Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - No One Seeks God

Episode Date: July 7, 2023

Romans 1 through 4 gives Paul’s version of the entire biblical story, also called the gospel. In this passage, we come to the end of Paul’s analysis of what’s wrong with the human race.  When I was a new believer, this was a tough passage for me. It bothered me, and I wrestled with it. But eventually it revolutionized my way of thinking about life and myself and the world.  This is perhaps the most radical of all the statements the Bible gives us about what’s wrong with the human heart. We’re going to learn three things about sin here: 1) the egalitarianism of sin, 2) the trajectory of sin, and 3) the cure for sin. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on March 1, 2009. Series: Bible: The Whole Story - Creation and Fall. Scripture: Romans 3:9-20. 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. People around the world understand the word gospel to mean good news, but it's much more than a message of salvation. The gospel is also a comprehensive worldview that can shape how we understand ourselves, others, and the world around us. Today Tim Keller is delving into the underlying implications of the gospel and how it truly changes everything. After you listen, we invite you to go online

to gospelandlife.com and sign up for our email updates. When you sign up, you'll receive our quarterly newsletter with articles from Dr. Keller as well as other valuable gospel-centered resources. Subscribe today at gospelandlife.com. Romans chapter 3 verses nine through 20. What shall we conclude then? Are we any better?

Not at all. We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. As it is written, there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away. They have together become worthless. There is no one who does good, not even one. Their throats are open graves. Their tongues practice, deceit. The poison of vipers is on their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.

Their feet are swift to shed blood. Ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace, they do not know. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Therefore, no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law. Rather, through the law, we become conscious of sin. This is the word of the Lord. The Bible, we say every week, is not so much a series

of little disconnected stories each with a moral. The Bible is actually a single story about what's wrong with the world and the human race. What God has done to put that right in Jesus Christ, and finally, how history then as a result is going to that right in Jesus Christ. And finally, how history then, as a result, is going to turn out in the end. And that is the story of the Bible. And what we're looking at in Romans 1, 2, 3, and 4

is Paul's version, St. Paul's version, of that entire biblical story, which is also called the gospel. And we are coming here, in this passage, to the very end of his analysis of what's wrong with the human race, which, though it's a tiny little word, is fraught with profound meaning. The Bible's answer to the question, why what's wrong with the human race is the word sin.

And Paul here is giving us a kind of summary statement of the biblical doctrine you could say of sin. And when I was a new believer and just trying to work my way around the Bible, I want you to know that this particular passage gave me fits. It was a tough passage for me. It seemed over the top some of the statements. You know, it bothered me and I wrestled with it, but eventually it revolutionized my way of thinking about life and about myself and about the world.

And I'll share a little bit of that what I learned back then with you now. But this is perhaps the most radical. And the strongest of all the statements that the Bible gives us about what's wrong with the human heart. And we're going to learn three things about sin here. The egalitarianism of sin, yes, that's what I said, the trajectory of sin and finally the cure for sin. The egalitarianism of sin, the trajectory of sin and the cure for sin. Now, first, and we're going to work pretty much through the passage.

In the very beginning, in verses 9 and 10, Paul is making a statement, he's making a point that I'm going to call the egalitarianism of sin. He says over and over again, there is no one righteous, there is no one who understands, there is no one who seeks for God, but it's in verse 9, he says the most amazing things. He says, Jew and Gentile alike are under sin. Are we any better? Not at all. They have to remember, Paul's looking back to Romans 1,

where he's talking about the pagan Gentiles rolling in the streets, sex drugs and reckons roll. Okay, that's what these long lists of sexual practices and evil, corruption practices of civil and corporate and individual, and then Paul identifies himself as a God-fearing Jew who's trying to obey the Tank Commandments in chapter 2, and he says, are we any better than them? Not at all. moral. Moral in immoral, religious in secular, he's saying there is no difference. In fact, in the beginning, he says, a like or under sin, well, what does that mean?

Well, if you want to understand what that means, you can scroll to the bottom of the text, where it says in verse 19, the whole world is held accountable to God. And the word accountable means liable. It's a judicial word word accountable means liable. It's a judicial word, it means liable for punishment. And what he's saying is, no matter who you are, no matter what your record, no matter whether you've lived a life of altruism and compassion and service, or a life

of cruelty and exploitation, we're all alike. We're all condemned., were all lost, we all deserve to be rejected by God. That's what he's saying. Now, how could that be? And that's actually getting the point too. Though, let me remind you of what we even know from last week, if you were here,

in looking at Romans 2. Paul is saying that a criminal robbing and murdering people and a moral religious upright Pharisee who thinks because of his good deeds and his righteousness God owes him blessing and people owe him respect. Paul is saying that as different as those look on the surface underneath those are both expressions of the same radical self-centeredness, radical self-absorption that is thin. Now how that can be, we'll get to in a second, but here's what I want you to see.

When Paul says, all I like, are they any better than us? Not at all. This is radical egalitarianism. I want you to see what the implications, let me give you two implications. The first implication is if you're looking at Christianity, and I know some of you are, if you're thinking about Christianity, like, well, what is this about? If you're exploring it, if you want to know more about it, almost always you come unconsciously with a preliminary model already determined in

your mind for how this is going to work. Basically, most people come to Christianity and I'm going to explore this and you start to say, okay, somehow there's some things this and that I must do for God. And if I do this and that for God, then God will be obliged to do this in that for me. That's how spirituality works. If I do this in that for God, God will do this in that for me. That's the model in your head. You kind of assume it.

You think you're exploring, though you already assume that model. What you're actually exploring, you think, is what's the this in the that's? Most people think, well, in spirituality works like this, there is a set of, there's some kind of life that is considered a good life, and I must adopt it. And there's a kind of life that's a bad life, and I must reject it. And then if I adopt a good life and reject an abandoned the bad life, then God will do this and that. I'm just trying to find out what is a good life, what do I have to stop doing, what I have

to start doing, what will God do. That's what you think of it exploring, but I want you to see that the model is wrong. Because hear me. Whatever Paul is talking about, when he calls people to become Christians and receive salvation, whatever Jesus is calling us to do, when he calls us to take salvation, he can't be calling us to simply stop bad living and start good living because he's saying here that the people who live good are no better

than the people who live bad. They're all spiritually lost, spiritually speaking, they're in the very same place. So if you think that what it means to become a Christian is well there's certain things I gotta stop doing and certain things I gotta start doing and then God will bless me. You're wrong. Well, what is it then?

I'm just trying to get you to see, because you come in with a grid, because you come in with a grid, it doesn't actually understand or accept this, because there's nobody believes this except Christians, no other worldview, no other religion, no other philosophies has anything like this. The fact is that whatever it is that Jesus and Paul are calling you to in order to get salvation, it's nothing like anything you can conceive of. You're going to have to listen really carefully because it's not on your mental map. Whatever it is is off, is a category buster.

And I just want you to recognize that. That it's unique, it's different, it's not what you expect, and you're gonna have to listen carefully. Because the gospel doesn't really fit in the other human category. So first of all, please keep in mind, that Paul and Jesus, I and me,

when I call you to become a Christian, I'm not just saying stop these bad, you know, living like this and start living like this. Of course, I want you to change your Christian, I'm not just saying stop these bad, you know, living like this and start living like this. Of course I want you to change your life. But change life is absolutely important, but it can't be the main thing. It can't be the chief thing. It can't be the central thing.

Why? Because people who live good lives and people who live bad lives are all alike, according to God. Now the other implication is let's just say you have a brace Christianity and you say, I am a Christian, do you realize the radical nature of this statement, are we any better,

not at all? There was nobody, whoever lived probably, who was more dedicated and upright and dedicated to his God, his principles, to the scripture than Paul. And yet when Paul, it's just amazing if you read all the way through Romans. If Paul goes through that list of sexual practices and various sorts of corruption in chapter one, and then he gets to chapter three and says, am I any better than them, not at all?

For Paul to say, I have come to the conclusion through the gospel that the criminal who is killing people and robbing people and raping people in the street is equal to me, that I am no better than that person. That is unbelievable. And I want you to think about this. Paul was a Pharisee, and as a Pharisee he would have considered Gentiles as spiritual dogs and unclean. And

yet here he is now dedicating his life to living with them, to living with these racially other people. Is it possible before the gospel came to Paul that he could have looked at heretics and infidels and said we're equal? He could have looked at pagans and he could have looked at libertines and immoral people and said we're equal not on your life. But now here's what's going on. A group of people, big swaths of the human race, that he would have looked down on, that he would have scorned, that he would have written off, that he would have shown no love and respect

for. The gospel, the doctrine of sin has radically rehumanized the human race for Paul. Can you hear me? Radically rehumanized. There's all kinds of people that he would have looked down on, caricatured them, thought who has anything to do with it? And now, I'm no better than them. These people are radically rehumanized in their mind.

Do you think this doctrine of total depravity, and that's an old theological term for this doctrine, the idea that the world is not filled with good people and bad people, that all people are lost, all people are neat salvation, all people are sinful, total depravity. The doctrine of total depravity will make you look down on people, not at all. Look what happened to Paul. If you believe in this doctrine of total depravity, you think it out and you take it to the center of your life, it rehumanizes the human race. All kinds of people that you would never give a time of day to, you know, love and respect. But I, because I'm no better, wherever you are socially, your social location makes you prone to look down your nose at people

of certain races, certain classes, certain nationalities. Even your vocation does. You're an artist. Oh, look at the traditional middle-class bourgeois. Your traditional middle-class bourgeois, look at these freaky stupid artists. You're conservative, you're liberal. You know, you really feel about your politics. Do you really look the other side and say, I'm no better?

No, you don't say that. You say, we're a lot better. You say, and true, no matter where any place you are in the world, whatever your racial or your cultural group, your national grouping, you've got a history with another kind of person, another kind of grouping, that you have always tended to, and your social location makes you tend to despise them, but if you believe in the doctrine of sin, you're no better. Do you see the radical egalitarianism of the biblical doctrine of sin? Secondly,

we also learn here about the trajectory of sin. Now, see, we have to now deal with the fact that a lot of people say, this is just over the top. I did as a young Christian. I looked at this and I see Paul saying, no one seeks for God. Well, sure seems to me like there's a lot of people spiritually searching and seeking to please God. And then it says, no one does good. Well, that's, wow, wait a minute. What do we know nobody does good? But if you look more carefully,

you will see that what Paul is giving us here is a definition of sin that goes deep. And what he's showing us is that sin is relational before it ever becomes, if it ever becomes a behavioral thing like breaking the law. It's relational before it ever becomes, and it doesn't have to become, behavioral in breaking the law. Why? Because look at the word turn away, all have turned away. And even look at the word seek, no one seeks for God. These are directional words. And what is talking about is trajectory.

It's talking about direction, your aim. Therefore sin is not so much a matter of whether you're doing bad things or whether you're doing good things. Sin is mainly a matter of what you're doing, you're doing for. And what we're being told is that sin makes you want to get away from God. Not go toward him to get away from God, not go toward him, get away. Sin makes you want to get out from under his gaze, get out from under his hands, get out

from under his control. You want to be your own Savior, you want to be your own Lord, you want to keep God at arms length and you want to stay in control of your own life. That's what sin makes you want to do. And as we have often said, but we have to say it now, again, there's two ways to be your own Savior and Lord. There's two ways to keep God in arms like one is to be a lot of yourself live any way you want. The other is to be very, very good and go to church and obey the Bible and do everything you possibly can and try to live like

Jesus so that God has to bless you. So God has to save you, in which case, you're trying to get control over God. And in that case, you are not seeking God. You're seeking things from God. See, the text doesn't say, no one seeks blessing from God. Of course they do. No one seeks answers of prayer from God. Of course they do.

No one seeks forgiveness from God. Of course they do. No one seeks spiritual feelings from God. Of course they do. But no, Paul saying no one seeks God. Of course they do. No one seeks spiritual feelings from God. Of course they do. But no, Paul is saying no one seeks God. And all you're so-called serving. And all you're so called doing good is really for yourself. It's away from God. It's away from others. It's toward self-centeredness. That's the trajectory. Let me give you an example of how what looks like selfish selflessness and sacrificial love and service is not.

AA can tell you, listen, people who involved in AA know about this sort of thing. When I'm about to describe to you, happens all the time. I'm gonna describe to you a married couple in which one spouse is an alcoholic. In a way, there could be the woman, rather than the husband, it could be the, you know, rather than the husband, rather than the woman. But I'm just going to make it this way.

I'm going to have the husband be alcoholic, the wife not. And here's how it often works. Often. Husbands an alcoholic. And so what does the wife have to do? Over the years, she has to bail them out. She has to make excuses for them. She has to clean up his mess. She has to clean up his mess.

She has to constantly rescue him. And then, of course, she turns on him and says, do you know what I'm doing for you? You see, I'm not leaving you. I'm staying with you. I'm trying to keep this marriage together. I'm trying to keep our family together. I'm trying to keep our family economically a flow of no help

to you. And I have to do this. And I have to do that. And I have to do all these things because, you know, look what you're doing to me. I suffer so much for you. I give so much to you and yet you do this all over and over and over again. So she seems to be the one who's serving. She seems to be the one who's giving of herself, right?

And yet AA will tell you how often this will happen if the husband gets into rehabilitation and begins to get better. Very often the marriage will fall apart. She won't like it. She won't be able to deal with it. Why not? If she really loved him, you want the best for the person that you love. If you love a person, you want best for the person, and the best thing for an addict is

for to go sober. If he really loves him, she should love to have him sober, but she doesn't. You know why? Here's what usually happens. She needed him to be a mess. She needed him to be a mess so she could rescue him. So she could feel good about herself.

She could feel worthwhile, so she could feel in control, so she could demand things of him and other people, so she could feel very noble about herself. She wasn't seeking him, she wasn't loving him, she was loving herself. She wasn't serving him, she was serving herself, she wasn't seeking him, she was seeking things from him, she was seeking power, she was seeking control, and underneath all of that selflessness, and underneath all of that service, she was serving herself and she was being radically selfish. She was doing all the right things, but she was doing it for herself.

And Paul is saying, that is the case with all of us, actually. Nobody, unless the whisper comes in to change your heart, nobody serves God for God. Nobody's really seeking God. They're seeking things from God. Nobody even serves others, because you always serve people. You always serve God as long as it benefits you.

So you can feel good about yourself, so you can make demands. So you can feel noble. No one seeks for God. No one does good. It doesn't mean nobody formally does good things. Of course, it is better to give to the poor. Of course, it is better to forgive somebody than it is to harm somebody who would have spent all the money on yourself, of course.

Not saying there aren't such things as virtuously as we're looking at the heart, we're looking at trajectory. Most Christians, even pastors, struggle to talk about their faith in a way that applies the power of the gospel to change lives, especially in our skeptical culture. Tim Keller's book, Preaching, Communicating Faith in an Age of Skepticism, is a guide for anyone who wants to become more effective in communicating about their faith.

Pastors and lay people alike. Drawing on his years of experience, Dr. Keller will help you share your faith in a more engaging, passionate, and compassionate way from the pulpit or in the coffee shop. Preaching is our thank you for your gift to help Gospel and Life share the hope of Christ's love with people all over the world. So request your copy today at gospelandlife.com slash give. That's gospelandlife.com slash give. Now here's Tim Keller with the remainder of today's teaching.

And I want you to know that when I just finished a little personal story here that early on in my Christian life, when I was struggling with Romans three, and figuring this just seems over the top, I feel like I do good, I feel like I sought God before I became a Christian too, and I just thought that Paul was just being over the top. But I remember, sometime early in my Christian walk

and it would have been in my early 20s, I had a very bad patch, everything was going wrong in my life. I suppose looking back on it, I suppose, I don't even remember the circumstances. For all I know, looking back on it, it might have been pretty weak tea, but at the time it seemed like the end of the world. I was sitting there and was praying and actually began to say, why should I be praying? What am I getting out of this relationship with God? Doesn't answer my prayers. There's all this unjust, these unjust things happening around me.

You know, I've worked my fingers to the bone for this man. And what am I getting out of it? And I had a thought. I'll never forget the thought. Now, because of my Presbyterian, I figured it was a hunch. If I was a member of some other denominations, I would have said, it's God speaking to me. Now in my mature theological position, as I think about it, it probably was God speaking to me through a hunch. And the thought was this, now, only now that everything is going wrong in your life,

now we'll find out whether you got into this faith to get God to serve you or in order to serve God. Now we'll know. And I began to realize maybe Paul was right, that really every single part of my heart either did bad things and now I was doing good things, I was doing good things for myself. No one seeks for God, no one is righteous, no one is really doing good for goodness' sake or for God's sake or even for other people's sake but for your own sake. And that radical self-centeredness is what's making the world a mess. And I came to see that I was running from God

even in my good deeds. Do you? I hope you do. Now lastly, how are we gonna cure this? I mean, this is a problem. In fact, you know, this middle part of the passage, their throats are open graves, their tongues practice the seats,

the poison of viperses on their lips, their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood. They ruin and misery mark their ways the way of peace They do not know. You know, whenever I look out on a Manhattan crowd, you know, many of you look quite marvelous and But this is what you look like to God Night of the living dead. You know, look at it.

It's amazing, spiritually speaking, and this is the case. Underneath all of our doing good, underneath all the good deeds and working for charity and trying to do the right thing and trying to honor your parents. All the good deeds, there's anger, there's touchiness, there's turning on people who if they harm you, there's a great deal of discouragement on happiness because God is not doing what He ought to be doing in my life. Inside it's all a mess.

And it's that kind of spiritual leprosy. You may look great on the outside, but inside you're falling apart. It's like spiritual leprosy. What will cure us? And Paul here at the end tells us two things that are the keys to the cure. The first thing is, at the very end, every mouth may be silenced. Now when Paul says that, you must remember that this is the end of his exposition of why we need salvation. And starting in verse 21, we'll get to it next week, he begins to open us up to salvation. He says, but now a salvation or righteousness.

But he's bringing us to this point, and this is his way of saying, you'll never be able to receive Christ's salvation unless you shut up spiritually, unless your mouth is silenced. Now what does it mean to be shut up, to shut up spiritually, unless your mouth is silenced. Now, what does it mean to be shut up spiritually? To have your mouth silenced means, no excuses, and no plan B. See, if you say, oh, I know I did wrong God, but I can do better next time. I know I've done these things wrong, but I can turn it around. I see my motives are bad, but I can change my mind.

Shut up. See, as long as you're still saying, I know I can do, I know I can do, Paul says, you haven't shut up and you're not ready for salvation. You can't receive the cure for this sin. Unless you realize you can't fix yourself, you realize that even trying to fix yourself makes yourself worse because every effort to somehow put it together and be a better person and really try harder is really just another effort in self-justification, self-salvation, self-sufficiency, you're just making yourself worse. And this condition of spiritually shutting up and just being quiet so you can receive the cure doesn't mean by the way beating yourself up and just being quiet, so you can receive the cure, doesn't mean, by the way, beating yourself up.

Oh, I've done so wrong. Shut up. You're still centered on yourself. You've got to get to the end of yourself. So the only way to begin to get pulled out of the radical self-centeredness of sin, is you've got to get to the end of yourself. And that means not just saying, oh, I'm so sorry for my sin, I'll try to do better. You've got to not only be sorry for your sin, but even sorry for the reason you did anything right

in your whole life, which means you got nothing to do but receive. There's nothing you can do now. You just got to wait and listen. John Gerstner puts it like this. Because of the gospel, the weight of God is wide open. No sin can hold you back because God has offered justification to the ungodly. Nothing now stands between you and God, but your good works. Now listen carefully. All you need is need.

All you need is nothing, but most people don't have it. They've got, well, look at the good things I've done. Shut up. But look at how bad these are. I can really shut up. See, what he's saying here is, all you need is need, all you need is nothing, but most people don't have it. He's saying, the way you open

yourself to salvation, in fact the only way you can receive salvation is not just simply to repent of your sins, Pharisees repent of your sins. When they do something wrong, they say, oh, I did wrong and I'm going to do better. You know, they repent of their sins and they're still Pharisees. If you want to become a Christian, you don't just repent of your sins, but you also begin to repent of the reason that you did anything right. And now you're in a position to say, I need something completely different than just help to live the right way. So first of all, shut up.

Spiritual silence. The second thing you need for the Cure is the fear of the Lord. Actually, the C cure is there. I never realized it until I started studying this passage and getting ready to teach it to you. And look at this. Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice to see, the poison on their lips, feeders with the shed blood,

rune in misery, why? There is no fear of God before their eyes. Do you see? If they had fear, they wouldn't have all those things. The fear of God is the antidote. It's the cure. The fear of God is the opposite. before their eyes. Do you see? If they had fear, they wouldn't have all those things. The fear of God is the antidote. It's the cure. The fear of God is the opposite. The reason they do all these things is there's no fear. So if you put in the fear, you've got the cure. What is that? See, here it is. What is the fear of the Lord?

All through the Bible, fear of the Lord is a major concept. It sure is. Do you know how often it says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom? It says it in Job, it says it in Psalms, it says it in Proverbs. What does that mean? Wisdom means, until you fear God, you can't even begin to think straight about reality. Well then, what is this fear of the Lord if it's so important?

If it's the cure for my sin? Well, for a trouble is for us to fear the Lord sounds like being scared of the Lord. And it doesn't, you know why? First of all, if you actually start to look at the way the text used the word fear of the Lord in the Bible, you hear things like this, Deuteronomy 10, it says, what does the Lord your God require of you, but the fear the Lord your God love him and serve him with all your heart and soul? The fear God is to love him with all your heart and soul.

Well then why do they call it fear? Let me go on further. Psalm 119 says, because you fulfill your promise to me, I fear you. What? Because you've been so good to me, I'm filled with fear. And then Psalm 130 verse four, which is maybe the classic test. But because you've forgiven me, therefore, I fear you.

Whatever the fear of the Lord is, it's increased when you see and experience God's salvation, His grace, His goodness, His love. It increases. What do you say? Why? What do you call it fear? It sounds like you should call it joy.

Why fear? The fear of God is joyful, humbling, awe and wonder before the salvation of God. It's called fear because, you know, it's not just happiness. When you really see the salvation of God and what it is, on the one hand, it affirms you to the sky, but it's the same time it humbles you into the dust. That's why it's called fear.

Let's call it the joyful fear, awe and wonder before the greatness of God's salvation. But it turns you out of yourself. call it the joyful fear, all I'm wondering before the greatness of God's salvation. But it turns you out of yourself. It turns you away from the being curved in, the self-centeredness, because on the one hand you're too humbled to just be self-centered and you're too affirmed and need to be. And therefore this joyful fear is what, the cure. And it happens when you see a salvation, you say, well, what does that mean? You mean see a salvation. What does that mean? I'll tell you what it means. Just

think of it like this and let's conclude like this. Because you don't seek for God, because you don't seek for God, because you don't seek for God, because I don't see, because nobody seeks for God. God's salvation has to be God seeking for us. You know, there's a lot of religions that say, oh, human beings can seek for God. If you just try hard, you can find Him. So God sits there and says, here's the rules and here's all the things

that you need to do. If you pick them up and you do them, I'm sure you can find me. In other words, in most religions, salvation is you finding God. But in the Christian religion, in Christian faith, it's the opposite. Salvation is God seeking and finding you. And if you know what He did to do that, it'll fill you with this joyful, humbling,

sin-curing fear. Let me just give you one story to tell you about it. God says in the Old Testament he goes to one prophet named Hosea and he says, Hosea, you see this woman over here, named Gomer, marry her. So Hosea says, sure, I'm a prophet, your God, you spoke to me, I'm a Marrier. And it's not long after, he's married, he begins to realize that I'll marry her. And it's not long after, he's married, or he begins to realize that she has wayward feet, that she is not being faithful to him,

that she is being sexually unfaithful to him. And as she begins to have children, she realizes they're not his children. In fact, he names one of them, not mine. And finally, her unfaithfulness gets worse and worse and worse and eventually she leaves them, she just leaves them and leaves the kids and goes off to one man and goes off to another man, goes off to another man. And finally, that last man, because, you know, since she gets what she deserves because

she's so faithless, she's breaking every promise she's lying, and finally, he sells her into slavery. And Josea turns to God and says, remind me why you asked me to marry her. And God basically says, so you will know something about my relationship to you. Now you'll know what it's like for me. Now you know what it's like to be me.

And here's what I want you to do, Josea. He says, I want you to go where she is being bid on and I want you to purchase her freedom. And I want you to take her back. And then you'll know what it's like to be me. And so there's poor Gomer from what we can tell, she's being bid on as a slave, she's probably script naked because they were, so that the buyers could see what they were buying. And she's standing there, and suddenly there is shock.

She hears her husband's voice bidding, and he purchases her freedom, and he walks up to her, and instead of berating her, he takes his cloak off, and he covers her nakedness and says, now you will come home and be my wife. Oh, how moving that is. And it's nothing compared to what God has done for you. You know what God is saying to you?

Through Hosea? Poor Hosea, he had to do it, so I could use this illustration. Rooned his whole life, but guess what? It was worth it. Because what God is trying to say is Hosea in the end, oh, he's saying to us through the word of God. Hosea just had to go next to the next city, but I had to come from heaven to earth to find

you. You weren't seeking me. For me to see, I had to seek you, I had to find you. And I didn't just have to reach dig down in my pockets to get the money out, to purchase your freedom, I had to go to the cross. And there I had to suffer and die, I had to pay the penalty for your sins. I, look at this sin, somebody's got to pay for it. And I was stripped naked on the cross so that I could clothe you with a robe of righteousness to say, you come home with me. When you see not that, oh, we all have the ability, if we really try

hard enough to go find God, but no, no, no, If you see the salvation of the gospel, is God seeking us, finding us, coming to us, at infinite cost to Himself, that will fill you with a Holy fear, a joyful fear. And you will find that the becure has begun. That was pray. Our Father, we thank you that now as we take up the bread in the cup and take the Lord supper, we're in a position where you can drive even closer into the center of our

being, the cure for sin. We see that You saw us because we didn't seek You. You had to do it because if you had sat and waited for us to come find you, we never would have. We thank you therefore that you, it's such a moving story, what you have done for us. But most importantly is the objective, a work of Jesus Christ on the cross that opened away for us. So now, the only thing standing between us and you is this belief that we still have control of our lives, that we can earn our salvation? Help us now to let's set us out our sin and even set us out our righteousness and receive your free salvation. Sure are sin, cure our hearts, begin the cure now.

We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Thanks for listening to today's teaching. We pray that it challenged you and encouraged you. You can find more resources from Tim Keller at gospelandlife.com. Just subscribe to the Gospel and Life newsletter to receive free articles, sermons, devotions, and other resources. Again, it's all at gospelandlife.com.

You can also stay connected with us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter. This month sermons were recorded in 2009 and 2016. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017, while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.