Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Grace to the Barren (Part 2)

Episode Date: July 15, 2024

What’s the purpose of writing a letter to somebody? The purpose is to get something across. So when we read the Bible, we need to have the intellectual integrity to treat it the way we’d want our own communications treated. Galatians 4 is a text that many find difficult to read and interpret. What is Paul saying? What does he mean? But if we understand the context, it really is very simple in the end. If we look at Galatians 4, we’ll see 1) he talks about two sons, 2) then he talks about two covenants, and 3) then he gives two applications. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on March 15, 1998. Series: Galatians: New Freedom, New Family. Scripture: Galatians 4:21-31. 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. The book of Galatians isn't a very long book, just six chapters, but it holds some of the most transformative truths in scripture. All month on the podcast, Tim Keller's teaching will be from the book of Galatians, a book that is all about the power of the gospel. Now, would you please turn with me to the passage that several of you felt, you felt a burden from the Lord last week to come to me and say, I sure hope you're not moving into chapter five before you explain all that stuff at the end of chapter four. And so here we are. We're going through the book of Galatians, and tonight I will.

I'm gonna try to get through this last part of the book of Galatians chapter four. There's a lot of thorny issues here. When you first read it, actually, there's some things that just don't sound right. And we're gonna read it. And I am tonight, I'm gonna take a moment to try to explain some of the things

that have created difficulties for interpreters of this passage. But what I really wanna do is I wanna show you the basic message, which is some of the things that have created difficulties for interpreters of this passage. But what I really want to do is I want to show you the basic message, which is one of the most wonderful messages of grace and hope anywhere in the Bible, and therefore anywhere in the world. Let me read it for you. So Paul says, Tell me, you who would want to be under the law, are you not aware of what the law says? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. His son by

the slave woman was born in the ordinary way, but his son by the free woman was born as a result of promise. These things may be taken figuratively. For the woman represents two covenants. For the woman represents two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves. This is Hagar. Now Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present city of Jerusalem

because she is in slavery with her children. But the Jerusalem that is above is free and she is our mother. For it is written, be glad, O barren woman, who bears no children, break forth and cry aloud, you who have no labor pains, because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband. Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise, and at that time the son born in the ordinary way persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now. But what does the scripture

say? Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman's son will never share any inheritance with the free woman's son. Therefore, brothers, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free." This is God's word. Now I know there's some things in there you say, what? And some sound kind of harsh and what is it about? So I look at the clock. I usually, as you know, I tend to, for simplicity's sake, and just for being a steward of time, we can't stop in some of these places and deal with some of the issues that interpreters wrestle with. But I will stop briefly tonight because it's rather hard to miss some of the things that

interpreters wrestle with. Maybe not the ones you think. Actually, the biggest issue that people wrestle with in the last 20 or 30 years, and there's been an enormous amount of literature written about this passage. And for a conscientious Bible teacher like myself, it frightens me because I feel like I ought to read it all and it's terrible and I've skimmed a lot of it. But it's all got a lot to do with this verse 24, where it says, these things may be taken figuratively. In Greek, he actually says, in the Greek he says, I take these things. Now that's a very free rendering, but it's fair of the Greek. In the Greek, he says, I will these things. Now, that's a very free rendering, but it's fair of the Greek. In the Greek, he says, I will take this allegorically.

He uses the word allegorismo, you know, the real, the Greek word allegorically, but this is fair. And the reason people get all upset about this, you know, I'll take a minute on this, indulge me, or please, what choice have you got? Try to stop me, okay. Is people, first of all, people look at this and say, this is Paul showing us how to interpret the Bible. Paul is showing us how to interpret the Old Testament.

He's studying Genesis 16, which is the story of Hagar and Sarah and Abraham, the story of Ishmael and Isaac, Genesis 16, and he's showing us how to interpret it. And look, he doesn't take it literally. Now you see, some people say, look, Paul doesn't take the Bible literally, he takes it figuratively, he takes it symbolically. This is symbol, and that's great, some people say.

And other people say, look, Paul is taking things not literally, but symbolically, and that's bad, because how will we know what any of these texts mean? If you can just see, this is a symbol of this, and this is a symbol of this. So people get pretty bent out of shape. And there's really two things I think you have to keep in mind.

One very sure, one is not as sure. But the most important thing is this. Right before Paul writes this, right before he says this, right before he says, my dear children, I am in agony, I'm in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, I wish I could be with you now. We talked about this last week.

Paul is upset about the Galatians, he's writing to, he's afraid for them. He thinks they're in danger spiritually, and so he's really upset. And then suddenly, that's just 19 and 20, and then suddenly in verse 21, he says, let me tell you about Abraham and Isaac. Now, does it make any sense that here's a man

in the heart of a counseling session, and suddenly he says, but now we will have a lesson in Old Testament exegesis and the interpretation of redemptive history. Class, would you please turn to page? No, that's not what he's doing. What he's doing, very, very simply, is he's counseling. And the purpose of this passage is not to teach us how to interpret the Old Testament.

The simplest way for me to do this is if I was talking with you and you were saying, if you were saying, I don't think there's any hope. I just feel like I'm at the dead end. I feel like there's just no way out. And what if I looked at you as a pastor and I said, there is light after darkness,

there is resurrection after death, there is hope even in victory. That's what the resurrection of Jesus means. The resurrection of Jesus means that there's always a way out, there's always a way through that after a death can come resurrection. Now what am I doing? Am I saying, what am I doing? I'm counseling and I'm taking the resurrection of Jesus Christ figuratively.

Just because I'm taking the resurrection story of Jesus Christ figuratively doesn't mean I think it's only figurative, you see. Just because I'm saying I'm going to take it figuratively, I'm going to use it figuratively, doesn't mean I don't take it literally too. Do you see? So basically, the reason we shouldn't get all bent out of shape is just because Paul says I'm taking this figuratively doesn't mean he doesn't take it literally. Doesn't mean he doesn't think it really happened. So we shouldn't get all bent out of shape. Maybe that's pretty simple. You know, I know there's all these thousands of books

that have been written. Maybe they should have just asked me. I don't know. But actually there really is a lot of, I want you to know that when people read this, and this is worth talking about, when people talk to Christians, very often they say, I mean I just heard Oprah Winfrey do this

to some poor woman, some Christian woman who got up and was disagreeing with her, and she went to, basically this is what they say, say, well yeah, you're reading the Bible, I read the Bible, you like to take it literally, I like to take it figuratively. And they think that's the end of the conversation. But of course's not okay. What listen if you write a letter What's the purpose of writing a letter to somebody the purpose of writing a letter somebody is to get something across and What if you wrote me a letter and you said I went to see your your friend Mr.. X and boy when I came out, Mr. X just beat me up. And what if I read that and I said, I'm going to have that man arrested. He beat her up. That's incredible. And so

I used it. You call the police and the police are over there and it's a bit, and next thing all your friend calls and says, what have you done? You know, and he said, well, you wrote me in the letter and said, he beat you up. I said, well, you wrote me in the letter and said he beat you up. I said, well, I meant that he really, you know, he told me that I was wrong and I was so glad he did and, you know, a good friend. I just meant, I felt beat, I mean, I was, you know, it was a figurative statement.

Well, I said, you know, I like to take things literally. I have a right to take things literally. And what would she say? She would say, how dare you? The purpose of my letter was get across my meaning. If you didn't understand my meaning, you should have asked. She'd say, what do you mean?

I just like to take you literally. Who cares what you like? You need to figure out what I'm trying to say. And so when somebody says, well, you like to take the Bible literally, I take it like the Bible. What you have to ask yourself is, would you dare let anybody else treat your letter the way you're treating God's letter?

Would you dare let anybody else treat your communication the way you're treating this communicat- you can't just say that. And by the way, the literal figurative thing is a red herring. Because you see, some parts of the Bible you do have to take figuratively, like the poetry, and some parts you have to take literally, pardon me, literally, history, poetry, figuratively, and there's some parts that are hard to tell, huh? Right? Some parts you're not sure what it means when the Bible says, he beat me up. You don't know. And you see, if you get a letter and you're not sure if it's figurative or literal, you ought to ask or you ought to think or at least you ought to hold back. But the whole idea is not, the point is,

you may not just decide what you like to do. And therefore, interpretation is very important. My job when I read the Bible is not, I like, what is Paul trying to say? What is coming across here? I have to work at it. And there's some places that are hard, but it's my job to figure that out and to do my best, or even to withhold judgment until I can figure it

out. But not just to say, I like, who cares what you like. You wouldn't dare. You wouldn't dare. You shouldn't dare to do with this communication what you would never let anybody else do with yours. And by the way, here's just one, indulging one more second. Those of you who have been studying in the academic world, if you've been studying literature, if you've been, oh my goodness, the last 20 years, if you have been studying in almost any academic discipline, you know, one of the big issues is,

how do we interpret texts? And there's structuralism, and there's post-structuralism, and there's deconstruction, and let's not go into it. But nowadays there is more and more, there are more and more people who say, it doesn't matter what the text, what the author of the text means, all that matters is how it means to me. But as soon as you, what if you wrote that down? What if you said to me, what if you said, it doesn't matter what the author means, it doesn't matter what Shakespeare means,

it doesn't matter what Paul means, it doesn't matter what the author of the text means, all that matters is what it means to me. And what if you told me that, and I said, well thank you, I will go rob your house. And you would say, what are you talking about? So I, what you just said means to me that I can rob your house.

And you see, you can't... You would never let me get away with it. As soon as you say, it doesn't matter what the author means, it just matters what it means to me, you actually can't even say that without expecting me to know what you mean. And you'll insist that I take seriously what you mean?

All I'm trying to say is, when it comes to reading the Bible, it's very easy to spout this. Oh, what to say is when it comes to reading the Bible, it's very easy to spout this. Oh, what really matters is what it means to me. I like to take it figuratively. There's no integrity in that talk. There's no integrity at all. There's no intellectual integrity. There's no common sense in it. And most of all, it's just simply breaking the golden rule. You're refusing to do unto God what you would have others do for you.

Now, what is Paul saying? That's the issue. What does he mean, and what's great about this? If we understand the context, what he is saying, it's really very simple, very simple, and not all that complicated in the end. Look, if you take the text, you'll see first of all, he talks about two sons, then he talks about two covenants,

and then he gives two applications. The two sons, right here in verse 22, for it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and the other by the free woman. His son by the slave woman was born in the ordinary way, but his son by the free woman was born as a result of promise. Now, why does he bring up two sons of Abraham? And

here's why. If you read the whole book of Galatians, you'll realize Paul has continually talked about this, children of Abraham, because to be a child of Abraham was a high privilege. You remember when Jesus was talking to the religious leaders in John 8, and they said, who do you think you're talking to? We are children of Abraham. Now the Galatians were pagans.

The Galatians were Greeks. They did not know the law of God. They did not know the word of God. They were not living according to the will of God, and they were living a pagan life. And one of the things that we have trouble remembering, because Christianity has had such an incredible impact on Western culture, such an incredible impact,

that we forget what it was like before Christianity came along with its new ideas. We forget just how incredibly vicious, how incredibly cruel, how incredibly lascivious the pagan world was. We forget what mud it was and how everybody was just rolling around in the mud. I just recently read a book, Getting Ready for a Sermon, that I preached last Sunday morning on something on the pagan world and we just forget just how lascivious and how cruel it was. What I mean by lascivious? One

of the things that's so interesting about Christianity was one of the reasons it grew in the Greco-Roman world was that women flocked into it. They loved it. And the reason women flocked into it was because Christianity was really one of the very first, essentially got it from the Bible, of course, in Judaism, but it came along and it said, you should have no sex outside of marriage. Now you right away think, boy, that's kind of puritanical, and it's true. In a way it was, but it was absolutely liberating to women because in that time, polygamy, which meant men had a lot of women, that was normal. But most of all, there was an absolute double standard when it came to sex in the pagan world.

Men could have sex with anyone, with anyone's, anywhere, any way, anytime, and women, and especially married women, could not. There was an utter double standard, but along comes Christianity and says, one man, one woman, in marriage, that's the only place for sex. And what that did was immediately meant that first of all, women felt empowered.

Women finally felt justice, sexual justice. And families were incredibly strong. Because as we all know, polygamy is just devastating to children, devastating to women, just devastating. And so what happened was, you know, the pagan sexual practices were utterly different than the Christian. But not only that, the pagan life was incredibly cruel. We know from history that when epidemics came along and people were starting to die,

it was not unusual for pagan families to pick their own family members up who were sick and out of fear of contamination, lay them outside to die on the street just so they weren't contaminated. Whereas Christians, of course, not only nursed their own sick during those epidemics, but other people's sick.

We also know, for example, that there were 140 men for every 100 women in the Greco-Roman world, but it was 100 and 100 inside the Christian world. Do you know why? Do you know why there was that incredible imbalance? And that was because it was normal that when your baby was born, if it was a girl, to kill it. Infanticide was absolutely normal. The census figures show that of 600 families

in a particular Greek town, you know, around the time of Christ, there were 600 families and most of the families had seven, eight, nine children, that kind of thing, but only six of those families had more than one daughter because daughters just weren't, you know, they weren't popular. We have a letter from an Alexandrian businessman who was out away on business and he wrote his wife back and she was pregnant and he was saying, you know, they weren't popular. We have a letter from an Alexandrian businessman who was out away on business and he wrote his wife back and she was pregnant and he was saying, you know, don't forget this, don't

forget this, I hope we'll be back in three weeks. And by the way, if the baby is born, I'll wall him away. If it's a girl, throw it out. And they were. Paganism, you see, until Christianity came along and said that every single human life is valuable, until Christianity came along and said that sex is a sacred thing and that there should be

no double standards, until Christianity came along and said all these things, paganism was really astoundingly lascivious, astoundingly cruel. And when the Galatians had come to Christ and when they got the vision, the biblical vision of what human life should be like, and when they saw their own past, they were filled with shame. How can we best understand the freedom we have in Christ? What is the relationship between the law of the Bible and the grace that Jesus offers?

In the book, Galatians for You, Tim Keller takes you through a rich and deep study of Paul's letter as he reflects on the amazing grace we have in Christ. Galatians is a powerful book that shows how people can think they know the gospel but are actually losing touch with it. In this study of the book of Galatians, Dr. Keller helps you understand how this short book in the New Testament can transform your life. Galatians for you is our thanks for your gift to help Gospel in Life share the love of Christ with more people. Request your copy today at gospelinlife.com

slash give. Now here's Dr. Keller with. I know it's only a cartoon. I know it's only a cartoon. And you're going to laugh at me. Go ahead, laugh at me. But whenever that place in Lion King happens, you know, where I don't even know that, you know, the daddy lion is dead, and the little lion is there with his father dead. And the uncle lion and the wicked mean guy wants to cripple this little lion. He wants to cripple this child. He comes up and he looks and he says, what have you done?

Now, Jeremy Irons has got a tremendous voice and he's the actor and I can't do it like he does. But I'll tell you something, I have nightmares when I hear that voice. Because that is the voice that all of us hear when we look at our past. What have you done? He comes up and says, Simba. Right? He says, what have you done? Well, I, it just happened, he wouldn't be alive

if it wasn't for you. He'd be alive if it wasn't for you, remember that? He'd be alive if it wasn't for you. And the kids crippled forever, shame. Now, it doesn't take much. When I got here in 1989, the codependency, dysfunctional movement was just at full height.

And everybody, all the books and all the seminars were saying we're filled with shame because our parents didn't love us and so we're victims and we're codependent. And you know, somewhere in the early 90s there was a backlash from the left. Wendy Kaminer, for example, wrote a book called I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional. There was a backlash from the left and everybody started to ridicule the idea that because your parents didn't love you, you're a victim and blaming your parents for all your problems.

And it kind of died down. But I'll tell you, from the Christian point of view, the co-dependency movement was not wrong because it took shame too seriously. It was wrong because it didn't take shame seriously enough. Because see the Bible believes, the Bible teaches that we all have deep, deep, deep down a deep sense of being naked and ashamed. We all know there's something wrong with us. We all do. And of course bad parenting can make it worse and good parenting can make it better, but

we all have that. It's much deeper than the codependency movement, one who we acknowledge. And it does drive us. And we do try to cover ourselves. We do try to make ourselves, the reason we need to be sexually attractive, the reason we need to be successful, the reason we need to make money, we all choose to, we're trying to cover our shame. And most of us do a pretty good job of it.

We take philosophy 101 and we believe in relativism That's one way of doing it. I mean we do everything we can to cover the shame of Jonathan Edwards said if there were no fires in hell If there was no fire in hell, but if God takes away the barrier and the shield Around your conscience so that you will have to live with what deep in your conscience you really think about yourself. He said there'll be fire enough, it'll still be hell. In other words, if we do everything we can to hide from ourselves what we think of ourselves, the self-loathing, the self-criticism. It's very deep. It's very down deep. And if something comes along and triggers it, we're in hell

here. And the Galatians came out of this paganism and their consciences were enlightened by the Holy Spirit and by the Word of God and they looked at themselves and Paul said, you are saved not by your record, but by Christ's record. You're saved not because of what you have done, but by what Christ has done. You are in spite of everything you've done, in spite of all of your shame and guilt, in spite of all of that,

you're children of God, you're children of Abraham. And that was great, but Paul didn't stay around that long and next thing you know, along come these teachers and they come in and they look at the Galatians and they say, Paul called you children of Abraham. Well, you believe in Christ, that's wonderful, but you know, wait a minute, wait a minute. You've got a long way to go.

Do you know what you've done? You know what you've done. There's a lot to do. You're going to have to start to obey the law. You're going to have to pick up all the ceremonies. For years and years and years, we have been purifying our souls through all these ceremonies and these rituals

and these washings and the way we eat and the way we dress and the way we live. We've been doing everything we can for years to purify ourselves from the pollution of the pagan culture around us. You have a long way to go. We've been doing this for years. What makes you think that you were there already?

Well, believing in Christ is a start, but you're not children of Abraham. Oh no, think of what you've done. You're not children of Abraham yet. So Paul counterattacks, incredibly great counterattack. He says, let's talk about whose children of Abraham. There were two children of Abraham. There were two sons. And there were two people who related to Abraham. One was Ishmael and he was born in the ordinary way and one was Isaac and

he was born by promise. Now if you remember the story, you'll know what happened. God had come to Abraham and to Sarah and had said, Abraham, Sarah, I'm going to give you a child. I'm going to give you a child through Sarah, your child, and from your child you'll have a great family and you'll have many descendants and you will be a great nation. And they'd waited and they'd waited and they waited. And now Abraham was very old and Sarah was very old. And Sarah finally to Abraham and said it'll be a miracle I'm barren I'm desolate I've never had a child I am therefore marked in my culture I am

ashamed there's only one thing you can do to remove my shame. In that day, it was possible and legal if the husband slept with the servant, the slave of the wife, then the child of the slave woman was legally the child of the wife. And see though, as we all know, it would have been a miracle for Sarah at the age of 70, 80, 90 to have a child, but it's not necessarily a miracle for a man of 70, 80 80, 90 to have a child. But it's not necessarily a miracle for a man

of 70, 80, or 90 to father a child. And therefore, Abraham had a choice. He could either get a family through his own human ability, or he could wait and get a family through God's miraculous ability. He had a choice. And he decided, he and Sarah decided, we're not gonna wait for God.

We're not gonna get a family through God's work, we're gonna get a family through our work. And we're gonna do it in a way that we have control over, something that we, in our human ability, have got the stillly power to do. Sarah says, I can't have a child, but you can have a child, so let's do it that way. So Abraham and Sarah moved out,

using their own human ability, and through that human ability, they got Ishmael. But later on, God visited and in a miracle, through Sarah, they had Isaac. Then Paul says, let's take this figuratively. And you see, now I'm gonna defend Paul. This is not that fanciful, this is not that allegorical. Paul is saying this represents two covenants,

this represents two ways of relating to God. And you know what? It's not just a symbol. These two children, these two sons were literally born, literally born, they were literally the result of two completely different approaches to God. Do I decide to basically earn with my own human ability what I want or do I wait for God and let it be completely dependent on his ability and Paul says when you go the human way you become a slave now that's not too hard to understand because when you take a look and see what happened it's not too hard to understand what happened there is nothing worse than what Abraham did.

Abraham exploited both Sarah and Hagar. Even though it was Sarah's idea, Sarah was beautiful and young, and she had this child, she was fertile. And then we're told in the story that she felt self-righteous over her mistress, and her mistress felt absolutely like spit, absolutely like dirt.

And Ishmael had a younger brother, Isaac, but Isaac, of course, was the favorite of the father, because Ishmael was the son of the slave woman. And of course, poor Ishmael, you know, started to make fun of Isaac and started to persecute Isaac because, of course, he understood that he wasn't loved. I mean, by following his own human ability, Abraham screwed up his life.

And Paul says, when you try to use your own ability to deal with your shame and nakedness, if you say, I will feel, I will get rid of this shame and nakedness by working hard, I'll become a partner. I will deal with this shame and nakedness by becoming a PhD. I will deal with shame and nakedness

by having a wonderful family. I will deal with shame and nakedness by being a wonderful family. I will deal with the shame of nakedness by being a beautiful person, sexually attractive. I can get anybody I want. If you use your human ability, you will become a slave. The results will be slaves, you will be a slave. The whole thing is slavery, the whole thing. You'll have to, you'll need it.

You'll have to do it. If anything gets in your way, you'll be filled with anger. If anything gets in your way, you'll be filled with anger. If anything gets in your way, you'll be, even if it doesn't get in your way, even if nothing wrong happens, you'll be driven and driven. You'll be a slave. Or, he says, you can see what it means to rely

on what Jesus has done, to be saved by grace. It says, the Jerusalem which is above is our mother. You know what that means? It is our mother. That means he's saying we're already citizens of heaven. You're not, if you're a Christian, you're not hoping by living a long time and really hard, training hard.

He's not saying at the very end of your life, maybe you'll be led into heaven. You are now citizens of heaven. She is our mother, not she will be our mother. What does that mean? That's not just figurative language. Your mother's city was this place where you were a citizen. Your mother's city was a place where you had rights.

Your mother's city was a place where you belonged. And he is saying, you Galatians, if you try to listen to what those teachers are saying and dealing with all of your shame by trying to be moral, by trying to be religious, by doing all this stuff, you will be nothing but a slave. But if on the other hand, you understand that what Jesus Christ has done is sufficient,

there's nothing to add to it, then you'll be free and you'll live a free life. You'll work, but you won't have to work. You'll try to succeed, but you won't have to succeed. You'll try to build a family, but you won't have to have the family. You won't be a slave to anything. And then he finally says, and this is the most great part, he quotes Isaiah 54. And when he says this, my heart leaps. He says, for it is written, be glad, O barren woman, who bears no children, break forth and cry aloud

you who have no labor pains, because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband. Sarah, in her culture, she was a woman, and in her culture, by not having a child, she was in shame. That's the reason why Paul used her as an illustration. And Paul says, get this, if you rely on your own human ability,

you'll have children. But if you rely on God's ability, no matter who you are, what you've done, no matter what your background is, more will be your children than the children of she who is fertile. Now, some of you may have heard this story, but it's always moved me remarkably,

and that is, if you ever go to one of the best churches in Harlem, Bethel Gospel, and you listen to Ezra Williams tell you the story of how that church started, he didn't start that church. He's a very old man, he's in his 70s. He didn't start the church, it's older than he is. I think he's like the second pastor. But he tells this incredible story,

and the incredible story was pretty simple. And that is, basically, many years ago, there was no church in Harlem, the Bethel Gospel didn't exist, but there was a couple of African American women who were going to a Bible study in Center City, run by a German woman, and they became Christians. And they asked her to come on up to Harlem

and begin a Bible study there and work with more African Americans. And this woman was engaged. And when this woman turned to her fiance and said, I'm gonna be doing this and I'm gonna be involved with these people, this was many years ago, 80, 90 years ago, the fiance said, if you do that, we're over.

If you do that, not only will I marry you, but probably nobody's gonna marry you. Nobody in our circles will marry you. And she wrestled over this. Ezra Williams says she wrestled over this until she came to the text, Isaiah 54, one. It said, more are the children of the desolate woman than of she who has a husband.

She was facing the possibility of something that is still to some degree, to some degree, it's still an embarrassment in this society, not like it used to be, but to some degree it still is. Back then it really was. She knew that it was very possible that she would be a single woman and never married. That was a mark of great shame. But she realized that she obeyed God and if instead of getting her shame and nakedness dealt with, instead of getting her righteousness, instead of getting her worth from having a family,

fitting into the white culture, fitting into what everybody said, I'm gonna be obedient to the Lord Jesus Christ, and I'm gonna rely on what he says about me, and what his righteousness is, and she got this promise. You will have more children children you will be more fruitful God loves to work through people like you Tell me

What it's easy. I don't care what you've done. I don't care if you've been a hit man for the mafia I don't care if you've been in the depths of degradation. I don't care if you've been at the very gates of hell. You come to him and instead of saying, I will clean my life up, that will just give you more slavery, more slavery than you were in before. If instead you say, nothing in my hands I bring, simply to the cross I cling,

more will be your children than the fertile person, you see, the beautiful person, the person that seems to have it all, who instead, through his or her own human ability, seeking to cover his or her nakedness. More will be your children. See, Paul, don't forget in verse 20, you don't think there's a connection here? In verse 19 and 20, Paul called these people who? What did he call them? My dear children. They were his children. Paul hardly had a home. Paul was always being beaten. Paul was in disgrace. Paul lost his career.

He had been a promising academic career. Paul was a hunted man. Paul died in exile. Paul didn't have any children. Oh yes he did. And no matter who you are, you will be fruitful if you put yourself in his hands. Greater, be glad o barren woman who bears no children. Break forth and cry loud for you who have no labor pains because greater are the children, more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband. I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God and a salvation for all who believe. Let's pray. We thank you, Father, that the gospel is so radical and so great. We thank you that Paul could come along and say,

therefore, throw out the slave woman. Get rid of that slave in my heart. Get rid of trying to get into the earthly Jerusalem and realize that by salvation of grace, by the work of Jesus Christ, I can now be a citizen of Jerusalem who is of above and she is our mother. We pray that you would get rid of the slave mentality and you would help us to live with the freedom and the poise and the confidence that is possible through the gospel. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for listening to today's teaching from Tim Keller.

If you have a story of how the gospel has changed your life or how Gospel in Life resources have encouraged or challenged you, we'd love to hear from you. You can share your story with us by visiting gospelinlife.com slash stories. That's gospelinlife.com slash stories. Today's sermon was recorded in 1998. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel in Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.