Psalms 50:4

50:4 He summons the heavens above,

as well as the earth, so that he might judge his people. ¹ 

Psalms 50:6

50:6 The heavens declare his fairness, ² 

for God is judge. ³  (Selah)

Luke 7:29

7:29 (Now ⁴  all the people who heard this, even the tax collectors, ⁵  acknowledged ⁶  God’s justice, because they had been baptized ⁷  with John’s baptism.

Romans 3:4

3:4 Absolutely not! Let God be proven true, and every human being ⁸  shown up as a liar, ⁹  just as it is written: “so that you will be justified ¹⁰  in your words and will prevail when you are judged.” ¹¹ 

¹ tn Or perhaps “to testify against his people.”

² tn Or “justice.”

³ tn Or “for God, he is about to judge.” The participle may be taken as substantival (as in the translation above) or as a predicate (indicating imminent future action in this context).

⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “now” to indicate the parenthetical nature of the comment by the author.

⁵ sn See the note on tax collectors in 3:12.

⁶ tn Or “vindicated God”; Grk “justified God.” This could be expanded to “vindicated and responded to God.” The point is that God’s goodness and grace as evidenced in the invitation to John was justified and responded to by the group one might least expect, tax collector and sinners. They had more spiritual sensitivity than others. The contrastive response is clear from v. 30.

⁷ tn The participle βαπτισθέντες (baptisqente") has been translated as a causal adverbial participle.

⁸ tn Grk “every man”; but ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") is used in a generic sense here to stress humanity rather than masculinity.

⁹ tn Grk “Let God be true, and every man a liar.” The words “proven” and “shown up” are supplied in the translation to clarify the meaning.

¹⁰ tn Grk “might be justified,” a subjunctive verb, but in this type of clause it carries the same sense as the future indicative verb in the latter part. “Will” is more idiomatic in contemporary English.

¹¹ tn Or “prevail when you judge.” A quotation from Ps 51:4.