Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Love Before the World (Part 1)

Episode Date: June 26, 2026

This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on April 26, 1992. Series: Four Ways to Live, Four Ways to Love. Scripture: Ephesians 1:1-4. 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.

Does what you believe about God really matter? Many people say that what matters most is simply living a good and loving life. But the Bible says something very different, that the way we live flows directly from our beliefs about God. Starting this month and extending through the end of September, we're going to go through one of Tim Keller's most extensive sermon series in which he explores the core of the Christian faith. As we go through the series, Dr. Keller will teach from the first two chapters of Ephesians

to look at how the Bible's central truths about salvation and grace are meant to shape even the most practical parts of our everyday life. I'm a part of Ephesians that we move to now because somebody said, what do you do when you get the end of Ephesians? It's just like sailing around the world. If you keep going in a particular direction long enough, you come back around. And we're going to read from the beginning of Ephesians. Ephesians chapter 1.

I'll explain the reason behind all that. Ephesians chapter 1. And what I'd like to do tonight anyway is read actually verses 1 to 14. One of the things that is most intriguing about that, one of the things that's most intriguing about this first part of Ephesians is that even though in your English translations, including the one we're going to read from tonight, it's broken into several sentences.

Ephesians 1, verse 3 to 14, is one long sentence in Greek. And I'll give you some reasons why I think that happened. It's not good grammar. It's not, even in Greek, to have a sentence that long is not good grammar. It's not good former style. But Paul was caught up. Let's take a look at this. Ephesians 1, verses 1 to 14, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,

to the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, weigh every word. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in Him, before the creation of the world, to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love, he predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Christ Jesus

in accordance with His pleasure and will. to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the one he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment, to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ. in him also we were chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him,

who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory, and you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit, guaranteeing our inheritance, until the redemption of those who are God's possession to the praise of his glory. You don't mind. Let's start in prayer, all right? Just for a moment. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you that you are so willing to let us in on your heart

and in on your counsels that you write us a book like the book of Ephesians, that you would take us as maopic as we are, as self-centered as we are, as dim-witted spiritually as we are, and seek to tell us about truths and about realities that are so great, to try to take us to heights, spiritual heights, to give us vantage points, to see vistas and panoramas, which are almost too much for us to bear.

And yet you want us so much to be partners with you and not just servants but children, and not just citizens but friends. And therefore you would show us these things and you would give us these things and you would help us to see these things. Father, I pray that you would help us tonight to understand and to revel and rejoice in them. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, you know, it's been a long time that we've been looking at Ephesians 4, 5, and 6, and a lot of you, at any given time, I figure 70% of you've only been coming to church, the church for six to eight months.

I figured that out somewhere. And that means that a lot of you have no idea where we started when we were moving, going through the book of Ephesians. And we actually started in chapter 4. Now, the book of Ephesians is a fascinating book. And sometimes unless you stand back, you can't see some of its teaching. Chapter 4, 5 and 6, which we move through in a snail's pace, is full, chockful of practical, the most practical and specific and detailed instructions on how to live daily life

that you can find anywhere in any literature. It tells you how to communicate. It tells you how to reconcile your differences. It tells you how to change habits that are hard to change. It talks about community. It talks about the church. It talks about spiritual warfare. It talks about your conscience.

It talks about marriage. It talks about work. It talks about the family. It talks about the most practical issues. And therefore, we went on through and we saw how detailed the Christian lifestyle was and how just tremendously practical it was. However, chapter four begins with, at least in this translation, it begins with the word four. In the modern translation we're reading here, it says, as a prisoner for the Lord then, chapter four verse one, I urge. you, that little word then is kind of lost. Actually, Paul begins with the word therefore.

Chapter 4, 5, and 6, with all of that great practical stuff is completely based on chapters 1, 2, and 3. When you read chapters 1, 2, and 3, you've got almost a totally different atmosphere. Couldn't you tell as I was reading it? I mean, we've been working through chapters 4, 5, and 6 in great detail, and it's just full of the most practical stuff. Chapter 1, immediately, if you're reading it all, immediately gives you a nosebleed. Immediately you begin to get nitrogen bubbles in the stream because you've been brought up from the place you were to a level and to a vantage point, as I was praying, and to see things from God's point of view. And it's lofty and it's difficult in some ways. But listen, chapter four hinges, four, five, and six,

hinges on chapter one, two, and three. And therefore, the teaching, and let's just take a minute to think about it is that you cannot live practically unless you know what you believe. In other words, doctrine. I use that word again. We worked on this a couple of weeks ago. Doctrine. There is nothing so dangerous as to say it doesn't matter what you believe religiously. It doesn't matter what your doctrine is. It doesn't matter what you believe as long as you live as a decent person. It doesn't matter what you believe as long as you're loving, honest, and so forth. Now, Thomas Jefferson made that into a dogma. He said, it's not your creed, but your deeds. It's not what you believe. Who knows what you believe? As long as you live as a decent person. He wrote one lady in

the letter is pretty famous. He said in there, I've never tried to persuade someone else to believe as I believe about God. Because who knows? It doesn't matter what you believe. It's by life and by my deeds that my life is validated, not by my beliefs. Now, the whole book of Ephesians is a complete contradiction to that. On Easter Sunday here, we talked about 1st Corinthians 15. That entire chapter is a challenge of that idea. Because Paul was writing to the Corinthians, and he said, some people are telling us that the dead are not raised.

He says, if Christ is not raised, if the dead are not raised, let's eat and drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. What's he saying? He is saying that beliefs are absolutely practical for your daily living. And he said, if there is no afterlife, if there is no heaven or hell, then who in the world is to say that I should sacrifice myself to be nice to people? Who's to say what is being moral and decent? See, Paul is perfectly logical and Thomas Jefferson is perfectly illogical. But I know that what Thomas Jefferson says certainly rings much more true on the streets of New York than what Paul is saying. And therefore we've got to screw this in. We've got to make sure that our understanding as Christians of reality has not been restructured by the world. Paul says, you cannot live a decent and loving life except on the basis of faith and belief and doctrine. Now, when somebody says, just to show you the illogic of what Jefferson says, is if somebody says to you, it doesn't matter what you believe, as long as you're decent and loving.

Okay? The problem with that is that's a belief. Who's to say it's important to be decent and loving? Why? Scientists tell you it's important to be decent and loving. It doesn't matter what you believe as long as you're as decent loving, but that is a belief. You've just done something, you know, you just told me I'm not allowed to do. And that is to say, it's a belief. Besides that, you can turn around to a person and say, well, let me ask you why you believe it's important to be decent and loving. For example, I'm a landlord. And I think it's much more important to get money than it is to care for the welfare of my tenant. So I'm gouging them, and I don't care. All right? See, that's not right. Why not? And as soon as that guy tries to answer, as soon as he tries to answer you, he's into beliefs. He's into doctrine. You see, for example, he has to be assuming that people are more important than money.

But why? Money lasts longer. And money is a lot more useful. And money doesn't talk back to you. I mean, there's all sorts of ways in which you can say, why is, what makes you say that people are more important than money? There's an assumption about human nature. there's assumption about human value. That's belief stuff.

That's faith. That's doctrine. You can't even say doctrine doesn't matter without laying down a doctrine. You can't even say, for example, that is only important to be moral and decent without defining moral and decent. And science can't do that, but that's a belief. And what Paul is trying to say then is let's make sure as Christians, we don't let that illogic and that pollution and that pernicious idea, which is not only illogical, but ultimately it just contradicts itself and it eats itself. up. There's no basis for morality except religion. There's no basis for even talk about moral

and decency unless you start talking about the nature of God, the nature of human beings, the nature of right and wrong metaphysics, not physics, you know, that which is beyond, that which you can taste, touch, here, and see and smell. And Paul says, let's not be bothered by that nonsense. Let's make sure we see that you cannot be good in your marriage, chapter five. You cannot deal with your conscience, chapter six. You cannot work in a sense. a way that is satisfying, that's chapter 6. You cannot solve your differences and communicate in chapter 4 unless you understand the great lofty doctrines about the nature of God and about salvation, about redemption, and about sin, and about Jesus is the sin bearer, and about adoption,

forgiveness, and so forth. All the deep doctrine, all the heavy stuff in chapters 1, 2, and 3 comes first. And frankly, what it means to live a Christian life is to understand that doctrine and work it out. There is absolutely no life without truth. Life is based on truth. Jefferson was wrong, and many of us are living, though we say we're Christians, as if Jefferson was right. Because you read chapters 1, 2, and 3, and you say, I don't want to get into all that. Well, that's where we're going. And we're going to do this, actually over a period of about four months. I've tried to map the thing out, so we move through a little bit more, more of a clip than we did the last three. And what we're going to do is, I would like to show you that chapter 1 and chapter 2. are pretty intriguing. In chapter one, we actually see salvation from God's point of view.

In chapter two, we actually see salvation from our point of view. In chapter one, we see what God has done. And you see, if you go through chapter one, verse 3 to 15, you see this marvelous, almost what some of the theologians call the order of salvation, the ordo salutis. You see, first of all, it talks about him choosing us. then redeeming us by blood. Then we're forgiven and adopted. Then we're kept safe forever. Then we're brought into glory. And believe it or not, that even that's not the end of the picture.

That's verse 14. But when you get into verses 15 to the end, it actually begins to talk about the fact that there's a glory beyond heaven. And that is the consummation of all history in which there's even a further glory can fade on us. Now, it's heavy stuff. It's esoteric stuff. I'm telling you this.

If you say this isn't practical, you don't understand how Christianity works at all. It's intensely practical, as I'm going to try to show you all the way along. Chapter 2 actually shows salvation from the human point of view. Instead of starting with him choosing us and forgiving us and redeeming us by blood, chapter 2 starts with sin, being dead and trespasses in sin and then becoming alive. Then it moves into the idea and the concept of how faith develops us. and turns us into people who can do certain things. There are certain deeds that we alone can do

because of the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. And then it moves on through into talking again about what it means for our relationships as Christians. So chapter two is almost a psychological, starting with your own heart from your point of view what happens in salvation. All I knew is I was dead and I'm alive. And now these things are beginning to happen.

But in chapter one, we see salvation from God's point of view. what he's done for us and what he does in order to enable the great things in us that actually happen. Now, we're only going to start with the first step tonight, and I think it's going to be pretty intriguing because the first step is, what? You see it? It says in verse three, four, pardon me, it says, we get all these great spiritual blessings, and then it begins, four, see? It says, praise me to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. That is a statement.

If you realize the heaviness of it, if you actually try to intellectually get underneath it or even emotionally get underneath it, it will just crush you. It'll break your back. It's like putting something on it's too heavy. You see what it's saying? It says, in Christ, there is no joy,

there is no honor, every spiritual blessing, there is no satisfaction, there is nothing possible of a good nature. There is nothing great possible but is actual for the Christian. Think about that. There is nothing, nothing that you can possibly imagine, and even beyond what you can imagine,

great that is possible that will not happen to you if you're a believer. In Christ, every spiritual blessing. But then, verse four, four, which means here's why, here's why you as a Christian are the recipient of these great blessings, of these great benefits and great resources. Verse four, for he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love, he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ. The first step is he chooses us.

Now, let's start with that. I like to state it, I like to state what the Bible teaches, and then backpedal a bit and deal with all the objections. I want you to know, let me start off this way by saying, this doctrine is the most comforting doctrine possible. If you just kind of let yourself experience it. The problem with most of us cognitive types is as soon as we hear the doctrine, instead of experiencing it, we immediately begin to say,

but what about this problem, what about this problem that it creates? Frankly, the doctrine of election and predestination, which is constant through this chapter and constant through the Bible, and if you try to avoid it because you don't get it or you don't really like it, and you try to, you know, it's a little bit like trying to walk and miss the mud puddles, you know, down in the village on a rainy day. After a while, you give up because you just start getting soaked and you say, oh, well. The same thing happens with this. You can't avoid it. It keeps coming up. It keeps coming up. The doctrine itself, if you experience it, is a tremendously comforting thing.

If you don't sit down and try to work out every bit of the intellectual implications of it, which can in some cases be pretty complicated. Think of the doctrine of election as a piece of hard candy. When you first, bite it, it hurts. You know, you don't taste anything. In fact, it kind of feels like it maybe it's going to actually break your tooth or something. But if you just put the pressure on it, once you bite into it, it's tremendously sweet on the inside. From the outside, it looks like it's going to bust your jaw. But from the inside, it's tremendously sweet. And I would not bring it up. There's plenty of things that people differ on. This is one of the things. So I wouldn't even bring it up, because I believe in choosing my battles. I wouldn't bring it up

if I didn't think that this was crucial for the Christian life. And I'll be happy later on to tell you how crucial it is for my life. But let me just explain what the doctrine is. Look, basically what Paul is saying is, why do some people have these spiritual blessings? Why is it that some people have got these great things happening in their life? Verse 3. And his answer is,

if I say to you, why are you a Christian? You immediately say because I chose the Lord. And that is true. But that's from the human point of view. Ephesians 1 is looking from the other point of view, looking down from God in a sense. And the answer here is the ultimate cause that Paul is saying is you chose him because he chose you. So he says, I put it this way, why do some people have these blessings? Why do some people have it?

Why do you experience this today? And the answer is because he chose you. Now, when somebody says, I don't like it that way, I think, frankly, the real reason is because I accepted Christ. The answer, of course, is that's the penultimate reason, according to Chapter 1. It's not the ultimate reason. And let me show you the problem that comes up immediately if you insist on making your choice ultimate rather than penultimate. If I ask you, and this happened to me some years ago, I do this in the new member seminar, so some of you've heard a number of these illustrations, but we got to this place in the

passage, so I'll pull them out again. Some years of it. Some years of you, ago, the question was put to me like this, because I thought you could be kind of agnostic about this whole thing. Was God's choice more penultimate, or was our choice, which is ultimate, which is penultimate? Which causes which is the answer, is the question. Here's the answer, I think. Somebody once said to me, why are you a Christian? Why, verse three, do you have these spiritual blessings? Why do you have these things in your life when other people don't? And so your answer, the first answer always is, from the human point of view, because I've received Christ. The question is good. Why did you receive Christ?

and the other people haven't. Well, the answer is because I admitted my sins. Great. Why did you admit your sins and other people haven't? Well, I humbled myself and other people didn't. Great, comes the question. Why did you humble yourself and other people didn't? Now, you see what's going on here?

As long as you make your choice the ultimate reason that you today are a Christian, the real bottom line, the real bottom line, of why you're a Christian and other people aren't today is because you're better. There's no other way out of it. You're better. You're smarter. Or maybe you're more open. Or maybe you're more humble. But that's still better. Or maybe so, well, there's nothing better about me, but I was just willing than you're more willing. Listen, that goes completely against everything the scripture teaches. 1 Corinthians 15. Paul says, I was the least of the apostles. I was one abnormally born, but by the grace of God, I am what I am. and therefore

you have got to see that this is the doctrine of election. Let's put it this way. Nobody. You cannot make yourself a Christian. You did not make yourself a Christian. This is how Christianity differs from every other religion. Buddhist, the teaching of the Buddhist is

if you want to be a Buddhist, you have to make yourself a Buddhist. Here's what to do. The teaching of Islam, you want to be a Muslim, you've got to make yourself a Muslim. Here's what you do. Christianity is completely different. You want to be a Christian? You can't even want to be a Muslim. a Christian unless God has begun to open your heart. You can't make yourself a Christian. Nobody can. Therefore, pride and superiority are utterly excluded. And you are what you are by the grace of God alone. If you believe that God's choice is ultimate and your choice is penultimate, then you can really

mean that when you say that. If you believe that your choice is ultimate, then when you say, I am what I am by the grace of God alone, you don't actually mean it. Almost completely by the grace of God alone. But there was one little bit of difference between me and other people. No, says Paul, there's no qualifications. There's no qualifications at all. If you, there's no, of course, about it. If somebody says to a person who understands that, that your choice was, was ultimate, are you a Christian? You say, well, of course I'm a Christian because I received Christ. But you see, if you believe that your choice was penultimate and God's choice of you was ultimate, and somebody says, well, are you a Christian? You say, yes,

it's astonishing. It's amazing. It's almost a joke. Why? me, but it's true. You see, the doctrine of the sovereignty of God of election, the doctrine of the ultimacy of God's choice, the doctrine of the absolute sheer graciousness of your Christianity means that you always will have a sense of humor about yourself. Because you know that it's actually a joke, why me? I don't know. There is no good reason. In this, you know, in the way. It's a joke. me at all. And therefore, you see, that's the doctrine. Jesus says, no one, chapter 6, verse 44, no one can come to me, no one can come to me unless the father draws him. Marriage is one of the most significant human relationships there is, but is also one of the most difficult and misunderstood.

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eternity is ultimate and our choice, therefore, is caused by his choice. His choice is ultimate. Our choice is penultimate. Secondly, that means that therefore you really can say it's by the grace of God absolutely alone, I am what I am. You can't make yourself a Christian. All of the religions say you can make yourself this, but Christianity says, no, you can't. It's something that God has to do to you. The father, no one can come to me except the Father draw him. The Father has to enable you. The Father has to open your heart. The Father has to give you the desire. The Father has to give you the desire. The father has to let you see the way to go. John chapter 3 says, you must be born again to see the kingdom. Can't even see the kingdom to want the thing unless God begins to open your

heart. And if that's true, then there's always a wonder and pride and superiority are completely excluded, and there's a joy and a wonder and an amazement always about the miraculousness of the fact today you believe. The last part is, some people say, well, isn't there a place? Some of someplace in Romans 8, verse 30, that says, those he foreknew, he predestined, those he predestined, he justified, and those he justified, he glorified. Isn't that true? Those he foreknew, he predestined. Well, somebody says, that means God can see the future. And so God saw the end from the beginning and he looked down the corridors of time. And he saw some people would choose him. So since he foreknew them, he predestined them. Now, the problem with that, besides it being

pretty redundant. I mean, if the person's already going to believe, why predestined them? I mean, why fix something that's already fixed? But not only that, if you look carefully at that verse, and I'm only saying this for some of you who've thought through this, it doesn't say some of them he foreknew he predestined and some of them he justified, because the word for no. The word no in the Bible is not an intellectual word. You know, when Jesus says to somebody, I never knew you, he doesn't mean I never knew about you. I didn't see you. I didn't have anything. You know, Jesus, I never knew you, he didn't say, who heck are you? That's not what he means. He says, you're not on the list of human beings. That's not what he's saying. When he says, I never knew

you. He says, I had no relationship with you. To know someone is a personal noun, a personal verb in the Bible. And when he says those they foreknew, doesn't mean God knew about looked ahead. It's not an intellectual word at all. It means, listen, to foreknow someone means to for love them. It means God put his love on you. God looked down the carters of time, put his love on you. And that's the reason that today you're just, today's the, because he loved you from before the creation of the world, that's the reason that today you say, I believe. Now, is the Bible teach that? Yeah, and I can't really take the time to explain how often it teaches it. You know, we went through the book of John in the morning services over the last few years, and it's kind of hard to avoid it.

Here's a place. You know the place where Jesus is talking about himself being the bread? He says, I'm the bread of life. He who comes to me shall not hunger. We sing it sometimes. So whosoever would take me and so forth. And it sounds very, very democratic. Of course it is. However, the Pharisees, the religious leaders say some mean things, and he turns around immediately. He says, you know why you don't believe in me? It's in John chapter 6. In verse 35, he says, I'm the bread of life. Anyone who comes to me will not hunger.

In verse 36 and 37, he says, You don't believe because all the Father gives me will come to me. I will lose none of those he has given me, and I will raise them up on the last day. What is he saying? If you don't believe, it's because you weren't chosen. And it's not just John who says it. It's not just Jesus who says it.

It's not just Paul who says it. You know, you can go on and on. Acts chapter 13. verse 48. That's Luke now, not John, not Peter, not my Paul. In the book of Luke, Luke is talking about how Paul was preaching and then how the people really like the sermon. And they believed. And Luke says, when the Gentiles heard, they were glad and they glorified the mind of God, the Word of God, excuse me, can't remain writing. When the Gentiles heard him, they glorified the Word of God and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.

The word ordained means to be appointed, you know. It doesn't say as many as believed were appointed to eternal life. It says as many as were appointed to eternal life believed. And, you know, it racks it up. I mean, the more you go through it, after a while you try to avoid the puddles, next thing you know, you can't. You're wet. It's all around you. Now, why do people want to avoid it?

Why do people want to avoid it? Here's a couple reasons, and I need to talk about it. First of all, a lot of people say, well, that means that people don't have free will. No, that's not true. That's not what the teaching is saying at all. Look, you have perfect, what is free will? Free will means I choose what I want to do. That's free will.

The Bible doesn't say that a human being can't choose God. The Bible teaches that a human being doesn't want to choose God. Not that you're incapable of choosing, but you're incapable of wanting it. Romans 3 says no one seeks God. Romans 8 says the natural mind, unless God actually comes in dust like the nat and natural mind, remember we talked about this a few weeks ago, has hostility toward God. So give me, a lot of people say, oh, that's not true. What do you mean? I see people trying to obey God all the time. They obey God. Yeah, they're raised in the church. They listen to the

Ten Commandments. Look carefully, and you will see, if you were raised in the church and you were given a kind of general Christian morality, you haven't stuck with it. Where haven't you stuck with it? You didn't stick with it. Whenever to obey really meant losing something. In other words, wherever your mastery of your life was really challenged, you always took it. You say, well, I obey the Ten Commandments. It's 90% of the time, but it's the ten percent where you disobey, look and see where that is. It's whenever God actually challenges you for the mastery of your life.

If you know to obey this means I'm going to lose something really important to me, then you disobey. Why? Why? Which just goes to show that 90% doesn't count in that the whole time you're in charge of your life. You haven't really done the whole purpose of obedience, which is to submit your life to the king. He doesn't just want your keeping his rules. He wants you. He wants you to say, you're the king. That's why I obey. Therefore, the Bible says that if you give a person a thousand choices, unless God opens that person's heart, she will never want to come. Here's the best example. Remember the lion example? You've heard that one.

Here's a lion. You put in front of him a bowl of hot piping quaker oats for breakfast, and on the right hand, and on the left hand, you put a piece of raw meat, and you give him that choice a thousand times. Now, everybody will tell you, everybody zoologists will tell you

that the lion is capable of eating the hot piping quaker oats. But he never, ever, ever, ever will. Why not? Does he mean he doesn't have free will? No. He's carnivorous. It's his nature not to want that. He's his nature to want this.

And when the Bible says that you cannot come unless the father draws you, that doesn't mean you don't have free will. Heck no. It means that you don't want him. And you can't want him unless he opens your eyes. The best illustration of the doctrine of election goes sort of like this. Here's 20 people and they're walking along and they're all blindfolded. And you see them walking one at a time down around.

down a ramp and everyone falling into a furnace and each one dying. So you go up to each one and say, you've got to stop walking into this furnace. You're walking into a furnace. You're all going to be killed. And the guys, I won't listen to. They say, that's ridiculous. We're on our way to Miami Beach. We can feel it getting warmer.

We can't wait to get out and get in under those rays. I mean, we live in New York City. It's at the end of April. It's 40 degrees in raining. We've got to do something. What happens is the Bible says the doctrine of God's ultimate. a choice is that God has to come and pull a blindfold off of you. And then you look and you say, what's the matter with me? Why am I walking to the furnace? Where's the way to Miami? Now, do you consider

that a forcing of a person's will? Heck no. You're given the person, his or her mind back. You're pulling the scales off the eyes. So this doctrine has nothing, nothing. In no way does this thing challenge the idea of free will. Well, somebody says it's unfair. Now we're getting closer to a problem. I admit it, but not completely yet. You're not there yet. I'll tell you where the problem shows up. But not yet.

See, it's unfair because you see the whole problem, and I can understand this idea. See, a lot of Christians sit there and say, if this makes no sense to you at all, you probably aren't born again. Because anybody who is eternal life, you know, deep down your heart, you know, you just didn't choose this thing.

God came to you, he opened your... I mean, you know that. You realize that... Eternal life is a gift, which means that there's a sense in which you don't really decide on it. What it means to be a Christian is not that you've decided to adhere to these beliefs and to move in this direction and to do these moral values, and you're sort of proceeding, as if you've decided to take a course, you've decided to sign up or something. That's not what Christianity is.

People who really have eternal life, they sense that some outside agitator has come on in. that something has grabbed you. Something is dealing with you in your innermost being. It's shaking you. It's your maker making you again. And you sense that something's being done to you. You know that. So you know that.

The real problem is the intellectual thing, which is it's not fair. Why should God choose some people and not others? Well, it's not unfair. Again, another illustration goes like this. It's only unfair if everybody deserves this. See, for example, five people and they're friends of yours. And you go up to, and they say, you know what we're going to do?

We're having, the recession has been hard on all of us. We're having trouble making our rents. We're going to go rob a bank. So you sit there and you say, this is ridiculous. You can't do that. You know what's going to happen? If you get caught in all this sort of thing, you can't do it. And you argue and you argue, but they're blind. They won't listen to you. They're crazed. So they say, out of our way, we're on our way out the door. So as they go out and out the door, what do you do? you come after and you take a nice little baseball back and you hit the back the last two knock them out drag them on in tie them up till they come to their senses the other three go off and they rob a bank they kill a guard they're on death row okay now what happens so you go to see

him on death row and they say well this wasn't fair if you took two of us you had to take all of us as a matter of fact it's your fault that we're here and you'd have to look at them and say that's ridiculous. The two people who are free have me and me alone, you see, to give, you know, to give gratitude to, but the three of you have you and you alone to blame. Since all of you deserved to be here, therefore it wasn't fair. It wasn't unfair for me to take two of you. Heck, I wasn't obligated to take any of you. So you really can't choose. You can't say, listen, God sends out the message to everybody, and if he decides to go and open the eyes of some people, it's not unfair. Well, then here's the third objection. Now we get to the real problem.

No, I won't get you to the real problem yet. I got five minutes. Let me get you to another objection. Let me get you to another objection. A third objection is, well, if it's all, if that's true, then why do we have to do anything? It's all set. It's all predetermined. I don't have to do a thing. For example, I don't have to talk to other people about Jesus. If they're elect, they're going to get it. I myself don't even have to do anything because if I'm elect, you know, I'm going to get it, as simple as that. Yeah. Again, it's really, if you think the thing out from God's point of view instead of your point of view, it starts to work itself out. See, for example, here's my, let's just say, my family and I go up to a cabin, and it's cold,

that's a great place, we're going to rough it. And I say to my oldest son, I say, listen, we're going to go out, we're going to cut the wood, and we're going to, if we don't cut the wood, you know, we're not going to have a fire and we're going to freeze, so we're going to go out and cut the wood. And you've never cut the wood, but I want you to cut the wood with me. I just want you to come out and cut the wood. And I'm going to watch you and I'm going to cut the wood. And I'm going to cut the wood. And I'm going to cut the wood. And I say, honey, why haven't you cut the wood? He says, well, Dad, I know that if I don't cut the wood, you're going to cut it anyway. So because I know that you won't let us freeze, I've lost all incentive. And I say, honey, why haven't you cut the wood? He says, well, Dad, I know that if I don't cut the wood, you're going to cut it anyway. So because I know that you won't let us freeze, I've lost all incentive. See, that's stupid. I say, I'll give you some incentive. I say, I would say, your incentive, see, your incentive for doing what I have said should not have been fear that you were going to die if you didn't do it. Your incentive should know you've got a father who at least has got the skill and got the capability and got the love to know that if you don't do it, yeah, yeah, you're right.

You're not going to freeze. You're not going to die. You're not going to really muck your life up. You're not going to kill your family. But I wanted you to be my partner. I wanted you to grow like me. I wanted you to do this to please me. In fact, you know, it takes all the pressure off you to realize that people aren't going to die if you don't do a good job.

How to kid, what was your incentive to start with if it wasn't love for me? Well, the only incentive was fear. See, the same thing happens when you say, well, if all these things are set, then I don't have to do anything. I've lost all my incentive to know that I can't really muck my life up. My dear friends, that is so wonderful to be a Christian and to believe this truth, to know that you're secure that you can't muck your life up. He's put his love on you. And if he's put his love on you, that means that he is working with you and he has given you things to do. And the reason that you're supposed to do them is to please him, to be grateful to him, not to say, well, if a person says,

well, if it's all set, I've lost my incentive, that means the only incentive you had before was fear and not love. Now, the real problem comes down to this. Why? Doesn't Jesus, doesn't God want to save everybody? Yes. He says so. He says, I'm not willing to see anybody die. Isn't it secondly true that God could save everybody? Yes. He's all powerful. Then why doesn't God save everybody? And you know what the answer is? We don't know. But you see, you better not blame it on me. If you say, well, I don't believe in this election, predestination stuff, I'm a Christian. I don't believe in that. You've got the same problem. Do you believe God wants everybody to be saved? Yes, you say. Do you believe that God could save everybody? Well, you say, I guess.

But you see, he doesn't want to violate anybody's free will. What the big deal about free will? Insult me for a minute and save me for eternity. What in the world? He's so wonderful about free will. You're going to tell me that you've got the answer for why God isn't saving everybody? Yes, I got the answer. He's not going to violate anybody's free will.

That's ridiculous. If that's God's reason for sending people to hell, it's a stupid reason. He's got a reason. He's got a reason that he doesn't say everybody, but you and I don't know it. And he's got a reason that he chooses some people, but you and I don't know it. And we do know it's not in us. It's not because I'm better. Let me conclude this way.

When I first met my wife, I was a Christian, she was a Christian, and I did know there were some people that believe this thing. And I said, but I thought only cultic strange people believe this. And I first met her, and I said, we talked, and I realized she believed this. She believed the doctor of the ultimacy of Christ's choice over ours, causing ours. And I said, well, how do you believe this? And she said, I couldn't face life without it. And that just floored me.

And I began to realize his time went on, it's true. You see, there is nothing more humbling and yet more wonderful than this. There is nothing makes you more secure. This is the kind of love you want. You see, why does he love you? Well, because I was humble. Well, because I did this or this. Remember, when your wife asked you guys, those of you're married, when your wife asked you,

honey, why do you love me? You don't say, I loved you because you were humbler than the other girls. I loved you because you're a better tennis partner. I loved you because you're prettier. None of those things, nobody wants love like that because you know that you can lose that kind of love. See, the love that you want is a love that is its own rationale. You know, whenever somebody is really in love,

you start to say incredible things that are so slurpy when they're put down on a piece of paper. You know, that slurpy thing from years ago, that Dan Fogelberg's song that talked about, you know, longer than there have been fishes in the ocean, higher than any bird ever flew, longer than there have been stars up in the heaven, I've been in love with you. But the reason you talk slurpy like that is because you know ultimately that there is a kind of love somewhere like that. A love that says, I love you just because I love you, just because I love you, just because I love you.

Only Christians know that there is really a love like that, that there really is somebody who has said longer than there have been stars up in the heavens, for he chose us in love before the foundation of the world. A Christian is the, a Christian who understands this says, the stars may fall from heaven, but his love for me will stand because his love is older than the stars and it will outlive the stars. That's liberating. Those of you who wonder about self-esteem, electing love is the only thing that will really do it. There's a friend of mine. Now, I'll try to finish up next week. There's a friend of mine I knew for example, was a missionary in Korea, and he tried to win the little girl prostitutes to Christ. And when he gave him a kind of conventional appeal to become Christians, they usually would say,

you don't understand. God couldn't possibly, possibly accept us. No matter what we do, we're just awful. Their self-esteem was that bad. Finally, Harvey turned around and said to them, listen, they told him about the doctrine of electing love and predestination. He says, you know why some people come to Christ? because God, sheerly in his mercy, chooses some people so that the people who come to Christ, like me, he said, it has nothing to do with my desserts, it has nothing to do with my merits, it's sheerly because of his love and grace, totally. And they said, you're kidding. In Korean.

And they said, well, how do we know if we're elect? How do we know we've been chosen? And this is the simplest part. Harvey says, do you want this? And he said, yes. Well, I said, well, listen, that means God must be working in your heart because the Bible says, you can't want God unless he's working in your heart. Don't give yourself too much credit.

You see, the doctrine of election actually takes away anything. Any kind of merit. If you say, but I do want this, I do want this, I do want this, I do want this, then he's working in your life. You couldn't possibly want it otherwise. You can't say, well, I want this, but how do I know God's going to accept me? What did Harvey say to them? He said, if you want it, it means he has accepted you.

Come. This is the doctrine of grace. grace, not just grace. This is a doctrine of love behind love, not just love. This is the reason what my life verse in 1 Corinthians 1 is, God shows the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. God shows the weak things, the shame the strong. God shows the foolish things and the lowly things and the despise things, even the things that are not to bring to nothing the things that are, that no one will boast in his presence. Don't you see what you can look, you look at that and you realize the only thing God actually says might be a reason why he chooses some over others

is he likes to play jokes. He loves to go after the weaker ones. He loves to go after the most foolish. So the proud people will see that God is God. So the proud people will see that salvation is by grace and grace alone. There's been no worship in my life until I understood this. There was no security in my life until I realized this. Until I realized I never truly earned it at all.

that I really understand that I couldn't possibly lose it at all. Some of you think that you're better than other people. You think that you've made it. You think you're more polished. You think you're getting up in the world. My friends, eventually life is going to teach you that you're not. And come to this doctrine and let Jesus teach you. Jesus was always a better teacher, a much more gentle teacher than life will be.

It's only by God's grace that you have not been, that you weren't born, in a Kurdish family, clinging to the side of a cliff, another part of the world. Then how many degrees would you have, huh? then what would your cash flow be? Even what you are now is due to the grace and mercy surely of Jesus Christ and God.

And therefore, you need to rest and relax completely in that grace tonight. If you're a Christian, you need to see that he loves you because he loves you and you need to worship him for that.

If you're not a Christian, then you have to say, man, this's a little bit confusing, but I'll tell you this. If you don't like the idea of a God who's king, I tell you, you need a king. You don't need a king.

president of the universe. You need a king. You need a king who loves you and loves you in terms of sovereignty and power. I know that right now our culture is against the idea of really submitting to an absolute king. That's all that the Bible gives you. And I tell you, if your heart leaps at all and says, I would like to know a king like this, I would like to have a love like this, then that love is already working in your life. Then go to him because he's already come to you. And he's done everything for you. Let's close in prayer. Father, as we listen to the music, as we take up the offering, we pray that all of us will think about this great grace and realize that the ultimate reason that we chose you is because you chose us. We thank you that you're a God like that,

that there really is a love that's older than the stars, and that therefore there is a love that will outlast the stars. Father, help us to revel in this, help us to rejoice in this, help us not to worry about the intellectual problems that are there. Instead, help us to bite down into this and receive the sweetness out of it, for we pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thanks for listening to Tim Keller on the Gospel and 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 and 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 gospelinlife.com slash partner. That website again is gospelinlife.com slash partner. Today's sermon was recorded in 1992. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life podcast were recorded between 1989 and 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.