NewCity Orlando Sermons

Psalm 37 | Justice

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In this installment of our Summer in the Psalms series, Pastor Benjamin Kandt reflects on Psalm 37:27–28, a passage that calls us to actively pursue goodness in a world marred by brokenness. Pastor Kandt unpacks how God's steadfast love for justice is not only a comfort but also a call—to live distinctively as His people. We are invited to turn from evil, do good, and trust that the Lord will not forsake His faithful ones.

This message reminds us that God's justice is not delayed, forgotten, or passive. Instead, it is deeply rooted in His character and woven into the lives of His saints. As we consider what it means to be preserved by God and to dwell forever in His care, we are challenged to embody righteousness in our ordinary decisions and relationships—confident that the Lord loves justice and never abandons His beloved.

Rev. Damein Schitter:

Hello everyone. This is Pastor Damian. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, orlando. At New City, we believe all of us need all of Jesus for all of life. For more resources, visit our website at newcityorlandocom. Thanks for listening.

Gina Fickett:

Please join me in praying the prayer of illumination. Please join me in praying the prayer of illumination. Heavenly Father, may your word be a lamp to our feet and a light to our path, through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen. Today's scripture reading is from Psalm 37, verses 27 and 28. Turn away from evil and do good, so shall you dwell forever, for the Lord loves justice. He will not forsake his saints. They are preserved forever. But the children of the wicked shall be cut off. This is God's word. Please be seated.

Benjamin Kandt:

I would like to believe in God. I simply can't. That's a line from Ta-Nehisi Coates' book which is entitled we Were Eight Years in Power, and the reason he gives why he can't believe in God is he says that when I was nine, some kid beat me up for amusement and when I came home crying to my father, he said fight that boy or fight me. He goes on to say at that moment my dad taught me that we live in a godless world and that there was no justice in the world except the justice we dish out with our own hands. Happy Father's Day. Welcome to Worship with New City. We're going to talk about justice today.

Benjamin Kandt:

Now, if that feels like that doesn't go hand in hand, consider this the Lord in Genesis 18, 19 says that he called Father Abraham. He chose him to teach his children to keep the way of the Lord by doing justice and righteousness. In other words, integral to being a father is teaching your children to do justice. This is actually deeply relevant from a biblical worldview. So what is justice? Well, thomas Aquinas famously defined justice as to render to each what each is due. To render to each what each is due. That's good. To expound that a little bit what justice is really. It's giving people what they are due, whether provision or protection or punishment, whether provision or protection or punishment Surrender to each what each is due. And so, listen, I want to do justice to justice, but I can't say everything there is to say this morning. So next week will be kind of a part two of sorts, but this morning, really, what I want to get at is that I personally feel a growing ache to do justice, to love mercy, to walk humbly with my God, and I want that for you too. But if you're anything like me, there's something that happens when you sense that a call to do justice, you sense that call, but then you also hear and feel that something's a little bit off in our society's calls for justice, and so you feel conflicted a little bit. And so what I want for you is I don't want you to give up on God's call to do justice just because there's probably some injustice in our secular society's calls to justice, tracking with that.

Benjamin Kandt:

And so my intent for the sermon is to contrast Psalm 37's biblical vision of justice with our cultural moment, secular social justice models. It's important for me because I don't want you to think that you're not able to do justice just because you disagree with what you see on your news feed. And so what that means is, as we look at Psalm 37, we're going to see that justice belongs to the Lord, that he loves it, he defines it and he will bring it about. And so, to that end, I have three points the motive of justice, the standard of justice and the goal of justice. If you have a Bible or a device or your worship guide, go ahead and get Psalm 37 in front of you. We're going to look closely at this text together this morning.

Benjamin Kandt:

I want to begin in Psalm 37, verse 27, where our scripture reading started this morning. This is what it says Psalm 37, 27. Turn away from evil and do good, so shall you dwell forever, for the Lord loves justice. So when we ask the question of the motive of justice, we're saying for what reason? What should be the motivating principle as we do justice? Well, I'm helped because Johannes Kepler, the 17th century astronomer, he wrote that in all of his science he was simply thinking God's thoughts after him. I love that language. That's a really great way to talk about the motive of disciples. We, as disciples of Jesus, we're simply trying to think God's thoughts after him, feel what God feels after him, what makes God mad and sad and glad. I want that to resonate in my own heart. But we also want to love what God loves and hate what God hates.

Benjamin Kandt:

And in Psalm 37, verse 28,. It says the Lord loves justice. Do you love justice? Do I Like? When you watch the news or scroll your feed, do you hear the cries for justice among your neighbors? Does it move you? This dates me a little bit, but the song that was a big deal when I became a follower of Jesus had a line in there which I loved which was break my heart for what breaks yours. But instead we often plug our ears to the cries of justice because it's too hard for our own hearts to bear. But the Lord loves justice.

Benjamin Kandt:

This matters deeply to God and so therefore it ought to matter deeply to us. But there is a limit to feeling God's feelings after him. Look with me at verse eight. It says this refrain from anger and forsake wrath. He can be wrathful at injustice, but you all refrain from anger and forsake wrath. He can be wrathful at injustice, but you all refrain from anger and forsake wrath. Fret not yourself. It tends only to evil. Let me make that plain you can be unjust in your pursuit of justice.

Benjamin Kandt:

The motive of secular social justice is often vengeance, bitterness, resentment and rage, but this text says that that tends only to evil. Instead, christians are to never avenge ourselves but leave it to the wrath of God. For it is written vengeance is mine. I shall repay, says the Lord. So how do you avoid vengeance in your pursuit of justice? What does that look like? Well, verse 5 puts it like this Commit your way to the Lord, trust in him and he will act. He will bring forth your righteousness as the light and your justice as the noonday On June 1st, rev Reynolds was up here teaching us that commit your way to the Lord means to roll your life onto him. So what does that mean? What does it actually look like in practice to roll your life unto the Lord when it comes to our pursuit of justice? Let me tell you a story about that.

Benjamin Kandt:

Martin Lloyd-Jones was a pastor in the 20th century in London and one time, during World War II, lloyd-jones was preaching at Westminster Chapel and as he was preaching, a bomb was dropped by the Nazi Air Force, the Luftwaffe, and it was dropped on a building across the street. But it was such an intense explosion that it caused dust from the ceiling to fall down on the congregation where he was praying. He was praying in that moment, so what did he do? He paused and then he just kept praying. Later, in another sermon, he said about this particular instance. He said I was never worried for a second about a man like Hitler. It was enough for me to read Psalm 37. That is so punk rock. I love that. We need preachers like that this day. Where are they? Listen, he was talking about verse 35. He says this I have seen a wicked, ruthless man spreading himself like a green laurel tree, but he passed away and behold, he was no more. Though I sought him, he could not be found. Where is Hitler now? Or Stalin, or Nero, or Herod, or Mao. Where are they now? Verse 36, quote behold, he was no more. You see, imagine what it would take for Nazis to be dropping bombs on your city and saying I was never afraid of Hitler because I read Psalm 37. What would that take? How did Martin Lloyd-Jones do that? How do we do that?

Benjamin Kandt:

Well, in psychology there's this concept called a mutual mind state. A mutual mind state is when you're like seeing your kids play and they fall and they skin their knees, and then they look at you to figure out if they should freak out or not. In that moment, what's happening is their mind is syncing up with your mind, and your mind, if it's calm, regulates their mind and makes it calm. Look at verse 13. It says this in our text the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he sees that his day is coming. Listen, if the Lord isn't worried about the future, neither should we. Now the Lord looks to the future. We want to feel his feelings after him. He's not fretting. Why are we? But here's the reality is that God looks to the future and laughs, not because evil is funny, but because it has an expiration date. And so we look at our father's face and we say you're not anxious, I'm not anxious Mutual mind state, but the ultimate freedom from anger, vengeance and anxiety is actually found somewhere else. It's found in the cross of Jesus Christ.

Benjamin Kandt:

I've been apprenticed under Rachel Denhollander in this way. She was a gymnast and, in 2018, was the first woman to publicly accuse Larry Nassar of his heinous abuse, if you know that story, which led to hundreds of other women to come forward and share their own stories. Now, after Denhollander did this, she actually wrote an article with her husband called Justice the Foundation of a Christian Approach to Abuse. You see, she's a Christian. I actually think she's in the PCA, our denomination, and she said she argues in this article. I would read it. It's great.

Benjamin Kandt:

She says the way forward really is through this classic doctrine of the substitutionary atonement of Jesus, which says that on the cross, jesus took the penalty for our sins so we could be forgiven. She's saying that's the way forward for justice for victims of abuse. I don't know if your mind went there. Hers did, because she's trained and deeply immersed in a biblical imagination.

Benjamin Kandt:

Now she gives four reasons why that's the case, why the cross of Christ can give both comfort and vindication for victims, and she says this? Number one the reason is because the cross means that God hates evil and the injustice of abuse. The cross says that. So then, a victim's sense of injustice and desire for vindication it's actually upheld at the cross. Injustice and unrighteousness are real and God hates them. That's what the cross of Christ says. But number two the cross shows us that forgiveness and justice can be friends, not enemies. You see, jesus bore the divine wrath against sin on the cross. So then, we are freed to forgive, because we know that every sin against you, every evil done against you, every injustice against you is either going to get what it deserves on the cross of Jesus Christ or in hell for an eternity. That means that justice and forgiveness can go together. They're not enemies, they're friends.

Benjamin Kandt:

Number three the cross redeems power dynamics. Think about the misuse of power in abuse. But the cross redeems it because the strong God becomes weak to strengthen weak sinners. You see, at the cross, the son of God sets aside his divine prerogatives and the strong becomes weak, so that at the cross, god can act for others, using his power to act for others to overcome evil, to uphold justice, to free the enslaved, to restore creation. God himself perfectly identifies with the victim on the cross of Jesus Christ.

Benjamin Kandt:

Fourth and finally, in her article she says the cross shows that both victim and perpetrator need forgiveness and justice, something often missing in secular social justice. Both oppressor and oppressed need forgiveness and justice. Both oppressor and oppressed need forgiveness and justice. You see, the cross actually helps Christians to refrain from viewing criminals and abusers as the other and as fundamentally different from ourselves, because we know the seeds of every sin dwell in every human heart. Den Hollander actually put this theology to work in the courtroom when she looked at her abuser in the eyes and she said quote I pray you experience the soul-crushing weight of guilt so that you may someday experience true repentance and true forgiveness from God, which you need far more than forgiveness from me, though I extend that to you as well. More than forgiveness from me, though I extend that to you as well. Where did she learn to do justice like this? Well, she learned it from the only true standard of justice, which is the point two, the standard of justice. Look at verse 27 with me again. It says this turn away from evil and do good, so shall you dwell forever. What is good and evil? Who has that knowledge.

Benjamin Kandt:

We all know that there is right and wrong, but we disagree where it comes from. If we've evolved, then where do we get this sense of justice? Vladimir Soloyev says it like this. Vladimir Soloyev says it like this man descended from apes. Therefore, let us love one another. Do you hear the silliness of that? We laugh, but that's what we're being told. Why is it wrong to be violent, arrogant or oppressive? If we live in a world ruled by the survival of the fittest, where the strong eat the weak, then why do we feel outraged when people use power to oppress others? Why? Who are you to tell me what's right and wrong for me? Where do you get this idea of fairness or justice, of rights, if there is no God? You see, secular social justice cannot give what it offers. Let me just give you one example as a case study. The best-selling author, yuval Noah Harari, says it like this in an interview with NPR. The title of the interview is this why did humans become the most successful species on earth? This is what he says.

Benjamin Kandt:

Quote most legal systems today in the world are based on a belief in human rights. But what are human rights? Take a human being, cut him open, look inside you'll find a heart, kidneys, neurons, hormones, dna, but you won't find any rights. The only place you find rights is in the stories that we have invented and spread around over the last few centuries. They may be very good stories, but they're still just fictional stories that we've invented. Did you catch that? Without God, human rights are a fiction that we've invented. Dostoevsky puts it like this if God doesn't exist, everything is permitted. If all moral values are relative and social constructs, then how can you make the case that we all ought to treat others with love and not exploit them? You cannot, if you'd rather.

Benjamin Kandt:

Another philosopher, homer Simpson. He says the truth is more of a hunch that you're willing to die for. That's the basis of secular social justice a hunch that you're willing to die for, because rights don't exist. You can't cut a human open and find them there. They're just in the fictional stories that we tell.

Benjamin Kandt:

Listen, since Genesis 3, human beings have been grasping for what's called the knowledge of good and evil. In other words, secular social justice is built on this right to determine good and evil for ourselves. But here's the problem Resistance to submit to God's definition of good and evil is itself the source of all evil and injustice in the world. So what is the standard of justice? Look with me at verse 30. It says this the mouth of the righteous utters wisdom and his tongue speaks justice. The law of his God is in his heart. His steps do not slip. Jesus taught us that out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. So how do we quote speak justice, verse 30? Well, we need the law of God in our heart, verse 31. You see, we need a transcendent moral reference point of good and evil.

Benjamin Kandt:

Francis Schaeffer said if there is no absolute by which to judge society, society is absolute. One of the questions I ask when I'm talking to people about the Christian faith and moral relativism is hey, do you think the Nuremberg trials were a good idea? That's when Nazis were judged for their crimes against humanity by non-German cultures. If everything's relativistic, how can one culture impose its values on another culture? How can one culture impose its values on another culture? That's the principle of multiculturalism. It doesn't work. If there's no transcendent reference point by which all cultures can be judged, then right and wrong is just whatever the society discerns it to be.

Benjamin Kandt:

Here's the thing. I think we don't want a standard outside of ourselves, because if there was one, we would realize we haven't lived up to it. It's like that moment when you're driving in the car and you realize that you're speeding in a school zone and you do that little panic move, maybe slam on the brakes real quick. That's what all of us experience existentially, if there's a transcendent moral absolute outside of ourselves by which we all must be judged. Now, some of you might not agree with that. I understand it, that's okay. But I just want you to consider that maybe you haven't even lived up to your own standards of justice.

Benjamin Kandt:

There's this illustration about if you had let's just imagine your whole life. You were born and you had a voice recorder hanging around your neck and every time you made a moral judgment by which you bound someone else she shouldn't do that, he should really do this it just clicked on and started recording your own voice. And then you die and on that great day when you stand before God as your judge, all he does is says can I see your voice recorder? And he simply presses, play and plays back every one of your own moral judgments, every time you bound somebody else by what they should or shouldn't do. And then he just looked at you and pointed at it. How would you fare in that moment? How do you feel right now? That's our own standard of justice, not even God's standard of justice, which is much higher, much more exacting, much more pervasive in its assessment of our existence.

Benjamin Kandt:

In our call to worship in Romans 3, it put this forward that Christianity believes that before God, every mouth will be stopped and the whole world will be held accountable to God. That day is coming. But listen, that day is not only just, it's actually humane. It's humane because what it means is that there is no elitism before God, and if there's no moral elitism before God, then there ought not be any before man. In other words, male and female, black and white, rich and poor, gay and straight, oppressor and oppressed, all stand before God as lawbreakers in need of his mercy. You know that you've received this just mercy because it will make you merciful in your pursuit of justice. Augustine of Hippo says it like this there is no saint without a past and no sinner without a future. Let's look at that future together when we look at the goal of justice. This is where we'll close. Look at verse 27 with me Turn away from evil and do good, so shall you dwell forever, for the Lord loves justice. He will not forsake his saints. They are preserved forever. But the children of the wicked shall be cut off.

Benjamin Kandt:

Where is justice headed? This is a good question to ask your not yet disciple friends and neighbors. You ask them a question, something like if your religion or your ideology was perfectly attained, what would that look like? What's the end game? That's the question we ask when we talk about the aim of justice, the goal of justice. Now, secular social justice can't agree on this, because for libertarians, justice means individual freedom. For progressives, justice means fairness for all. For utilitarians, it's maximum happiness for the maximum amount of people. For postmoderns, it's subversing oppressive power. Who's right, you see, for followers of Jesus, justice is heading somewhere far more beautiful than any of those, because it's not about a utopia that we build, it's about a kingdom that we inherit.

Benjamin Kandt:

Look at verse 28. It says this the Lord loves justice. He will not forsake his saints, his saints. They are preserved forever. Because biblical justice believes that the goal of justice is actually the glory of God and the healing of all things under his reign. That's the goal we're after. That's the aim, the end, the telos of justice for followers of Jesus, and the Bible gives us a picture of that in that future in Revelation 7-9. It says this there's a great multitude that no one could number, from every tribe, every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands and crying out with a loud voice. Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the lamb. This is where biblical justice is going Not merely peace, not only equity, but a multi-ethnic, multilingual, united people, forever reconciled around the throne of God Almighty. That's the end, the goal of justice.

Benjamin Kandt:

So I want to pause here for a moment. I want to speak to our brothers and sisters of color in this room. I simply just want to say I see you, I'm so thankful for you. I want to name that because I think that there's a cost, an unseen cost, that you pay to be a part of a church that's majority dominant culture. But you pay that cost and the rest of us are so grateful and we bless you, we honor you for being in our midst.

Benjamin Kandt:

But why would I say that? Do I say that because you know, right now, diversity is in vogue in our culture? No, because if you study history, you realize that cultural values are fickle and flimsy like anything else. I mean, just consider how many DEI departments were developed and ditched in the last five years. No, I say that I can say that with joy, because Revelation 7-9 is what we're going for, it's the aim of our existence, all of human history is heading in that same direction and I want New City to get in on it.

Benjamin Kandt:

A multi-ethnic, multilingual, united around the throne of God, people of God that are worshiping, saying salvation belongs to the Lord. I want us to get in on this and so we can celebrate whatever diversity we have in our midst, because, as one scholar says it, the church does not merely have some kind of relationship to social justice, but rather the church is God's social justice, right here in our midst. We are the people, what Martin Luther King Jr called the beloved community, the people who one day will cause mankind to say surely there is a God who judges on earth. Psalm 58, verse 11. So it's no accident that MLK also said that the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice. He believed that deeply, and because he believed in a God who judges the earth and makes all things new. That's why three times in Psalm 37, it says for us, to quote wait for the Lord. Now, that's not a passivity, that's not an inaction. It's rooted in a confidence that we can act because God will act in our pursuit of justice. Now, contrast that, because for secular social justice there is no moral arc to the universe. If it in any way bends towards justice, it's because we must bend it with enough force from ourselves. That's why secular social justice is so militant and unforgiving and belligerent and self-righteous and hypocritical, because it is imminent justice.

Benjamin Kandt:

Ta-nehisi Coates said it like this there was no justice in the world except the justice we dish out with our own hands. Now let me affirm something here. We all share a longing for justice, all of us. But Christians believe in a transcendent justice that will roll down like waters, because we believe, as we're going to confess in a little bit here, we believe that one day Jesus will come to judge the living and the dead. We believe Psalm 37, verse 37, there is a future for the man of peace, but transgressors shall be altogether destroyed. The future of the wicked shall be cut off. What do we do with the coming judgment of God. You can't read this psalm without finding it Verse 9, 10, 20, 22, 28, 34, 38. It is all over the Bible.

Benjamin Kandt:

The idea that God will not judge evil could only be invented in the secure suburbs buffered from the realities of human evil. John Stott says it like this God's judgment is his steady, unrelenting, unremitting, uncompromising antagonism to evil in all its forms and manifestations. Only God's judgment can do justice to our cry for justice. Someone else said it like this faced with a world of rebellion, a world full of exploitation and wickedness, a good God must be a God of judgment. A God who would not judge, a God who is not angry at injustice, would not be worthy of our worship, because that God would not be good. But if God judges evil, where does God stop Systemic injustice? What about personal evils? What about envy, bitterness, lying lust, gossip, greed? Where does God stop For the self-aware among us? We realize that if God judges evil, god must judge me, and that gives us a sense of fear of the Lord.

Benjamin Kandt:

But in that moment I want to go back to what MLK said. Does that mean that the beloved community is just better than everybody else? No, we're simply those who have stopped running from God and started running to God. This is verse 39. The salvation of the righteous is from their own doing. It's not what it says. The salvation of the righteous is because they're a little bit better than their neighbors. No, the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord. He is their stronghold in the time of trouble. He is their stronghold in the time of trouble and with God as our stronghold, we wait patiently, expectantly for justice to roll down like waters. Let me give you a picture, as we close here, of what that might look like.

Benjamin Kandt:

On January 1st 1863, abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all slaves free in the United States of America. But in Galveston, texas, slaves wouldn't hear this news until June 19th 1865, over two years later, when Union General Gordon Granger arrived and he read General Order no 3, which says, quote all slaves are free. We call that Juneteenth and it's actually coming up this Thursday. We'll celebrate it nationally. It's a holiday. It's worthy of marking and honoring and celebrating, and so what happens here is that freedom had been won, but it took time for the news to spread. That's the moment that we live in now.

Benjamin Kandt:

We live here and now, where Jesus has already won. He has defeated all of the sources of injustice. On the cross and in his resurrection, jesus has suffered more injustice than any human in the history of humanity. But Jesus will also bring the sword of justice on every human in the history of humanity, except for those who flee to him as their stronghold. So God could be both just and the justifier of all who have faith in Jesus. But listen, the good news of that victory is still making its way into every corner of this world and into every corner of our hearts. We're living right now between proclamation and fulfillment, between the cross and the crown.

Benjamin Kandt:

And so what do we do? What do we do in the tension of the times that we live in? Psalm 37 says it like this we turn away from evil and we do good. We commit our way to the Lord. We trust in him and he will act. He will bring forth our righteousness as the light and our justice as the noonday. We live now in light of the king who will bring justice and healing in his wings.

Benjamin Kandt:

Let's pray, king Jesus. We look to you now because you alone are worthy. You alone hold together all of the cries for justice from all creatures on planet earth, you yourself being the victim of the greatest injustice that's ever happened that the perfect, spotless, innocent son of God was slain and murdered on a cross because of an unjust trial. But you did it for us and for our salvation, and so we look to you with hope. Give us your spirit of justice to enable us to lead us, to give us the motive according to the standard and towards the goal that you have for justice in your world. We pray this in your name, Jesus. Amen.