Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Alive With Christ (Part 3)

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on November 15, 1992. Series: Salvation From the Outside In. Scripture: Ephesians 2:1-5. 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 and Life. We live in a culture that encourages us to focus on ourselves, our needs, our goals, our fulfillment. But what if our lives only made sense when we see them as part of a much bigger story? This summer, we're featuring one of Tim Keller's longer sermon series in which he teaches about the core truths of the Christian faith and the big picture of God's ultimate plan of salvation for humanity, revealing how we can find real meaning, growth, and change in Christ. Sometimes when we look at them, and yet you know all of history, in the West, at least, is a before and after picture. We've got B.C. before Christ, and we have A.D. after the year of our Lord.

If you're a Christian, you can divide your life into before and after as well. You've got before pictures and you've got after pictures. being a Christian is a monumental change. What you have here in Ephesians 2 verses 1 to 5 is you've got a BC and an AD. You've got a before and after picture. We've been looking at the before and starting last week and continuing this week, we're looking at the after picture. As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air

and the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following us desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. Because of the great love for us, God who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ, even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved. Let's look at this. Before and after. We've been looking at the before. And we saw that before were under the influence of the flesh.

See, verse three. It says all of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following's desires. Now, we've been looking at that for a while, and what we did see there is the flesh is not the body, remember, but rather it's the bent of the whole nature to be your own God, to be your own Savior, to save yourself, to keep control of your life,

and to develop strategies for living that will not necessitate you depending on God. And so before Christ, you're in the flesh. You may be a violent person. You may be a criminal. You may be a licentious person. Or you may be moral, generous, upright, compassionate. But in either case, you're in the flesh. Now, if that surprises you or that confuses you, it's because you still don't understand

the basic message of the gospel. To be in the flesh does not necessarily mean that you're constantly breaking God's law. To be in the flesh means that you're using good things to avoid having to rely on Christ's Savior and to avoid having to make God your king. In other words, in your indecency or your indecency or your... decency. You're doing everything you can be to be your own savior. Sure, over here's one person who builds his or her life and gets his or her meaning in life out of drink or out of drugs or out of eating and they're addicted and everybody sees, yes, they're in the lust of the flesh. But

over here's a person who gets his or her meaning in life out of being moral and decent, out of feeling like I'm better than most. I'm religious. You see. And though it's very subtle, that person is just as much in the grips of the flesh because they're using religion as a strategy for avoiding making Jesus both Lord and Savior. Now we were looking at that. We spent plenty of time on that. There's no reason to go back to that. But we've got to remind you of that because you can't, unless you understand and have a good clear picture of the before, you won't understand the after. In some translations, it goes this way. In verse four, but God, because of is great love for us, who is rich in mercy, made us alive together with Christ, even when we

were dead. Now, all I want to do and all we have time to do tonight, and since we're getting ready for the Lord's supper, it's just to look at this term, but God made us alive. In the Bible, there are many, many, many ways of talking about this. In the book of Titus, I think I referred to this last week. In the book of Titus, Paul says almost the same thing, in a passage is unbelievably parallel to the passage we just read. In Titus, he says, at one time, we too were deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions. We lived alone and in anger and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God, our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous things we have done, but because of his mercy.

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and regeneration by the Holy Spirit, which he poured out on us through Christ. Now here in Ephesians 2, he made us alive. Here it talks about the rebirth and the regeneration by the spirit. In John chapter 3, Jesus is talking to Nicodemus about the same thing when he says, marvel not that I say, He must be born again. He must be born again, born from above, to enter the kingdom of God,

to see the kingdom of God. Born again. Born of the spirit. Born of above. Made alive. Rebirth. Regeneration by the spirit. They're all talking about the same thing.

This is the sine qua non of what it means to be a Christian. This is the essence of what it means to be a Christian. I know that there are plenty of people, especially in a town like ours, who like to make distinctions between Christians, they say, well, are you a born again Christian? And you see, that's an exercise in redundancy. Because according to this, what is a Christian, but somebody who's been made alive, who's been given the rebirth and regeneration by the Holy Spirit, who's been born from above,

that's what a Christian is. Now, when Paul and when Jesus uses this term, they could have used other terms for what it means to become a Christian. but they continually said, made alive, born again. When they chose a metaphor like that, as dramatic as that, and as drastic as that, they must have been trying to get across certain truths about what it means to be a Christian. So let's try to draw some of the implications out. If being a Christian means to be made alive, if it means to be born again, what do we learn about being a Christian?

These things. First of all, the first thing we learn about being a Christian is Christianity is not something you simply it's not something that just gets added to your life. Christianity is not a supplement. Christianity is not something that some new information that you add. It's a complete reorientation. It's a complete change. Look, when a person becomes a Christian,

they don't just get some new information that they add to things. They don't just put a new file in the drawer. They don't just put a new book on the shelf. Instead, when the Holy Spirit opens your eyes to the truth, When you're born again, religious people, to their shock, realize that all of their lives, their religion was really a way of keeping Jesus away. Religious people, when they're born again, realize that all of their lives, their religion was their religion and their morality and their religious activities were just strategies

to keep from having to really trust Jesus' Savior. But it was a strategy to be their own Savior. successful people realized that all of their life, success was actually a way of keeping Jesus away, keeping control of my life. Loving people find that their love was a way for them to actually keep Jesus away and keep control of their life. Co-dependent people realized that their codependency was a form of worship, was another way of saying, I can be saved as long as people need me. Everybody, religious people, violent people.

addicted people, loving and decent people, every one of them. Instead of just getting a little addition, Christianity means a violent almost, reorientation of their life. And they suddenly see, for the first time, that though all of them admitted that they were sinners or they had flaws or they had errors or they had faults in their life, they finally realize that they are so lost that it will take the death of the Son of God to save them. Something they never understood. They may have sat in church for years or they may have never wanted to come anywhere near church for years, yet they're in the same boat. They were in the lust of the flesh.

Their flesh had taken hold and through indecency or decency, they rebelled against God. And when they're born again, they're shocked to have this radical new view of themselves. Does that happen to you? Christianity, because it's the new birth, is not an addition, it's not a supplement. Secondly, this term being born again doesn't just teach us that Christianity is not just an addition, but it even means Christianity is not just simply getting in touch with your own inner resources. You see, in this city, you've got just a myriad, just a multitude of books and tapes and seminars and religions and various sorts. Is that me off?

I'm still there. Pardon me. And various sorts of, well, various forms of philosophies that basically come down to this. You have what it takes. You just have to get in touch with it. You have to dig down deep. You have to get in touch. But you've got the inner resources.

You've got what it takes. When the Bible says you must be born again, you must be made alive. What is the Bible saying? It's coming from a radically different perspective. It's saying you do not have what it takes. And the sooner you admit that and realize it, the better. Another way to put it is, in verse four, starts, but God. And that right there is the essence of the way Christians look at things.

But God. You don't have what it takes. There needs to be an intervention from the outside. What you need has to come from the outside. Have you begun to understand Christianity that way? Or do you, is there anybody here that still thinks of Christianity in terms of your own efforts and what you're doing? Or do you see it's got to come from the outside? It's not a matter of getting in touch with what's on the inside.

Not at all. You don't have what it takes. If you think that sounds awful, if you think that sounds demeaning, if you think that sounds pessimistic, you still don't understand. but the one thing you do are beginning to understand is Christianity is a very different thing than probably what you have thought it is. But God, the new birth means of something a life has to come from the outside. So the new birth means that it's not just an addition. Secondly, the new birth means it's not just getting in touch with something inside you. There's nothing inside you but deadness and life comes from the outside. Thirdly, the new birth means it's not something that you can direct.

It's not something that you take up. Christianity is not something. a program that you just decide and take up and go into. Who decides to be born? Who decides, I think it's time? Birth is something that happens to you. Something comes and rocks you. If you get any, if you have any idea what Christianity is when you read the New Testament, you'll see that. Here's Paul. So he used to be Saul of Tarsus. And there's a place where Paul says, in Galatians 2.20, he says, I live yet not I, but Christ lives within me. I live yet not I, but Christ lives in me. Now, that's a perfect example of what it means to be a Christian.

There's a confusion there, but it's a wonderful confusion. It's a delirious confusion. It's a joyful confusion. He says, it's I that live, and yet it's not I. See, that's what every Christian feels like. It's me, but it's not me. Well, it has to be me. Of course it's me.

I am Paul of Tarsus. I'm not Paul of Tarsus, but it is a new Paul of Tarsus. A Christian, because it comes a beautifully complex person. It's stupendous what Christianity is. Something has come from the outside. A new life has been brought to me. A new perspective has been brought to me. I see things differently.

I have a new power within me, a new strength. I've been made partaker of the divine nature. And now there's a sense in which I'm still in me, but I'm not me. There's a joy about it. And yet there's always, I would call it, a holy and joyful confusion about it. It is I, it is not I. It's me, yet it is not me.

You can see it in that hymn. And can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior's blood? Died he for me, who caused his pain? Now, if you think of Christianity as something that's an addition or something that comes from the inside, then you believe Christianity is something that you direct. something that you pick up, like a program. You decided to go to grad school.

You decided on a career. You decided to lose weight. You decided to learn language. You decided these things and you're moving through them and you're being disciplined about it and you're making progress. That's not at all what Christianity is about. Christianity comes from the outside and something that happens to you. Oh, yes, you cooperate.

Oh, yes, you discipline yourself to grow. But you always know that you're being rocked from the outside and now from the inside, that it's you yet it's not you, that there's two yous, and the new one is growing stronger and stronger all the time. There's an inner conflict. There's almost a sense of which sometimes I've talked to Christians who say, especially new Christians who say, I don't think I was here a while ago. What am I? What happened? It is I, yet it's not I. Being born again is something absolutely amazing and absolutely remarkable. It's miraculous. It creates a complex psychological state. It comes from the outside, not from the inside. It's a completely new orientation. It's not just an addition.

All of that is seen in this term being born again. Now, the last thing I want to ask you for tonight before we go to the Lord's table is this, do you know that this has happened to you or not? How can you tell? And I think I mentioned at the very end of last week's, sermon in the evening, I started to get into three marks of the difference between a nice person and a new person, three marks of the difference between a morally reformed person and a spiritually reborn person. Those are two different things. How do you know you're spiritually reborn and not just morally reformed? And I'll tell you what those three, I'll just give you three indicators, three marks that might help. Why does God allow suffering in the world?

How can one religion be right and the others wrong? Hasn't science basically disproved Christianity? Tim Keller addresses these questions and many more in his book The Reason for God. Drawing on literature, philosophy, real-life conversations, and potent reasoning, this book will challenge you to gain a deeper understanding of the Christian faith, whether you're a believer seeking to understand your faith better, whether you're exploring Christianity yourself, or whether you're reading it with a friend who's searching for answers.

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That's gospelinlife.com slash give. Thank you for partnering with us. Your gift helps the message of Christ's love go out all over the world because the gospel truly changes everything. First of all, number one, a moral person and a Christian have two different views of the truth. If you lay a piece of food on a rock, it just sort of lays there, you know? The rock can't absorb it, it can't take it in, it's just there.

If you put some food into a stomach, the stomach has got a certain question, about it that can absorb it and get the nutrients out and take that and turn it into energy. A moral person might believe the truth, might applaud the truth, might obey the truth, might admire the truth, might pat him or herself on the back that he believes the truth. But a Christian feeds on the truth. It's a tremendous difference. Before you were Christian, when you were just a moral person, you knew you had to believe the Bible, and you knew you should read the Bible, but after you become a Christian, the Bible becomes food. You find yourself panting after it. You want to understand it. Before you were a Christian, you couldn't imagine yourself

reading the Bible for pleasure, maybe for inspiration in real hard times, but not just to want to know it just for its own sake, but that's the change that happens. The great theologian Jonathan Edwards says what you develop is a taste for the truth, a relish for the truth that you didn't have before. It was not that hard to see. You know, when a minister preaches, sometimes especially you've got people who've been going to church for years, and some other attitude is, but I already know that. I've heard that before. I've known that for years.

I've known that for years, right? A real Christian, even if you've heard it 100 times before, takes it and says, boy, I need to know this better. Boy, it's a thrilling thing, it's a disturbing thing, it's a comforting thing. Don't you see the difference? One of them looks at it as food. The other one looks at it as something else. I mean, there's nobody that sits down Sunday morning

and you get up to eat and you sit down and somebody wants to serve you breakfast and you say, I had breakfast yesterday. I had breakfast the day before that. Why in the world would I want breakfast now? Eggs, I know what eggs are all about. Toast, I know what toast is all about. You would have to say this person is obviously an android

from Star Trek or something like that. This person doesn't need to know. But if you're a human, being if you don't have a heart of stone but you have a heart of flesh. It says in Colossians 316, the word of God dwells in you richly. Only a Christian understands that, only a Christian wants that, only a Christian can do that. Huge difference. Your attitude to a truth. A morally reformed person applauds the truth. A spiritually reborn person applies the truth, eats the truth, feeds on the truth, gets the sweetness out of it. Do you know that?

Second, if you want to know whether you're morally reformed, Versus, spirits are reborn, those two kinds of folks also differ, not only in their attitude toward truth, but in their attitude toward failures. Failures, yes. Listen. All other philosophies and all other religions basically say this. Pull yourself together. Get a grip.

Summons up all of your, and focus all of your strength. And do this. You can do it. And that's really what salvation is to a Muslim. That's what salvation is to a Jew. That's what salvation is to a Hindu. That's what salvation is to a humanist. That's what salvation is to anybody.

Get it together. Summons up all of your focused strength and do it. So then what does a person like that say to a failure? Gee, I'm sorry. I mean, what does that person say to someone who says, I summoned it all up, I pulled it all together, I did everything I possibly could, and I couldn't do it. failed. Now what? And every other religion except Christianity says, I don't know. You tried, I don't know.

You failed. Your life's a failure. You're all broken. Whoops. I don't know what we're going to do now. When John the Baptist was not sure who Jesus was, wasn't sure he was the Messiah. He sent a messenger, though he was in prison, and he said, how do we know you're the one or should we look for another? And what did Jesus say? He says, go back and tell John the Baptist, what you see. And what did he see? Tell him that the blind sea, the deaf here, the lepers are cleansed, and the poor have good news preached to him. Now what was Jesus saying? He says, John, you want to know whether I'm the real McCoy? Do you want to know whether the gospel of the kingdom has really come in me? I'll tell you how you can know. Look at the hard cases. Look at the

failures. Look at the, look at the lame, look at the halt. Look at the lepers. Look at the poor. at the marginalized, look at them. Their lives are transformed through me. That's how you know the difference between spiritual power and moral reformation. The morally reforms have nothing to say to a failure, but Christians know that they are failures. Christians have seen God's power work through failures. Christians never stay away from failures. They never give up on anybody. They hope for anyone. That's how you know. Whether you're a morally reformed person who pulled yourself up by your bootstraps, whether you've been transformed by the grace of God. See, John Newton sang about it in that hymn.

Hear him, ye deaf, his praise, ye dumb, your loosened tongues employ. Ye blind, behold, your Savior come, and leap ye lame for joy. I've never gotten over that verse of that hymn. You can just hear John Newton, the author, just exulting in the contradictions. Hear him, ye deaf. His praise, ye dumb, your loose in tongues employ. He blind, behold, your Savior come, and leap ye lame for joy. I said it this morning, I'll remind you of it.

Some of you heard it before. Everybody in this room knows they ought to be perfect. Some of you have gone to counselors to try to deal with it. But the best you could ever do is just put it to sleep. It's still sleeping. It's still there. Every other philosophy basically says, the way to deal with that is to lighten up, loosen up, make yourself less sensitive to

righteousness and morality. Just realize that everybody does it, everybody fails, don't worry about it. No other faith, no other religion really comes to grips with the emotional reality of the fact that we know we should be perfect. And therefore, everybody in this room knows that you're a failure. You all know it. However, we have all sorts of strategies to make make ourselves feel like successes. But in the gospel, you come back to grips with the fact that you're a failure. You have not ever lived up to your own standards. You have never done your best. You have not lived up to the standards you set for other people and that your failures, except that Jesus Christ has come and he's put himself in your shoes and he's put himself under the law

and he's obeyed the law fully. And now if you trust in him, he is the fulfillment. He was perfect for you. He fulfills that law that you know in your deepest of deeps you have to fulfill. George Whitfield, the great preacher once, decided he was going to go preach to the Kingswood Colliers. Who were the Kingswood Colliers? Kingswood Colliers were, this is in the 1740s now, they were minors, and they were considered the most violent people, they were considered, they were very poor people, they were

marginalized, they were an ethnic group that was put aside, and they were seen as little more than animals. They were made to live in certain communities apart from everybody else where there was lots of violence and crime and poverty and ignorance. and they had to live in mines and work under the most abysmal conditions and they died halfway through their you know they had terribly small lifespans because of what they were living in and they're always black and full of grime because they were covered with coal dust and today you can go to a spot at kingswood there's a cross of stone in the ground where george woodfield

went into a field in front of the mines and began to preach outdoors and everybody who everybody had said to George Woodfield, don't you dare go there. Don't you dare preach to them? They'll probably mug you. They'll probably take anything you've got, they might kill you. But he went to begin to preach, and what did he preach? He preached on the Lord our righteousness. And he said what the gospel says, the essence of sin is you and me substituting yourself for God and taking on what only he deserves to have, prerogatives that only he has deserves. The essence of salvation is God substituting himself for us and taking upon himself what only we deserve. Jesus Christ standing in our place and taking what we deserve because we put ourselves in his place

being our own God and our own Savior and taking upon ourselves prerogatives only he deserved. And because Jesus Christ has fulfilled the law, because Jesus Christ has been perfect for you, because Jesus Christ has been a success where you were a failure, if you trust in him, you're righteous in him. your failures are over. And as he began to preach, people started coming out of the minds, and instead of attacking him or laughing at him

or walking away, they listen to him. And at a certain point, Whitfield was very puzzled to see that their faces seemed to be changing. Instead of being very black, there were little tiny white gutters forming down their cheeks

where their tears were beginning to wipe away their coal dust. And so many of them who had all their lives been told, you're marginalized, your failures, when they finally heard for once a religion for failures, a religion who acknowledged that their failure was really actually no different than the moral failure of the people who thought they were successes down in the respectable parts of London, when they heard a gospel that really showed them that Jesus Christ could be their righteousness

and their wisdom and their sanctification and their redemption. Their lives were changed. So many of them got converted that they were changed. They set up a church there, and the first thing Whitfield did was set up a school to educate the kids so they could get out of the poverty and out of the economic conditions they were in. The world has nothing to say. Lee Atwater, remember him?

Before he dies, he says, I'm sorry. And all the, I'm sorry for the dirty tricks I did in the last Republican campaign. And all the media said, huh, now he thinks he can come on back and ask forgiveness. Who does he think he is? Bundy, just before he's electrocuted, says, I sinned, I was sorry, I've turned to Jesus Christ. And all of the media said, huh, who does he think he is? He thinks we can forgive him now? The world has nothing to say to Axe murderers, nothing to say to sleeves balls, nothing to say to Kingswood colliers, nothing to say to failures. And as a result, how will it ever deal with

its own failure? It won't. Because in the end, every person is going to know on the day of judgment that they have not loved as they should love they have not succeeded as they should have succeeded what are they going to say but the christian knows that god loves to work in the hearts of failures in fact he chooses the failures the foolish things to shame the wise the weak things to shame the strong remember the weak and despise things hear him you deaf his praise you dumb your loosened tongues employ. He blind, behold, your Savior come, and leap ye lame for joy.

Now last thing, a morally reformed person and a spiritually reborn person differ in their attitude toward truth. They differ in their attitude toward failures. Christians will, and this just follows. Thirdly, they differ in their attitude toward themselves.

Morally reformed people think pretty well of themselves. Spiritally reborn people have a unique attitude toward them. themselves. They're not always standing on their own dignity, spirits of reborn people. They're not always looking at themselves at all. They're not proud of themselves, but at the same time, they're not concerned or self-conscious at all. When you get near one of them, you sense that you're in the, presence of somebody who knows that he or she is what they are by God's grace. And they make you feel like you can be too. C.S. Lewis put it this way. When you meet a really mature Christian,

when you meet them, you'll find that they will love you more than other people and they'll need you less. They'll love you more and they'll need you less because they knew who they are in Christ. Their attitude is not one of superiority or inferiority. They don't think more of themselves. They don't think less of themselves. They think of themselves less. They think of themselves less. They don't have a superiority complex, they don't have an inferiority complex, because on the one hand, they know their wickedness and they know their security and the love of God. If you put those things together, here's what you've got. Are you, which of these are you? Are you morally reformed?

Or are you spiritually reborn? Reborn? Or are you neither? Are you nice people? Are you new people? Or are you neither? If you're just nice, if you're just moral, I ask you to please let your heart be broken tonight by the knowledge of the fact that you are a failure and you know you're a failure.

You might have it together, you might look really good on the outside, you might be keeping your weight down. You don't look your age. You own apartment. You've made it. You see, you know you're a failure. You may not know it today, but you will never be able to deal with that emotional reality. except through the gospel. Your heart is hard if you think that what we've been saying here tonight sounds fanatical.

But I'm afraid it could get harder. Because like the trolls, if they're caught by the sun, so if you're caught by the light of the second coming, and you haven't yet received Christ's Savior, you'll be turned to stone too. If you're new, then what do I say to you? The new life that's come into you, you've got to grow it. You grow it through Bible study, through prayer, through fellowship with other Christians, through repentance, and through the sacraments.

You can take this new life, and you can spread it out and work it out through and into your life if you come before him now and appreciate him for what he's done. So I'm going to pray and then realize the newness of what's come into your life and stir it up tonight as we receive the bread in the cup. Let's pray. Now, Father, we ask that as we come to you and as we receive, receive by faith your strength and your mercy in the bread in the cup. We ask that those people here tonight who might not have your new life would not receive the bread in the cup, but we would receive you.

And we pray those of us who have received you might receive you afresh and anew and have our life stirred up because we've met you at your table. O Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for listening to Tim Keller on the Gospel in Life podcast. If you'd like to see more people encouraged by the gospel-centered teaching and resources of this ministry, we invite you to consider becoming a Gospel in Life monthly partner. Your partnership helps connect people all over the world with the life-giving power of Christ's love. To learn more, just visit gospelandlife.com slash partner.

That website again is gospelandlife.com slash partner. Today's sermon was recorded in 1992. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel in Life podcast were recorded between 1989 and 2017 will Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.