intended to reflect God's character to the world.So then, Keller takes a commandment of God which forms a key aspect of Jewish life and instruction, and is intended to promote God's character to the world, and he confounds the teaching of this commandment to today's Christians by reinterpreting its application and scope. Let me give you an example of how this is accomplished. On pg. 13 of his book, he states that one way of practicing what he calls, "primary justice" is to be like Job, and to be a "father to the needy."Keller reinterprets this to mean that today's church is commanded to care for the needs of all the poor that are in AND OUT of their sphere of influence. In other words, whereas the traditional application is that the Church should care for her own, in order to promote God and His gospel to the world, Keller takes it to mean that the church should reach OUTSIDE of the church to the community and care for their physical needs.The traditional approach has always been to understand that those commands to care for the underprivileged were to be seen as "benefits of membership" to those outside of the nation. In other words, as other nations viewed Israel's internal workings, they would become envious because of the care that God's people had for their own people.So, let's notice that in the Biblical context, Job's sphere of influence was those people who were part of the Israelite nation, and more specifically, his close neighbors. Nowhere in the Bible does it indicate that Job was reaching out to other nations and areas outside of the political borders of Israel. But also notice that Keller does not take that context and attempt to show Christians how to help other Christians in their own church community (as we see examples in the New Testament Church which cared for their own). Instead, he expands it to teach that we must help all others OUTSIDE of the Church community. This is THE central focus of his book.What greatness could we achieve if we truly helped our Christian brothers and sisters, widows and orphans FIRST and foremost? Jesus said that this was how others would come to know who He was, because they (the world) would see the love we had toward one another (John 13:34-35); not toward the whole world. It was in the formative days of the Church that people sold their possessions in order that all Christians might share and not have any need; not so that the entire world might share and not have any need. This was a clear picture of "primary justice", and it was an excellent example to the world of how Christians loved one another. This in turn caused the Church to grow mightily in those days. (Acts 4:4; 2:41; 2:47)Another argument that Keller uses to justify his reinterpretation is where he uses Amos 1:3-2:3 as his example text. Keller states that in this text, it shows where other nations were judged for the manner in which they treated the disadvantaged. Yet a concise study of this passage will reveal that God's judgment upon those nations was not because they ill-treated the down-trodden, but specifically for how they treated HIS PEOPLE who were down-trodden. Even if we take this as a commandment that the whole world was expected to follow the same system that Israel followed, it doesn't show that Israel was commanded to show social justice to the rest of the world.Keller's conclusion that "It is clearly God's will that all societies reflect his concern for justice of the weak and vulnerable," is not held up by the context of any Biblical text that he presents. The context clearly shows that those nations were not being judged because they failed to have concern for the weak and vulnerable, but because they acted evilly against HIS PEOPLE.Not to necessarily bash Keller for his views, but more to give an example of where he stands in the political/spiritual spectrum, we can see him on page 30 sharing with us his socialist vision for corporate America:"How can business owners follow the same principles [Old Testament laws regarding redistribution of the wealth] today? They should not squeeze every penny of profit out of their businesses for themselves by charging the highest possible fees and prices to customers and paying the lowest possible wages to workers. Instead, they should be willing to pay higher wages and charge lower prices that in effect share the corporate profits with employees and customers, with the community around them."If I didn't know any better, I might think this statement came straight out of Karl Marx' manifesto. To be sure, Keller (along with Craig Blomberg) understands that democratic capitalism is not conducive to the format of what he is proposing for redistribution of the wealth. (cf, page 32, 2nd paragraph)Another concern I have is how Keller exploits racial tensions to promote his concepts of social justice. For example, on pages 122 and following, he attempts to use the Bible to show racism. On page 123, he makes the bold claim that racism was the driving factor for Miriam and Aaron to speak against Moses regarding his marriage to an Ethiopian woman. Instead, the alternative interpretation is that Miriam and Aaron were speaking out against Moses based upon their historical practice of only marrying within their nation. Not because Moses' wife was black, but that she was an Ethiopian.Again, on page 124, Keller claims that Peter's refusal to eat with Gentiles was based upon racism, and not upon religious justifications as the Bible states. Keller even goes so far as to suggest that there is a question about whether or not "white Americans today need to repent for the sins of ancestors and acknowledge the white privilege they have today." (note 111, pg.211)In the end, Keller's book is an attempt to promote redistribution of social advantages to those who are less advantaged by instituting social programs, initially at the church level, and then by virtue of her (supposed) growing influence, at the community level and beyond. He gives such an example on page 126 where he tells of "an effort like the TenPoint Coalition." Among other tactics, they "sought to stem the tide of gang killings in Boston....[by] bridging between institutions that previously had not worked together or that had even worked against one another."So what was the end result of this coalition of religious leaders? Are gang killings no more? Did the coalition produce any marked change in gang killings, or gang activity? Just what is it about Keller's suggestion that is supposed to have been so miraculous that we need to jump on this bandwagon? Why did Keller not further develop this understanding that he so wishes to promote?Some other pertinent questions to ask regarding TenPoint is: Why are all the staff of TenPoint black, if Keller's point is to show how White America needs to give to their community through the church? Why the name of God (or Jesus) is not mentioned in TenPoints ten points? Out of all the things that could/should be emphasized, doesn't God get a simple mention?Another point of contention with Keller is his tendency to erroneously state the opposition's case, as he does on page 138, where he claims that "Some have argued that Christians should only do justice as a means to the end of evangelism." But this is only a half-truth. The chief end of any church is evangelism, which Keller refuses to acknowledge. Any church program which fails to include this aspect in their outreach has failed to keep that in mind.To close out this review, I would sum up Keller's chief error by pointing out what he states on page 135 with the querying assumption that "if it is true that justice and mercy to the poor are the inevitable signs of justifying faith..." But what of secular philanthropists who spend millions of their money aiding the poor, and attempting to restructure social forces in underdeveloped neighborhoods where resources are scarce? If it is true that practicing justice and mercy is an "inevitable sign of...faith", does this mean that Bill Gates and Donald Trump are born again believers?

I have been waiting for years for someone to write this book. And so I'm hugely grateful to Tim Keller. He's clearly the man for the job - his years of ministerial experience, academic ability and personal integrity well qualify him to write of the crying need for Evangelicals to engage with issues of justice and poverty. He's done it before in his celebrated  MINISTRIES OF MERCY PB , but this book seems to have a greater apologetic edge.And he knows his audience. Or rather his audiences. For he is well-aware, no doubt from heated interactions, that there are various groups out there who are profoundly sceptical of this passion. The problem is that they come from such conflicting starting positions; so it takes a masterly lightness of touch to engage each without alienating another.A COMPLEX BATTLEGROUNDBut part of the approach is to identify his interlocutors from the start (from page xi) and then interact with each as he goes along - I've tried summarise them like this:- The Instinctive Advocate: those Christians with the gut feeling that poverty and justice are important but who have never been able to integrate that with their faith. To them, Keller seeks to give a thought through, biblical rationale for why this instinct is god-given.- The Sceptical Evangelist: those who fear any journey down this road will inevitably lead to doctrinal compromise and the `social gospel'. We're here just to evangelise, aren't we? To which Keller challenges by articulating both Old & New Testament motivations and commands to love the poor, and to question what a reluctance to such love might indicate about their ministerial context and personal spirituality. He doesn't think they are the same thing - and this is important to what he goes on to say - but he does argue that we can't have one without the other:"... to consider deeds of mercy and justice to be identical to gospel proclamation is a fatal confusion. I propose a different way to understand evangelism and social justice. They should exist in an asymmetrical, inseparable relationship." (p139)"It is also impossible to separate word and deed ministry from each other in ministry because human beings are integrated wholes - body and soul. When some Christians say, `Caring for physical needs will detract from evangelism', they must be thinking of only doing evangelism among people who are comfortable and well-off." (p141-142)- The Revisionist Campaigner: frustrated by evangelicals' sluggish or avoided engagement, these go further than Instinctive Advocates and blame what they perceive as the `individualism' of protestant orthodoxy. Their solution is to water down or distance themselves from it. To them, Keller is resounding in his appeal to evangelical orthodoxy - not just because he seeks to prove its biblical faithfulness, but also because he sees it as the fundamental bridge to a changed life and ethical behaviour, when it is properly understood. This quotation could serve as a summary of a point that he frequently returns to:"But as we have seen, doing justice is inseparably connected to preaching grace. This is true in two ways. One way is that the gospel produces a concern for the poor. The other is that deeds of justice gain credibility for the preaching of the gospel. In other words justification by faith leads to doing justice, and doing justice can make many seek to be justified by faith." (p140)- The Atheist Accuser: those who follow the likes of Christopher Hitchens by claiming that `religion poisons everything'. Keller has interacted with such issues before, most notably in  The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Scepticism . But the focus is narrower here. His approach is to question the ethical basis for human rights in the forbidding frigidity of a godless universe, and then to suggest that talk of human dignity is an inevitable corollary of divine creation and redemption. He even seems to have Derrida on his side on that point! (p167) It is a trenchant argument - proving that far from being poisonous, religion, and Christianity in particular, is pivotal for the protection of the vulnerable and the weak. This is, of course, why it is such an affront and scandal when Christians don't do that.I suppose for a number of years I fell very much into the first camp - troubled by the world's injustices, but unable to articulate an integrated theological response. Many friends, whom I hugely respect, were in the second - and part of the problem, I think, is that they would not read or engage with many who think differently on this issue (because of their lack of orthodoxy in other areas). What is so refreshing therefore about Keller's approach is that he is explicitly and deliberately approaching the question from the vantage point of the classic reformed doctrines of creation, substitutionary atonement, justification, sanctification and so on. Some attack him because his social involvement leads to suspicions that he has gone soft on these. But Keller retorts by saying that it is precisely this gospel that drives him to it. And he enjoys great precedents in reformed luminaries as diverse as Jonathan Edwards, Murray M'Cheyne and Abraham Kuyper (all of whom he quotes at various points).GETTING BACK TO THE NON-QUESTIONHaving lived in the two-thirds world for a number of years, it was impossible to ignore the appalling conditions and social realities of people's lives. It would have been callous to do so. That, in part, is why very few African friends understand the western church's hang up on social action and evangelism. It's a non-question for them. But in Generous Justice, Keller convincingly argues in a coherent, accessible and readable way why it should be non-question for us all. I sensed when we lived in Uganda, and I sense all the more strongly having read this book, that one mistake is to get lost in the intricacies of working out theoretical priorities (a necessary activity, of course). You start pitting this life against the next life and ... well ... it seems no contest.But suppose we take the concern for justice out of the mission equation, just for a moment (don't panic - I do think that it is an integral part of what God is doing on earth, which is why we should be involved. But bear with me just for a moment.) Instead, place justice and poverty in matters of holiness and discipleship and suddenly the landscape changes. It's not then primarily a question of priorities. It's a question of godliness. We don't ask, `is it more important to be honest, humble or generous?' That would be ludicrous. We shouldn't expect to have to choose - we should strive after all three.So it is with seeking justice and loving the poor. And as that is God's heartbeat, so it should be ours. As Keller points out, it's fascinating that God introduces himself as "a father to the fatherless, a defender of widows' (Ps 68:4-5). This is one of the main things he does in the world. He identifies with the powerless, he takes up their cause." (p6) To be like God is to do the same thing - to care for what has been called the "quartet of the vulnerable" (the widows, orphans, immigrants and the poor cf. Zech 7:10-11). (p4)GRACE CHANGES EVERYTHINGThe thrust of this book's argument is that grace is the heart of everything. And so Keller returns to the well-worn but crucial paths on the dangerous road to Jericho. His earlier book  MINISTRIES OF MERCY PB  was subtitled the Call of the Jericho Road. And here he is very clear why we should:"Before you can give this neighbour-love [e.g. as the Samaritan does], you need to receive it. Only if you see that you have been saved graciously by someone who owes you the opposite will you go out into the world looking to help absolutely anyone in need." (p77)This is why the gospel of grace is absolutely pivotal - both for motivating and modelling an all-round holistic ministry, and for reminding us of our own deep needs and equality with those we serve and love.This book is not ivory-towered or remote. He cites plenty of examples from his own ministry and that of friends. Fans of  The Wire: Complete HBO Season 1-5 [DVD] [2002 ] will be thrilled to learn of a ministry in inner-city Baltimore being pioneered by a friend of Keller, for example. And he is deliberately and carefully non partisan politically - much of the time showing why both sides of the USA political debate are missing the big picture. But the reason is simple - the Bible's big picture on these issues is huge and all-encompassing (for more than any contemporary political creed or philosophy).So i can only hope and pray that this book has its desired effect - to galvanise the sluggish, to win over the sceptics, and to live out God's heartbeat of love for the poor and the vulnerable. MINISTRIES OF MERCY PBThe Reason for God: Belief in an Age of ScepticismMINISTRIES OF MERCY PBThe Wire: Complete HBO Season 1-5 [DVD] [2002

Timothy Keller is popularly known as the CS Lewis of the 21st Century. Anyone familiar with his books knows how easy to read his books are, and how enjoyable and enriching they are to digest. In his latest volume he tackles the idea of Christian Justice.He starts off his book by talking about why he wrote it. The reasons he gives are, firstly, that certain Christians have become too focused about their message and not focused on their actions enough. The second reason is to answer sceptics like Christopher Hitchens who describes the Abrahamic God as a moral monster.The first four chapters basically look at how the bible describes justice. It looks at how the bible as a whole defines justice (many quotes given along with historical interpretations), how the bible defines justice according to the Old Testament, whether this changes in the New Testament and finally to whom justice should apply (this is done by examining the Parable of the Good Samaritan).Chapters five and six, ask the question why we should do justice and how justice can be done in the broader sphere. The central focus on why we should do justice is the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and the salvation/atonement theology of Christ - or in laymen's terms - if God could love you and die for you then the least you can do is respond to his love by helping others. The question of how is a bit more complex. The central argument is that justice is not easy and requires a lot of work, there are no easy fixes. Keller offers 5 core points which must be addressed in order to help achieve universal justice (namely direct relief, individual development, community development, racial conciliation and social reform).Chapter seven is interesting. It basically argues that it is not ok to exclude a person's faith/beliefs from their public/political discourses/opinions. This is clearly a response to modern secularism. However, where it gets interesting is that he argues that it is also not good enough to simply quote scripture to people and say that that justifies your position. Going one step further, he even advocates getting churches out of politics. How he reunifies his thesis is to say that a person's faith is able to prompt them to interact with society and push justice (for e.g. Martin Luther King). In such instances the arguments given must be given in a secular nature (i.e. a non-believer would still be able to understand them). Nevertheless, the cause of your drive (your faith) should not be ignored either - after all, if you're a good Christian then acting justly is a sign of your faith. In this way evangelism and secular reform are both progressed, and therefore everyone goes home happy.Finally the eighth chapter is an argument that we can get a degree of peace and beauty by pursuing the biblical definition of justice. Keller concludes that it is actually beneficial to the whole community to respond to justice in this way. To prove his point he offers an example of where this has happened in a small community which attempted to follow it, and how doing so improved all their lives.Overall, I would have to say that I enjoyed the book. However, I've read practically every book that Timothy Keller has ever written and I must say that they are all excellent reads - this book is no exception. Once again Keller left me thinking about the way I conduct myself, and whether I am actually being faithful to myself. I thoroughly recommend this book, like Keller, to Atheists who don't trust the biblical concept of justice, and also to (and more importantly) to Christians who wish to evaluate their own concepts of justice and how to engage in political/social, reform/works.I'd also recommend Keller's other book - Counterfeit Gods - which is also an enjoyable and highly relevant read.

I can't recommend this book enough, honestly.As a pastor, I can say with confidence that every preacher, church leader should have a copy of this book!!!

There was a time in history when the world was not Christian, didn't really know what this Jewish sect was about, except that its teachings were about belief in a supreme God, grace in the face of brokenness and sin, and life transformation, accomplished at the cross in Jesus Christ. It was a silly set of beliefs and somehow, in a very unexpected way, these beliefs became the norm in important parts of eastern and western Europe, Northern Africa and parts of Asia, and eventually the Americas. These parts of the world, especially Europe and North America are now rejecting these beliefs in a meaningful way. After having adopted grace and forgiveness as important aspects of living in society, we have essentially rejected them as ways of being in communion with/in God. God? God who?A generation ago, the BBC asked CS Lewis to give a series of talks on the radio that had to do with the general question: Given that we are becoming a post-christian society, please explain what is christianity so that we may know more of what we are rejecting.Now, in Generous Justice, Tim Keller addresses the question of how, as Christians, we carry a heritage that may help us know how to live in and actively engage the culture which creates the contexts for Christian churches and christians in a context that actively rejects the beliefs of Christians, but not necessarily the values that are generated by Christian doctrine. In the west, we are in the post-christian society announced by so many over the last 100 years, including CS Lewis. How do we go about living in the West, when the foundations of our beliefs are marginalized?The book traces the history of Christians as regenerated people, who by gratefulness and transformation are inclined to serve in a broken world, to serve in spite of cost and to be outspoken in the face of injustice. There is a nice balance here, between acknowledging the brokenness of the world, yet its beauty, the sinfulness of man, yet his creation as an image bearer, the corruption of people on a social and individual level, yet the search for redeeming justice. In a very strong sense, one comes away with the desire for a justice that is stronger than anything the world even imagined, a desire that can only come from an encounter with grace and redemption. The final sentence is a summary of what it is to be Christian, to believe what no one believes and to walk along a path that will be costly, but that comes from and leads to Truth.Keller provides much breadth and balance in this discussion, and, in a very readable style, treads where many Christians dare not go, afraid of crossing obscure doctrinal boundaries. The freedom and the joy he evidently manifests in this work, in exploring Christian doctrine and non-christian ideas, are part of what makes this work important to read. A definite 5 star. With the hope for a sequel.

A basic biblical lesson is that Jesus came to offer forgiveness. Timothy Keller wrote Generous Justice to give light to another basic biblical lesson that people commonly ignore and overlook: When a person has a true encounter with forgiveness, she or he will "inevitably" long for justice. The better a person understands grace, the more acute this longing will be. Generous Justice hopes to make this clear. Christians can learn that justice for poor and marginalized is at the centre of scripture. People who are not Christians can see that the Bible, properly understood, directs people to be just rather than oppressive.Generous Justice is an excellent book and makes a significant contribution as I consider social justice. It helped to clarify some issues for me, while also raising issues that I hadn't considered before.Keller's clarity on the biblical definition of injustice is most helpful in how he defines his question. The Bible seemingly make it obvious that doing justice is expected of Christ-followers. While Keller does spend some time answering the question, "Should we do justice," he quickly assumes the affirmative. This allows him to ask more complicated questions, such as "How", "Why", and "Where". Despite answering these questions in a readable book, Keller provides thought provoking answers.It is also useful to consider Keller's concerns about the definition of justice relative to how we should use the word. While he provides a definition using The Bible - to make long-term sacrificial decisions that address the needs, concerns, and causes of marginalized people - he concedes that not everyone will agree with this definition, nor will everyone agree with what he uses as his source material for determining the definition. It is difficult to talk about "justice" because there are so many different definitions. Defining the word becomes even more problematic because it is a conversational trump card. Whoever uses the word first is typically the person who gets to set its definition for the conversation. Disagreeing with the definition is taking the side against justice. Most people do not want to be seen as unjust. I'm glad that Keller's response to this problem is not saying, "My definition is best." Instead, he challenges readers to acknowledge that discussing morality is necessary to discussing justice. This provides a launching point for the conversation, because we can debate about what our morality is, where it comes from, and how it leads to our understanding of justice.Generous Justice also gave me an entirely new thought to consider. When planning to do justice, the church needs to understand the difference between long-term, or "permanent" poverty, and a short period of poverty. While this sounds obvious, the implications are great. Doing justice in the face of long-term poverty and injustice will be different from doing justice in cases of temporary need. This helps readers to understand the complexity of poverty and to see that our response must be just as complex.Keller also provides a warning that I rarely think about. When discussing justice - particularly poverty - it is very easy to see poor people as always-innocent victims of oppression. Indeed, scripture often concludes that oppressing the innocent is wrong. However, by no means does The Bible indicate that poverty and virtue are synonymous. Nor does it show that a wealthy person is always a villain. Such caricatures are unhelpful when we do justice.