John Piper and Tim Keller Wrestle with Sanctification

thank you Tim for taking whatever time we can squeeze in here we're at the uh Redeemer Offices here in New York uh I don't think I've been here on this floor anyway before so thank you we're going to do some other things together tonight but right now we want to talk about sanctification and Holiness MH and uh it's in the air especially as it relates to gospel and motivation yes so um how do you like to talk about it I going to just give you a free menu right here to just say when when you

consider sanctification and Holiness what's a helpful way to talk about it what is it why is it important well uh you know you would usually say that uh I I I absolutely believe in what the reformed people call the third use of the law that now that I'm a Christian and I've been saved by the gospel um I'm still obligated to obey the law but the law demands both inner Holiness uh inner change as well as external uh righteousness and behavior and I say what what the gospel does is it gives me especially a new

uh uh profoundly new motives uh that before I understood the gospel I might have tried to be moral and virtuous but uh I think what Edwards would say in nature true virtue is that you it's basically selfish it's essentially um I'm I may be obeying God but I'm obeying for myself and I'm actually not obeying for God's sake I'm obeying for my sake because I want to get something um uh that's radically different once you understand the gospel my motivations now aren't fear um they're uh Delight desire to Delight him and please him um that

means I'm not I'm I'm essentially uh I have essentially positive motivations to do it it means my obedience will be more unconditional because I won't be looking so much at uh what am I getting out of it right now I'm doing it just to please the one who saved me and and to honor the one whose uh character I aspire to uh to imitate um I think uh Walder Marshall's gospel mystery of sanctification is says it this way that you need the Comforts of the Gospel in order to fulfill the law so that's pretty much

what I would say too yeah so when you talk about third use of the law uh or Holiness external righteousness internal uh purity of Heart Right motives right what what is it out here that we're conforming to it's surely not the the legal codes of the Old Testament when you when you say law yeah right the New Testament talks about the law of Christ right um so what are you sending you there might be a little difference between us that I mean part the Presbyterians sometimes over don't make the distinction like they should but the

uh generally it's the the difference the Mosaic law had the ceremonial law involved which we do believe was fulfilled in Christ not so much it was abated but that Christ is fulfilling it I Believe In Christ now I don't need to go through the Washings and I'm I'm clean in him so in that sense it's it's been fulfilled in Christ the the the moral nub of the law which is restated in in the New Testament as the law of Christ is continuous with the Old Testament Ten Commandments and that's still binding on us but um

and I've just been reading through Calvin on this in his institutes he says every one of the Ten Commandments he believes actually also enjoins an inner an inner heart attitude as well so Thou shalt not kill does mean love your neighbor and so there that's the reason why he would say to obey the law means to look for an inner change in my heart as well right right so we love the doctrine of justification we do which is God's imputing an alien righteousness to us right through faith alone faith alone yes and then the Westminster

standards say the faith that justifies is never alone but is always accompanied by all its Graces yes so what's in in your mind um how how how is justification imperative different from sanctification imperative are they both necessary for final salvation and if so are they necessary in the same way I mean I think a lot of people stumble over yeah okay I understand I'm a I'm a sinner I need forgiveness I'm a sinner I need uh righteousness imputed to me okay I believe I trust and then this preacher stands up Piper or whoever and he

says there's a Holiness without which you won't see the Lord now I take that passage to mean there are behaviors and attitudes that if you persist in you go to hell um and they say I thought I was justified by faith so what what what do you respond to a person like that I go back to what you just said you're saved by faith alone but not by a faith which remains alone I think it's I as a pastor I think I've been able to clarify this for people when I say You're really saved by

faith not by how Sanctified you are but if you're not getting Sanctified then you don't have saving Faith okay saving faith will issue in it and so um the you might say sanctification is are the signs of salvation but not the cause again uh recently been rereading Walder Marshall this and he says he says there is a danger of saying you're justified by faith but you're Sanctified by works and to teach it in such a way that people essentially feel like I'm saved meaning my sins are forgiven but now it's up to me to live

a good life right which is almost half a justification it's like my sins were put on Christ but now in some way I have to weave a righteousness I'm I'm given a chance to start over and I do think a awful lot of simple Christians do think of justification like that it's it's just the pardon and now sanctification is what I do to keep God happy with me and I think we have to say no your your justification doesn't mean imputed righteousness sanctification is a sign that you got the saving faith I think that's how

I've been doing it and and and to use the words of James it's a sign because if your faith isn't producing a change isn't producing love it's not real right would and that would be Galatians 56 neither circumcision or uncircumcision counts for anything but Faith working through love so can you get at the the psychological dynamics of how that works Faith working through love yeah let's actually um let's spend time on that that's very important so what I'm about to tell you I don't believe gets to the bottom of it but uh some years ago

I remember talking to a woman who wasn't a Believer yet uh this is only one this is only one part of the answer she wasn't a Believer yet but she was just coming to grips with the idea I'm saved by grace and faith not by my works and she said I used to go to church years ago and when I came up in that church I never heard that you were saved by grace and faith I always heard you were saved by being a good person she says why haven't I heard this why don't more

churches teach it and fortunately by some wonderful Providence you most ministers obviously we immediately were so happy to have a question because we can hold forth but for some reason I said well why do you think and she says well it's this is scary I said what and he says if you're saved by works there's a limit to what God can ask of you um you're like a taxpayer you've paid your taxes you paid your dues and he could ask certain things of you but not anything but if I'm really saved by grace because of

what Jesus has done there's no limit to what he could ask of me and my obedience would have to be unconditional and I looked at her and I said you realize that most people when they first hear that you're saved by grace alone and not by works think well this is great that means I can live any way I want mhm but see for her she was already by the way she probably was saved at that point I look back I think she just hadn't professed the faith yet because she understood the gospel so well

um and she said she said psychologically if you realize that you've been saved by grace it means I owe him everything which of course you're not your own you're bought with a price and see that's one psychological thing that has to happen if you're looking at your justification you're looking at your free justification and costly to God MH okay and immediately says I I don't have the right to make these calls I've got to do what the Lord says I mean that's one and that's it's motivated by Joy it's not like oh I got to

obey okay let me press on that you said we owe him everything so now I've I've used I've used the phrase the debtor's ethic as a bad thing I know and I've heard you say I mean I didn't hear you say but somebody told me you said I'm not sure I know what Piper means when he when he when he says that and so right here is where I I heard a little glimmer now I'm sure I know you well enough to say you're not you're not a deor ethic guy but a person could take

that phrase I owe him everything and now okay in the past all yeah exactly you're right it needs clarification uh uh there's a place in in in the institutes which I read two nights ago I've been reading them at night where Calvin said because we're so blind that we we should obey God just because of the beauty of the good you'd like that term but because we because we're so blind God actually has to give us um rewards and punishments and um he then says by the way this is book two chapter 7 he says

we actually are debtors to his majesty now here he's talking about the fact that we just owe him everything he says and he says the payment of a debt deserves no reward therefore we actually should he shouldn't have to say if you obey me I'll bless you and do things uh and yet he gets up his right now see he uses the term debt there and you got to take a look at that at some point uh and he doesn't say debt to his grace debt or to Grace he says debt to his majesty but

then he says God he says we shouldn't be we should just be doing it out of the out of the beauty of who he is and what he is uh as a as a in the gospel I see the beauty of what he's done for me which is his love and sacrifice in just as his creator I see the beauty of his Holiness and that should be what I mean when I say owe him it means he deserves it I I want to say he he deserves it because of the Beauty and the greatness of

who he is now the trouble with the O thing I agree is it looks like he's done something and I have to pay him back rather than say um great music deserves praise uh a noble deed uh just attracts and evokes praise yeah and that's what I'm trying to get at so right right um two things are in my mind jusn for which one should come out next one is to to clarify how to help people not go the wrong route of o yeah and and the other is to to lean on what you mean

when you say um it's it's debed to his majesty or it's just uh sheer um Fitness to to respond a certain way to Beauty that's Edward's language it's Fitness otherwise you're not seeing let me go the first one and if I remember I'll come back to the next one I like Fitness better than debt by the way yeah now that you mentioned um so the when when when Paul says um by the grace of God I am what I am and his grace toward me was not in vain but I worked okay now that's what

I want I think that's Holiness there I did good things I I did the right thing I Min I worked harder than any of them and then he says nevertheless it was not I but the grace of God that was with me now the way I picture that is Paul received Grace by the grace of God I am what I am so Grace has come into his life it's awakened a new person has given him these desires and now as he contemplates how shall I respond he says I'm going to work my tail off for

Jesus right and then and then he says but it wasn't me working my tail of see so as far as debt goes goes like this so he says I'm going to take a step for Jesus and and then he says I took that step by the grace of Jesus it wasn't I but and so every step you take in obedience to Jesus you're going deeper in debt yeah so that's right so being a debor to Grace I think is just a wonderful phrase as long as you don't ever think it's payack because you can forever

I think forever and ever we go deeper and I also think that when you say de or De Grace it does get across some idea that he's done all this for me I I just it now is fitting for me to live for him that's what this woman was saying that I I have to take the conditions off because he's done everything for me now I owe him everything uh but then there has to be another shoe that drops otherwise it's it's repayment I agree and I actually like the idea it's unfitting um it's unfitting

for someone to for me to receive something from someone else and then not respond in a fitting way right but Fitness I think with the average person just doesn't go down just they're they're not an aesthetically driven person like well you know yeah praise fits I that's what Psalm Psalm 33 well there's a place in Psalm 33 when it talks about um praise him with skillful songs it's fitting praise fits him totally agree