Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - A King’s Wisdom – Solomon

Episode Date: October 11, 2023

If you don’t yet, you will soon sense an acute need for wisdom. You’ll take a job you never should’ve taken, hire somebody you never should’ve hired, date somebody you never should’ve dated. Often, the older you get, the more you worry. Because the older you get, the more you see how important wisdom is, how difficult it is to gain, and how your life absolutely blows up when you make choices without it. Many centuries ago, Solomon became king of Israel at the age of 20. When he did, he got wisdom, and he exercised wisdom in a way that can teach us a great deal about how we can get it ourselves.  If we take a look at this narrative, we’ll see 1) the need for wisdom, 2) the anatomy of wisdom, and 3) the essential principle of wisdom that runs all the way through it—the heart of wisdom. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on October 5, 1997. Series: Pointers to Christ – Directional Signs in History. Scripture: 1 Kings 3:16-28. Today's podcast is brought to you by Gospel in Life, the site for all sermons, books, study guides and resources from Timothy Keller and Redeemer Presbyterian Church. If you've enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to support the ongoing efforts of this ministry, you can do so by visiting https://gospelinlife.com/give and making a one-time or recurring donation.

Welcome to Gospel in life. Throughout the Bible, there are signs that point us to the Gospel. Today, Tim Keller is looking at how we can discover them and what they teach us. First Kings 3, 16-28. Now, two prostitutes came to the King and stood before him. One of them said, My Lord, this woman and I live in the same house. I had a baby while she was there with me. The third day after my child was born, this woman also had a baby.

We were alone. There was no one in the house but the two of us. During the night, this woman's son died because she lay on him. So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son for my side while I, your servant, was asleep. She put him in by her breast and put her dead son by my breast.

And the next morning, I got up to nurse my son, and he was dead. But when I looked at him closely in the morning light, I saw that it wasn't the sun, I had born. The other woman said, no, the living one is my son, the dead one is yours. But the first insisted, no, the dead one is yours, the living one is mine. And they argued before the king. And the king said, this one says, my son is alive, your son is dead. While that one says, no, your son is dead and mine is alive, then the king said, this one says, my son is alive, your son is dead. While that one says, no, your son is dead.

And mine is alive, then the king said, bring me a sword. So they brought a sword for the king, and he gave an order. Cut the living child into, and give half to one and half to the other. The woman whose son was alive was filled with compassion for her son and said to the king, please, my Lord.

Give her the living baby. Don't kill him. But the other said, neither I nor you shall have him cut him into, and then the king gave this ruling. Give the living baby to the first woman. Do not kill him. She is his mother. And when all is real heard the verdict, the king had given. They held the king and all because they saw that he had wisdom from God to administer justice. This is God's Word. Now, if you don't yet, you will soon sense an acute need for wisdom. If you haven't yet, you soon will take a job, you should never have taken, hire somebody, you never should have hired, date somebody, you never should have dated. That hasn't happened yet. And you see, there's

some Old Testament scholar that said that the definition of wisdom in the Bible is competence with regard to life's realities. Competence with regards to life's realities. Why does your life blow up when you date the wrong person? You never should have gotten involved. When you take the wrong job, you never should have taken this job. You overestimated this, you underestimated this, you didn't understand this. Why does your life blow up? Because you made a choice that

was not competent with regard to life's realities. And as time goes on, I understand by common sense and even by research, the older you get, the more you worry. And I don't know something about that. And even though I'm sure that that's a complex phenomenon, I know one of the reasons is this, the older you get, inevitably you come to see how important wisdom is, how difficult it is to gain and how your life absolutely blows up when you make choices without wisdom.

Now, there's a young man many centuries ago who at the age of 20 became king of Israel, Solomon. And when he did, he got wisdom and he exercised wisdom in a way that can teach us a great deal about how we can get it ourselves. And if we take a look at this narrative, we'll see we learn at least three things and we'll just go over them kind of briefly. It shows us the need for wisdom, what situations in which we need wisdom, then secondly it shows us the anatomy of wisdom, what

it's really made of, how it's structured, but then lastly it shows us the essential principle of wisdom that runs all the way through it, the essential principle of wisdom, the need for it, the anatomy of it, and the heart of it, the need for it. Now in some ways this illustration is what is an illustration. It's the only one of Solomon's cases that is given to us and it has two characteristics that tell us the kinds of situations in which wisdom is needed. The first characteristic is what? The choice. Two stood before him. And that's where you need wisdom. At Forks in the Road. You come along, should I marry? Should I not marry? Should this school, that school, this job, that job, this career, that career,

stay in New York or leave? Stick with the project or forget it. You come to Forks in the Road and listen, you realize that pretty much the people in this room, in Western civilization, Western culture today, there has never been a group of people more in need of wisdom because we have a hundred times more Forks in the Road than anyone ever has. You say, how could that be? Traditional culture made your mind up for you. I mean, in traditional cultures, somebody chose your wife or your husband. In traditional cultures, generally people told you what you had to do. What your

job was going to be when you grew up? What town you were going to live in? Well, your friends were going to be. If you tried to move to another town, they said, what are you doing over here? Your family is from that town. Get back there. What are you doing over here? We're not going to give you a job. You don't belong here. Go back.

There were not that many forks in the road. We have hundreds of forks, because all bets are off. Everything's wide open. There has never been a group of people that needed wisdom more than we do. You need wisdom when you come and two stand before. But maybe more key. The real problem situations in our life where we need wisdom are the places where the rules don't help us. See Solomon had this incredible case that required incredible wisdom because the rules didn't help him.

Why? Well, think of what the rules were for a judge. For example, if a man and a woman are arguing over whether they can raise a child, almost every society has told judges what the rules are. Societies decide whether a husband or wife would be a better sole parent. Now, these things change, you know. It was different 100 years ago than now. But the point is, if you're a judge, usually you have a rule for that. A man or a woman, and usually the judge is a rule.

And if the rule of society given to the court is usually let the mother raise the child, unless the mother is unusually hurting or broken in some way, then you'd follow the rule. But these are both women. Rules won't help. Okay, what if one was a middle-class woman, you know, educated, what, and what was, what, if one was a clearly dysfunctional, violent illiterate streetwalker? Well, in most situations, judges have rules, society give them rules. And in most societies, they would say,

so that the middle class one would be the one, who would be more likely to be able to give this child a good upbringing and so on, but they're both prostitutes. They're both in the very same spot. They're at the very bottom of the rung of the ladder. They're at the very outskirts of, they're socially marginalized, but they're the same. And usually courts have rules when it comes to things like corroborating evidence.

But you see in verse 18, it's very made very clear nobody else, nobody else could corroborate one woman or the other. Now, see, this is where you need wisdom, is it not? The problems in our lives are not those forks in the road where the rules can rule one out. Our problem is there's two people to get married to and both of them are according to the rules. I mean, the rules don't tell me. The rules don't tell me what career to take.

The rules don't tell me. Those are the places where we need wisdom. Wisdom is necessary when the rules don't help. There's a conversation I had with some regularity that I hate. Christian husband or wife comes to see me. I'm the minister. And they've discovered that their spouse has been unfaithful to them. They've had an affair, multiple affairs, and they sit down before me and they say, what does the rules of God, what do the law of God say, and what do I have to say to them? Should I leave my spouse, should I divorce my spouse, or should I stay?

And what I have to look at them and say is I have to say, you have a right to stay or to leave. The Bible doesn't say you have to stay, doesn't say you must stay. You have to decide for yourself whether you're going to restore the marriage or whether you're going to leave. Well, the person says, does that mean there's no right answer? Oh, no. Of course there's a right answer, I say.

Unfortunately, there's a wise answer and there's a foolish answer. And instead of relying on the rules, you're going to have to rely on your competence with regard to the realities of life. Do you know your own heart? Do you know your spouse's heart? Do you know the times and seasons? One decision is going to be the right one. One is going to be the wrong one. You'll know five years from now. You can't rely on the rules. You're going to have to rely on your

wisdom. I hate that conversation. But I don't hate that conversation anywhere near as much as the other person does. Wisdom. That's why people go crazy reading Proverbs, which is a book of wisdom, because Proverbs are not rules. If you go to Proverbs 26 verse 4 and 26 verse 5, in 26 verse 4, one Proverbs says, do not answer a full according to his folly, and the other says, answer a full according to his father back to back and you say, well, which is it? And the EC, is it right to take an unreasonable person and enter into the debate with them and try to refute them or is it better with an unreasonable person just to not just walk away and not get into any kind of discussion at all?

And what is the answer of the book of Proverbs? Sometimes it's disaster to do so and sometimes it's a disaster to not do so and you can't rely on the rules, you have to rely on your competence with regard to the realities of life. Almost everybody probably knows some words that you wish you could have taken, you could take back. Words that you said to somebody and they've ruined something. But do you know how many times the words that you wish you could take back did not break the rules? I'll give you three rules for words.

They have to be honest, they have to be fair, and they have to be well-intentioned. You know, you're not there just to hurt people. You're saying it sincerely, trying to be helpful. Honest, fair, and well-intentioned, but do you know, you can say things, and I have, that were, they were, they were, with the rules. They, they didn't break the rules. The rules didn't, where, didn't rule them out. And yet I never should have said them. I wish I could take them back. Why did I say them? I wasn't wise. I was incompetent. Wisdom is competence with regard to the reality of life when the rules don't help. There's never been a group of people in the face of the earth

that needed wisdom more than we do. Whatever you think the rules are, whether you think it's God's rules or whatever you think the rules are, you're going to come to these forks in the road, we're two are front of you, and they're both arguing, and they're saying the same things. And there's no way that you can figure it out by the rules and you're going to have to rely on your own insight. That's the need for wisdom. Do you have it?

How's your wisdom? How are you going to get it? Let's move on. Secondly, we learn here, not just of the need for wisdom, but we also learn something about the anatomy. I think I didn't use that term the first time did I? The anatomy of wisdom or the structure of wisdom. That's another way to go.

And here's the point. The king gets wisdom. Look at verse 28, it says, they held the king in awe because he had wisdom. In the Bible, kings have wisdom. People go to the kings because that's what they expect wisdom to be. Now here's a fundamental principle. We're going to have to take just a couple of minutes on it, but it's very, very important.

Whatever you hold most in awe in your life. Whatever your king is, whatever the ruling power is, whatever you are most under authority to, that is the source of your wisdom. Wisdom always, always emanates from the king. And if you have the true king, you'll have true wisdom. And if you have red king, you'll have red wisdom and green king, you'll have green wisdom

and purple king and purple wisdom because your wisdom is Completely determined the Lord is the beginning of wisdom your Lord is the beginning of wisdom. What is your Lord though? And What the Bible teaches is if any thing except Jesus Christ or the Lord Himself is the true King of your life The wisdom that your life is operating on is actually foolishness on its own terms. Let me show you what I mean. First of all, I don't have time to make much of a case for this.

If you go back into the Old Testament and the book of Proverbs, the Hebrew word most often used for wisdom is a word that actually means training. It means discipline and it means to come under authority. And in the Old Testament, there's no such thing as wisdom without coming under authority of something, serving something, and giving yourself to it religiously. There's a book, an ancient piece of Hebrew wisdom literature that's not in the Bible, but it's interesting and important.

And it's called the Wisdom of the Son of Syrac. And at the very end of the book, a man who found wisdom invites people to find wisdom. And here's what he says, he says, come to me, you who want wisdom, and lodge in my house of learning. Buy it for yourselves without money and bend your neck to the yoke. Be ready to accept discipline. See for yourselves the great rest and peace I have found. Now this is what the Bible says. Your wisdom is based on whatever you've bent the yoke, your neck to the yoke. Yoke always means control authority. What have you given yourself to religiously?

That is the source of your wisdom. Let me just show you quickly. What if you say, well, I'm a Buddhist, well, I'm a Jew, well, I'm a Christian, well, I'm an atheist, I'm not talking about what you profess. What is really the most important thing in your life? What is really the thing that you're yoked to? What is really the thing that, who's authority you're under? What is it that you feel like you've got to have? You must have, if it's money, for example. If the most important thing in your life is money,

there will be a wisdom that emanates from it. And here's what that wisdom will be. You will take a job, if you choose, here's a fork in the road, and here's a job that satisfies you, that fits your gifts, that's very fulfilling, but it makes $30,000 a year. And here's a job that isn't very fulfilling, that doesn't really fit your gifts,

but you can do it, and it's gonna make you $120,000 a year, and you'll do that. You made a choice. Both of them, you know, the rules'll do that. You made a choice. Both of them, the rules don't help, you made a choice. Why? Because of your priority, because of what's most important to you. But here's the thing. Any wisdom that emanates from any king but the true king is actually foolishness on

its own terms. Because here's what happens. If money is the most important thing in your life, you choose a job that isn't fulfilling to you and in the long run, you will become less productive, you will burn out faster, you know, have more money problems. I'll give you another example. If money is the most, is the ruling thing in your life, you'll make decisions sometimes to do ethically improper things. You'll cheat on your income tax, as you'll cut corners, which, as you know, in the long run, can destroy you financially, or if you're money's the most important thing, very often you'll take gambles. You'll come to Forks in the Road, and you'll take gambles, which, of course, could lead to financial disaster.

Let me give you another example, and then I'll try to summarize them. What if the most important thing in your life is parenthood? Is your children? And is your children. And if your children are happy, you're sort of living your life out through your children, you'll push them to do things that really don't fit them, but that will make you happy, and then they'll turn on you and hate you.

What if the most important thing in your life is work? Not money, but work. Your career, recognition, excellence and recognition. That seems so noble. Okay, much more noble than money. But I'll tell you what's gonna happen. If that's the most important thing,

when you come to these forks in the road, you will choose work over rest. You will choose work over family. You will choose work over relationships. And in the end, here's the great irony. If work is the most important thing in your life, the wisdom that emanates from that will be decisions that actually destroy and undermine your work. In the long run, when you choose work over rest, work over relationships. You know what ends up happening in the end? You become less productive. When you make your parenthood, the most important thing,

you will destroy your parenting. When you make money, the most important thing, you will wipe your money out. In front of Solomon, are two women, and Solomon in his brilliant move does something in order to figure out what's going on in their hearts. Instead, it was so interesting. Instead of he looking at them and just making a guess, he decides for them to reveal, he finds a way for them to reveal to him their wisdom,

the foundations of their life, what their yoke is. He takes out a sword and he's not going to kill the child. their wisdom, the foundations of their life, what their yoke is. He takes out a sword and he's not gonna kill the child. And the reason we know he's not gonna kill the child is because he's not surprised when their differentiated responses come up. They don't say, oh wait, wait, wait a minute here. Oh no. He's that, the sword is not the solution, it's the free spots of the solution. And here's the thing.

One woman shows that her motherhood is more important than the child. One woman shows a motherhood idolatry. One woman shows she is so unhappy with the idea that her rival would be a mother. She's quite happy to see the child killed. She doesn't care about the child. See, if parenthood is the most important thing in your life, you don't really care about your children. You're caring about yourself.

If your career and success is really the most important thing in your life, you don't really care about the work. You're caring about yourself. And that's the reason why you will always be led into foolishness and her foolishness. When she says, let him die, then neither of us will have him. That's foolish, of course. Anybody hearing that, right away would know.

That's not the mother. I mean, you know, and therefore what's going on? She's a fool, but why is she a fool? Why does she make that foolish remark? Because motherhood is her yoke, it's a fool, but why is she a fool? Why does she make that fool of her mark? Because motherhood is her yoke, it's her authority, and in- and see, in reaching for it, in doing anything she could to get it. And being jealous and angry at the people around who

might have it instead of her, she felt. One of the biggest obstacles for people to believe in Christianity is that they think they already know all about it. But if we look at Jesus' encounters with various people during his life, we'll find some of our assumptions challenged. We see him meeting people at the point of their big unspoken questions. The Gospels are full of encounters that made a profound impact on those who spoke with Jesus. And in his book Encounters with Jesus, Tim Keller explores how these encounters can still

address our questions and doubts today. Encounters with Jesus is our thanks for your gift to help Gospel in life reach more people with the amazing love of Christ. Request your copy of Encounters with Jesus today when you give at gospelonlife.com slash give. That's gospelonlife.com slash give. Now here's Tim Keller with the remainder of today's teaching. Reaching She fell, but thirdly, now we said, we saw the need for wisdom, we now see the structure of wisdom.

The structure of wisdom is whatever your king is, whatever the yolk is, whatever you've given yourself to religiously, and everybody has, will be the thing from which all your wisdom derives, and it will be in the end foolishness, it will be foolishness on its own merits, in its own terms. In other words, you will lose the very thing you most want, because fundamentally, no king, but the true king really is the king, and therefore you are out of touch with the realities of life. You are out of touch with the warp and move of what life is really like. But in front of the king Solomon, this by the way, you know how brilliant this is. I've got to say this even other time is running.

Somebody once said to me, well, what if the first woman sincerely is wrong? You know, what if she woke up and she looked and she really thought it wasn't her child when it really was. And she's telling the truth and she's all excited, but what if she was really wrong? The brilliance of this is that Solomon can see that any woman that would say, kill it, just to get back at some other woman, even if that was her child, she's not competent to raise it. It's absolutely brilliant.

But the brilliance is that Solomon, by this move, reveals the world's wisdom and true godly wisdom. Because the first woman shows us the essence of true wisdom, the secret of the universe, the secret of salvation. If you grab hold of this, this is the meaning of everything. The world's wisdom in the second woman is she reached for something and lost it. Godly wisdom was this first woman, she gave something away and gained it. Because the essence of true wisdom is, the way up is down. The way to find your life is to lose your life. The way to get power, real power you can't lose is to submit. The way to get freedom,

real freedom that you can't lose is to serve. The way to get rich, real riches that you can't lose is to give away. The astounding thing about this woman was she gave away her motherhood so that her child could have joy. She gave away all of her joy, she gave all of her hope so her child could have it. And ironically, what did she get? As she gave it away, she not only got the motherhood back, but she got it back safe and purified. She got back a motherhood that now she's going to conduct well. If that second woman had gotten the motherhood, it would have been an absolute tyranny in her life and the child's life. This is a deep structure of wisdom and if this is the meaning of your life and I'm

going to show you the meaning of the universe, how do I say? First of all, it's the meaning of your life. Every problem that I have, every problem that you have has to do with this. The most important thing in Abraham's life was Isaac. God comes and says, what? He takes a sword and he puts a sword. He puts a sword over the darling. And if Abraham says, oh, I've got to do, is act like I'm giving Isaac away, then I'll get him back.

Then that's not giving him up at all. Until he gave Isaac up, Isaac wasn't safe for him. Isaac was the ruling yolk in his life and as a result, he's gonna make all those mistakes that anybody makes who makes parrothood, the God. The foolishness that would be in his life, you see all that. And in every single instance, in every single situation, this is the decision that you and I have got to make. We've got to find ways of giving up things

and of being willing to say, I see a sword. See, Solomon, that woman is us. That woman is showing us how we're supposed to react. Sometimes, there's a sword over the things that are most dear to us, and we say, how in the world could God be doing that? But instead of looking at what she does, first of all, she doesn't panic, she's poised. Do you notice that?

She doesn't say what I think the normal mother would say, which is, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, she doesn't, what she says, please my Lord, give her the living baby, don't kill, there's poise, number one, number two, there is no resentment, there's no bitterness, there's no bitterness toward the woman or even toward the king, and thirdly, there's no bitterness. There's no bitterness toward the woman or even toward the king. And thirdly, there's this sacrifice.

This is a woman who's given parenthood away and now she can get it back. Now here's what I'm trying to say. Some of you would like to be married until you're willing to say, Lord, I give up the right to be married. You're more important than marriage to me. If you don't want me to be married fine, you've got to sort over marriage fine. Don't you realize until you say that,

you're going to kill anybody who does marry you and yourself with them. You have to give up. Your insistence on a happy family. You have to give up your insistence on your career. You have to give up your insistence. You have to. You've gotence on your career, you have to give up your insistence, you have to. You got to do what she's doing.

Don't you see? The second woman was the way of the world. The way of the world thinks the Christian way is utterly stupid. The world says, wait a minute, the way up is up, but no, the way up is down. The way down is up. Do you see? The way to lose your life is to find it. The way to find your life is to lose it.

This comes over and over and over again. Solomon found it. Why did he find it? Has anybody noticed, for example, how weird it is? Did he even think about it for an Oriental King, an ancient Near Eastern King, to be hearing personally a case between two prostitutes? Now I think I know what the normal worldly king would say.

He would say, I have to guard my reputation. I want people in awe of me. I don't want them to think anybody can get in here. You know, I'm a screen my calls, you say, power. You can't have accessibility to me, but he opens it to them. He shows the humility of taking two nothings, two nobodies, and he treats them as somebody's. And in the end, what's happened? He gives up the image, but look what happens at the end. Verse 28, they're an awe of him. He gives up honor and he gets it. You try to grab honor and you

lose it. You try to grab parenthood and you lose it. You try to grab honor and you lose it. You try to grab parenthood and you lose it. You give it up and say, Lord, whatever you want and whatever you get back will be safe. Now here's the point. You can say, wow. Do you see this woman? Incredible poise. Whereas the first woman, the second woman, is panicking.

You see, bitter, selfish. The first woman poised. How can she be that way? Because she's made a fundamental choice in the middle of her soul to follow the true king. Now, you say, I wish I could be like that, but I can't. But I want you to know if she can do it, you can do it because you know something that she doesn't know. And you have availability, something that she doesn't have available. There is a power and there is a, there is a something that you can know that will melt your heart into greater poise than that, greater forgiveness than that, greater sacrifice than that, greater self-control and that. Why? We know of one who is both the true king and the true sacrificial servant.

First of all, we know someone who had the audacity to show up and say, not what the son of Syracch said, come to wisdom, take the yoke of wisdom upon you, learn of wisdom, and get the rest of wisdom. But we have someone who had the audacity, it's not saying I'm the greatest teacher, but he said, come to me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, I will give you rest, take my yoke upon me. Obey me, I am the true King. In fact, I am wisdom itself. And the reason, if you make Jesus your king instead of anything else, instead of anything else, the reason you will have that poise is because he is the only king that can't be taken from you.

Do you hear that? Any other king you serve, you're always going to be nervous in the service because he can be taken from you. But also, he's the only king that can forgive because it's not just Solomon pointing us to Christ here. The woman is too. You know what the woman did? She looked at the throne and she said, no, no. Don't ruin his life, ruin mine. Don't tear him into two. Tear me into two. So that he can have hope and joy, I will lose and give away all my hope

and joy. But don't you realize there was a greater one than that who stood before the eternal throne and he looked at us and he saw the sort of judgment over us. He saw that we should be punished for our foolishness. And what did he say to the throne? What did he say to his father? He says, no, don't ruin them, ruin me. Don't tear them into pieces, tear me into pieces. I will give up all of my joy and all of my hope so that they can have joy and hope. And he did. And that's why the cross is, as Paul says, foolishness to the world, but the wisdom of God, because it's the ultimate place where somebody won through losing. It's the ultimate place because he went so far down,

deeper than the woman did and Solomon did, but so far higher. He lost so much more than anyone ever has, and that's why he can give us so much more, because he's gained so much more. Do you see him do that to you? Have you understood that he's done that for you? Has that begun to melt your heart?

He's the only king that you can't lose. He's the only king that will forgive you. And if you have him as your true king, he will be wise. You will be utterly wise. Summary. If you're not sure you're a Christian or put it this way, if you know, God is not the most important thing in your life, Jesus is the most important thing in your life, despair of wisdom, my dear friends. You can't get a little illumination from Jesus. Don't you see you have to take the yoke on. You've

got some yoke on. There is something that's the meaning of your life. He's got to be your meaning in life. He's got to be the reason you get up in the morning. He's got to be the thing that you bring everything into line with, because you're bringing everything into line with something. And until he is that, he won't be any wisdom for you at all. And Christian friends, you say, well, is this helping me figure

out whether to marry this person or not? Can't you be practical? Of course, let me just put it this way. On the one hand, he's the king. Wisdom comes from the king. And that means, listen to his word. Take as much as you possibly can of his rules into your heart, saturate them, your heart with them, so that you can make wise decisions. But you say, but I thought wisdom also happens in places where the rules don't help.

All right, but he's a king. You know what that means? He gives you guidance, but he doesn't necessarily, how do I put it? I'm going to put it better this way. Because he's the king, he's wise for you. That's why the people in verse 28 are so excited. If your next door neighbor is the wisest man in the history of the world, that doesn't maybe help you that much.

But if your king is the wisest person in the history of the world, that's a tremendous benefit because he's going to be wise for you. Jesus Christ says in 1 Corinthians 1, is your wisdom, your righteousness, your sanctification and redemption? He is your wisdom, your righteousness, your sanctification and redemption? He is your wisdom, which means, relax. Saturate yourself with His Word. Make sure that you're not being controlled by false rulers as you make this decision.

And then make your decision and relax. Why? Because He's going to be wise for you. If you make a mistake, He'll leave it in. He'll weave it into your life pattern so that He brings you into the place where you need to be wise for you. If you make a mistake, he'll weave it in. He'll weave it into your life pattern so that he brings you into the place where you need to be. If you really understand that the true King is your wisdom, you will relax, make your decision, do the best you can, pray to him, and don't be paralyzed anymore. You'll be saying, what do you see how much easier it is? Come to him.

What do you see how much easier it is? Come to Him. God does not give us a watertight argument. When He gives us wisdom, He gives us a watertight person. God does not give us a set of concepts. When He gives us His wisdom, He gives us a person. Come to Him, know Him. And that's what the Lord suffers about. It's getting in touch with Him, and that's the way you get wise.

Let's pray. Thanks for listening to Tim Keller on the Gospel and Life podcast. If you were encouraged by today's teaching, we invite you to consider becoming a Gospel and Life monthly partner. Your partnership helps more people discover the transformative power of Christ's love through this ministry. Just visit gospelandlife.com slash partner to learn more. This month's sermons were recorded in 1997 and 2017.

The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017, while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church. Dr. Keller with Senior Pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.