Case from Dripping Springs, Texas asks, "What does it mean that teachers will be judged with greater strictness?" (James 3:1) "When you say the teachers will be held more responsible than others for teaching what is fully biblical, what does that really mean in light of the fact that the believer is justified by faith alone?" Another way to ask it is, "What will be the ramifications for the Christian teacher who accidentally preaches some form of falsehood?" Let's get the text in front of us here.

It's James 3.1. "Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach," then the ESV translates, "will be judged with greater strictness." Literally, it's knowing that we will receive the greater judgment. So evidently, the implication is, if you teach and you stumble, because the next word says we all stumble in many ways, that is, you stumble in teaching either in some unholy way, you use language that's an unholy way, or you teach some error, then for you the judgment is going to be stricter.

Now what's going on there? I think the principles that are being assumed there go something like this. Number one, knowing what to do makes one accountable to do it. Romans 1.20. His invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since creation of the world in the things that have been made, so they are without excuse.

So the principle there is, well, you would have an excuse at the judgment day if the invisible attributes of God compelling you to worship were not known by you. So the principle behind the greater judgment or the judgment is you will be called a judge, judgment, because you knew what you should do, and the assumption is teachers, by teaching, are claiming to know what they ought to do, and therefore they have greater judgment if they fall short.

Here's principle number two, knowing more makes one more accountable. So the failure to speak wisely when we know more will receive a greater judgment. So this is Luke 12.47. The servant who knew his master's will but did not get ready or act according to his will will receive a severe beating, and the one who did not know did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating.

And here comes the principle. Everyone to whom much is given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much they will demand the more. So behind this statement about teaching being judged with greater judgment is teachers--I'm just thinking of myself here--I probably study the Bible more than any of my people.

So I'm being given much. I know much, I feel much, and I'm responsible to say much, and therefore the likelihood that I will not live up to this much or teach faithfully this much is very great, and therefore my judgment will be greater. That's principle number two. Now applied to teaching explicitly, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3, if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones--that's building on the foundation of Christ with good teaching--or he might build with wood, hay, and straw, each one's work will become manifest, for the day will disclose it, and it will be revealed by fire.

Fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. So the picture there is, teachers can build with wood, hay, and stubble, teachers can build with silver, gold, and precious stone, and the one will be burned up and the other will be preserved for his reward, and the more you know, the more you will be held accountable, and the more you blow it, given that knowledge, the more you will suffer loss.

Now those are the principles. What this person seems to be asking is, "Okay, I hear you saying that, but I thought we were justified by faith. I thought from work, though. You seem to be saying that judgment is according to some kind of works." And the answer to that is that justification by faith alone and judgment according to works are not contradictory.

They're both taught in the New Testament. Justification on the basis of faith alone means that we trust Christ alone, and God views us in our union with Christ through faith as having Christ's perfect righteousness, and thus accepts us into his just and holy favor, and then we are, according to Ephesians 8-10, saved for good works.

And the function of those good works is not to earn our acceptance or our eternal life, but to demonstrate our acceptance and our newness and our faith and our life that we have within us. I think, Tony, one of the best illustrations that I've seen in the Bible that I've ever come up with to help me distinguish between how works show that we're justified or born again or have true faith and how they produce it is the time when the two prostitutes came with the living baby to Solomon and said--both of them said, "This is my baby!

This is my baby!" We both had a baby, and one of them said, "She killed my baby, and then she stole my baby!" And, "I want my baby back!" And Solomon doesn't know which is the true mother here, and so he comes up with this wise statement. He says, "Okay, let's cut the baby in half, and each of you can have half the baby." And the true mother says, "Don't kill the baby!

She can have the baby!" And the other mother says, "That's fine." And Solomon says, "Okay, now we know who the mother is." Now, when that woman said, "Don't kill the baby," that didn't make her the mother. It just showed she was the mother. That's the difference between a work revealing our new birth and our justification and a work causing.

She didn't become the mother by saying, "This is my baby." She just proved she was the mother by saying, "This is my baby." So we have to go to the New Testament and let the judgment according to works stand. Romans 14, 12, "Each of us will give an account of himself to God." Second Corinthians 5, 10, "We must appear before the judgment seat of Christ so that each one may receive what is due for what he's done in the body, whether good or evil." Or Ephesians 6, 8, "Knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive back from the Lord." There's a correlation between the rewards that we will have in the age to come and the fruit of our faith here called good deeds.

And that doesn't mean that our justification or our acceptance is based upon our works. It simply means that these works are displaying our trust in God for our justification, and as displays, they are fitting us to have greater or lesser joy in the presence of God forever. Amen. Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for listening to this podcast.

Please email your questions to us at askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org. At DesiringGod.org you'll find thousands of other free resources from John Piper. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening.