Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Thanks Be to God!

Episode Date: December 13, 2024

The end of a worship service is always about mission. A minister says, “Let us go forth to serve the world as those who love our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.” Then the people say, “Thanks be to God.”  Do you realize how significant this is? You are being sent out into the world to give your life in service, now reshaped by the knowledge that Jesus Christ is your Savior, and you’re filled with his love.  Let’s look at Psalm 67 to learn about 1) the fact of mission, 2) the character of mission, 3) the dynamic for mission, and 4) the consolation of mission. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on September 21, 2008. Series: Liturgy: What we do in Worship. Scripture: Psalm 67:1-7. 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.

If you attend a church regularly, have you ever paid attention to the structure of the worship service at your church? Often we move through the same order of service each Sunday, but do we realize what each aspect means? Today, Tim Keller is preaching about liturgy, that is, about what happens during worship and why it's helpful to our understanding of the gospel. The scripture reading this morning is Psalm 67. May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us, that your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. May the peoples praise you, O God.

May all the peoples praise you, O God. May all the peoples praise you. May the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you rule the peoples justly and guide the nations of the earth. May the peoples praise you, O God. May all the peoples praise you. Then the land will yield its harvest, and God, our God, will bless us. God will bless us, and all the ends of the earth will fear him." This is the word of the Lord. We've been doing a five-week series on what in the sermon on what we do when we gather for worship. And because this is the last in the series, we're now in a position to kind of get the big picture and say what actually is happening in a worship service when we gather on a Sunday to worship? If you asked the question, what is the gospel? Probably the best biblical answer is God, sin, Christ, faith. The gospel is God is all important and we need to and ought to live for him.

But number two, sin, human pride, self-absorption has destroyed our relationship with God and with each has come into the world to rescue us from our sin, from death, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And fourth, therefore, we should respond to what Jesus has done by believing him in faith and with whole life commitment. God, sin, Christ, faith, the gospel. What do we do when we get together to worship? We start with a call to worship and praise God and get a sense of how great and all-important he is.

And then after that, we move to confessing our sins and to looking at our own lives and becoming aware of our needs and that we're not what we ought to be. And then after that we come to hear the scripture read and taught where we learn what God has done about those problems in Jesus Christ. And then finally we respond. We respond with offering up our hearts and our resources.

We respond with praise in music. We respond with the Lord's Supper sometimes in which we're communing with him. We respond by going out into the world in mission. Do you know what's happening at a worship service? It's the recapitulation of the gospel. You are reliving the gospel from the beginning to the end. God, sin, Christ, faith.

You're going right through it. Now do you understand why this means that a worship service is not built on a model of a modern entertainment event? In a modern entertainment event you are passive spectators and the event has a kind of warm-up there's some warm up acts, and then there's the big event, and then you go home. Now, I want you to know that I'm often late. I'm the preacher and I'm often late. It's New York, okay? Things happen.

You know, there's something on Fifth Avenue, I can't get through the park. I got to go south. So, you know, it's New York City, you get late. But if you're always late to worship, that shows you really think of this as a entertainment event and not as what it is, which is an experiencing of the gospel in a profoundly participative way every week in a way your soul needs. Okay now, so if you're habitually late, we're all about grace at Redeemer.

I absolve you. You know, pox phobiscum. I'm here to say, okay, that I don't think you understand what's actually happening here. The worship service is a whole. It's crafted to be a whole, by the way. The confessions and the music is tied to the way in which the gospel is going to be preached on that particular day. And you need to

not only not to be here for the whole thing and to be present in body, but you have to be a participant. How do you participate? It means you know what's happening. When you're in the worship, when you're in the early point, you're saying God is all important. When you're in the confession, you're saying I'm not what I ought to be. When you hear the benediction, you say God's face is shining on me. No matter what I feel right now, his face is shining on me. You're participating. You're not spectators and you see it as a whole. I'm not trying to make you feel guilty. I don't want you to starve to death

in full view of the table. I don't think you know what you've got. And that's the reason why we've been going through and saying, please understand what's going on so you can actively and meaningfully participate and understand that this isn't just a warm-up musical act till you come hear a speaker. This is a recapitulation, a reliving of the gospel in a deeply, profoundly participative

way which your soul needs every week. But we're actually not quite done. It's a pretty long introduction. I try to keep my introductions short. But it's important in a way to say this is a summary of everything we've been looking at these last five weeks. And actually, I have a better understanding of what happens in worship now because I've been preaching to you. I want you to think I've been sitting here holding out on you. We're

discovering this together. But we come to the last thing that ever happens in a worship service. And it really is probably, in most of our cases, an afterthought. It's called the dismissal. And the way it works is a minister says to you, at least here at Redeemer, the way it works is, a minister says, let us go forth to serve the world as those who love our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

And then the people say, thanks be to God. Do you realize how significant this is? You are being sent out into the world to give your life in service, now reshaped by the knowledge that Jesus Christ is your Savior, and you're filled with his love. And when the minister says, now get out there and live like you have been shaped by the gospel and serve people, get out there, that's a word that's basically a

mission. Mission is the Latin word for sent. You're being sent out into the world in mission and you know what your response is? You don't say, well, okay, if I have to. You say, we have enough grateful joy that we receive this and can't wait to go do it. Thanks be to God. Do you realize what's happening? I'm going to preach this sermon so you don't purge yourselves anymore.

The end of the worship service is always about mission. And let's take a look at this fairly overlooked but very important Psalm that actually very briefly, it gives you everything you need to know about what it means to be a missionary because all Christians are missionaries in this sense. And we're going to learn here real quick about the fact of mission, the character of mission, the dynamic for mission,

and the consolation of mission, the character of mission, the dynamic for mission, and the consolation of mission. The fact, the character, the dynamic and the consolation. So first of all, the fact. The first two verses splice together two of the most important texts in the Hebrew scripture. The benediction by Aaron, the Aaronic benediction and the promise to Abraham. Now last week we looked at the benediction, the Aaron's benediction, Numbers chapter six, and that's the place where it says that through the radical grace of God,

his face shines on you and blesses you and fulfills the deepest needs of your heart, desires of your heart. But the other text that verses one and two refer to is God's promise to Abraham because God said to Abraham, I will bless you that you might be a blessing to all the nations on the face of the earth. And therefore, what we have in verse one, look,

is a splicing together of these two things. May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us. Why? That your ways may be known on earth and your salvation among all nations. Now here's the principle, this is the fact. God never blesses you

except that you might be a blessing to others. He never calls you in for intimacy without then sending you out in sacrificial service. God never blesses you just to fill up your happiness tanks. So that whenever you want you can go and dip and have a drink. Rather God blesses you to fill up the tank of the engine of your life and fuel you

and compel you to go out into the world in sacrificial service. God's blessing has to be shared or it rots. So for example, it's like manna. You go back in the Old Testament, you know during the time the Israelites were wandering in the wilderness, which means the desert. When you and I think of wilderness, we think of Maine.

But in the, I know, but in New, but in, you know, in the Bible, wilderness is a desert, all right? So there was like nothing growing. And so there was no food. But God miraculously every morning supplied manna, and manna was, it looked like dew, but it basically was something like coriander seed which would miraculously appear on the ground.

You'd go out and you gathered it, and you could grind it up and turn it into cakes, and bread and things like that. But what God always said is when you go out to get the manna, you must only gather enough for yourself and your family. If you try to gather so much that you hoard it for yourself instead of sharing it, it stinks, it rots.

Now, interesting, I was amazed by this. Somebody showed me, down at NYU there's something called the New York Child Study Center. And it's just a research center for studying children and families. And the May 2007 newsletter studied trends amongst children in families with household incomes 75,000 to 160,000. So these are generally people whose children with parents who are professionals. So they're in family households with income of 75,000 to 160,000. And over the last 20 years there has been escalating psychological problems and teen suicides have doubled in this group.

What's going on? Okay. have doubled in this group. What's going on? Okay, so the newsletter says, complete financial security, excessive freedom to learn and explore, and a provision of a very wide range of interesting opportunities for entertainment, recreation, and education. Let me read that again. See, most of us think of this as a wonderful thing to snow your kids with. Listen. Complete financial security, excessive freedom to learn and explore, and the provision of a very wide range of interesting opportunities for entertainment,

recreation, education. Okay, let me continue the quote. Have been discovered to often lead to apathy, laziness, and inability to commit to goals, attitudes of entitlement, indecisiveness, moodiness, irritability without provocation, low self-confidence, and insecurity. In other words, if you pile your kids high with blessing and affirmation and prosperity, and they are never taught to sacrificially serve some cause

infinitely more important than their own happiness. They rot. Real blessing, God's blessing, rots. He never calls you in without sending you out. He never calls you into intimate relationship with Him. He never blesses you except that you might be a blessing to others. Every Christian who's really experienced the joy of God and wants to have the blessing, maintain the blessing, must be a person in mission.

That's number one. Number two, we learn here the character of mission. Now in this little passage, I mean this isn't everything you can say, but there's three things we're told about, well, what are we being sent out there to do? How do we make, you know, how do we get out there and do this? And the answer is share the truth, do justice, and build community. Three things. Share the truth,

do justice and build community. The first thing, which is part of our mission, that every single Sunday you're being sent out to do, remember this, is that your ways may be known on earth and your salvation amongst all peoples. Now this means God's truth. Your ways means his law, his word. But we're not just going out there

to share God's truth in general, his word. But we're not just going out there to share God's truth in general, but salvation. The gospel. How to get right with God in such a way that later on down here where it says, you rule the people's justly and they guide the nations. The word guide is the word shepherd. And the gospel is the message of how, through the grace of God God you can come into a personal intimate relationship with God as a shepherd by grace. So we're supposed to be sharing the gospel with everybody. Now over the years I have had a lot of non-Christian friends who have leveled with me and they said, you know, I don't mind you Christians believing the gospel and believing these things, but why you feel the need to convert other people

and to share it with other people and to get other people to believe it, why can't you just mind your own business? Well, I think you're asking us to be emotionally unhealthy. I mean, if you're a cultural Christian and you just basically say, yeah, I was raised in a, yeah, yeah, yeah, I believe it, I mean, that's one thing. But if anything ever gives you joy, if anything ever just gives you joy,

if you see anything, hear anything, or experience anything, that just gives you a life-changing experience of joy, you want, you need to share it. You want other people to see it, other people to hear it, other people to experience it. You just want to. And to not do it is not only emotionally inconsistent,

but it might be even emotionally unhealthy if you never want to do that. I mean, here I'm going to give you an example of evangelism. One night I came home, this was many years ago, where my wife Kathy, who likes ballet, and I don't, was watching a video that she had rented of Nereif. And it was a long time ago, so it was a video. Remember video cassettes? It's okay.

And he, and she was weeping. She says, this is the best thing I've ever seen. She says, listen, please, I know you don't like ballet that much. But she says, I've never seen anything like this and I just would love, I think you'll like it. And would you, it's 30 minutes, but would you really, and it gets really good near the end, would you please sit down and do it? Now, please, okay, what did I say? She's weeping, she's having great joy. She has great joy. She's tried this in the past, but it hasn't worked.

But she says, she says, I know you're not into this, but she says, I really think this time you'll see. What did I say? How dare you try to make me happy? No, I mean, it would be emotionally inconsistent for her not to do it. It might even be emotionally unhealthy for her not to do it.

And I know that in some way she's doing it for herself because she enjoys it more when someone else enjoys it with her. But I also know that she really wants me to enjoy something, see some aspect of reality I haven't seen. So I sat down. It was all right.

Okay. Was there anything wrong with what she did? Well, what if at the very end I said, oh, that wasn't any good. If I did that and she picked up the video cassette and hit me over the head with it and said, you Philistine, you cultural Philistine. See, that's bad evangelism. You don't want to do that. And I'm going to get back in a minute to why that often does

happen. But to say that a Christian whose life has been changed by the joy of knowing God personally through Jesus Christ should mind their own business is something that actually nobody else does. You know, you're asking Christians to do something that nobody else does. Everybody says, I want you to watch this. I want you to hear this. I'd like you to read this. I'd like you to think this. This month, we're excited to let you know about a brand new resource based on Tim Keller's Best Love books.

Go Forward in Love, a year of daily readings from Timothy Keller, features a short passage each day from one of Dr. Keller's books to use for daily reflection. Each day's reading offers deep insight, biblical wisdom, and spiritual encouragement. The passages are meant to lead you into worship, help you reflect on God's attributes, and encourage you to live more missionally. Go Forward in Love is our thanks when you give to Gospel in Life in December.

To receive your copy, just visit www.gospelinlife.com slash give. That's www.gospelinlife.com slash give. And thank you for your generosity, which helps us share the love of Christ with more people? Now their attitude makes all the difference can't hit you over the head with the videocassette But to share the truth is part of your mission and it's perfectly natural secondly, though do justice Because look in verse 4 it says the nations are glad they're singing for joy. Why? For you rule the peoples justly. So the joy comes not just from knowing God,

but by knowing that someday, God is going to come back to earth, and he's going to wipe away every tear. He's going to bring all the captives home, even the captives that died in captivity. He's going to judge justly and he's going to put everything right. Now, Christians who know that know the whole gospel and the gospel is sin. And that means we're not utopians. We're not people who really think that justice will ever in a major way be brought into this world through some kind of

political or military or economic program. We know better than that. But as a sign of the future kingdom, as a sign of what we know God's will is for this world and what God's accomplishment eventually will be for this world, we pour ourselves into fighting disease, into fighting poverty, and fighting injustice wherever we can. That's part of the mission too. So we have to share the truth, you have to do justice. Now this is a little bit surprising and maybe not immediately obvious. The third part of mission is building community. Yeah, now look. Look here for example. At the very

end it says, God will bless us. Now see as westerners we tend to read the word us as a collection of people. But when in the Psalms, the psalmist says, God will bless us, he's talking about their community. When our community thrives, when our community flourishes, then all the ends of the earth will fear him. It's exactly the same thing that Jesus said in John chapter 17, 21 when he says, Father, the world will know that you sent me. The world will know the gospel. The world will know that I am who, world will know the gospel the world will know that I am who

That you know I am from you, you know I have come the world will know I'm a savior He says when the world sees my disciples living together invisible and remarkable love and unity same thing The word centrifugal means force that propels outward, and the word centripetal means to force that draws inward. And nothing propels the message of the gospel outward so that people believe it more than drawing people's eyes inward to a community of love and unity. In fact, look carefully. All the peoples are

uniting here. All the nations, all the races are uniting in praise. When the world looks inside and sees a multicultural community of love and praise, when the world looks at the Christian church and sees people getting along inside that never got along outside, when the world looks, see out there in the world, different races, different genders, different generations, they just triangulate each other.

Power politics. But what happens if the world looks in here and sees different races, different genders, different generations humbly listening to each other, learning from each other, bearing with each other, loving each other? Out there when people have blow ups in their relationships, individuals, you know, they get mad at each other, they just stay away from each other. In here, what happens when the world looks in here and sees people constantly reconciling

and forgiving each other? Out there, sex, money, and power are used selfishly. What happens if the world looks in here and sees sex, money, and power being used communally, used to bless, used to give, not to take? In other words, mission out there is largely about life together in here. And there is absolutely no better way to make the gospel out there plausible than to live

the gospel out in beautiful, gorgeous community in here. And that's the next series. I'm not going to go any longer on this point because we're going to do an entire series, all the beta groups. I'm hoping that if you're not in a small group, you get in a beta group to discuss this. The next seven weeks are all gonna be about what does it mean for the gospel to shape a unique kind of alternate human society in here and be a community

whose flourishing and love attracts the attention and the admiration of all the peoples on the face of the earth. And therefore, you want to do community, I mean pardon me, you want to do mission? Share the truth, do justice, we're not here just for a great church

but for a great city, build community, and you are doing mission. And that's actually what you're being told to do, what you're being asked to do, invited to do, and which you gladly say you're about to do every single time we get to the end of a worship service. So there's the fact of the mission, there's the character of mission.

Okay, now dynamic. How do we become the people who can do this, who can share the truth without hitting people over the head with the video when they don't want to listen to it or at the end they say, yeah, it was all right. How can we become people who can do this? The keynote of Psalm 67, all commentators say, is joy. The word joy only shows up once. Let the nations be glad and sing for joy. But that's the keynote. The whole thing's about praise once. Let the nations be glad and sing for joy. But that's the keynote. The whole thing is about praise. This mission is about

praise. It's done in praise. It's just filled with praise. And it is important for you to consider that the last thing that's ever said in our worship service is thanks be to God. In other words, we are not doing our mission that you just invited us to do out of a sense of duty. We're doing it out of a motive of grateful joy. When Jesus sent 70 missionaries out in Luke chapter 10, he sent them out to preach the gospel, he sent them out to heal the sick. He sent them out to cast out demons and deliver people from evil forces. And later in the chapter, they come back and they're really excited. They've seen a lot of people's lives changed. And they say to Jesus,

paraphrased, wow, Lord, even the demons are subject to our name. Okay, I mean, they went out there and God, Jesus had given them power. And they went out there and they saw people's lives change, but they came back saying, we've got the power, basically. Even the demons are subject to our name. That was what a trip. And Jesus is very stern with them and says,

rejoice not that the demons are subject to your name. Now, why does he do that? See, they had gone out there and they'd seen lives change, but when they came back, it was all about them. In other words, they came back saying, we've been out there doing evangelism, sharing the truth, doing justice, you know, feeding the hungry, raising the dead, healing the sick. See?

We're out there sharing the truth and doing justice, and we come back and we say, we are right. People are believing in us. We've got the power. See? Everybody wants to follow us now. Man, this mission is great. And Jesus says, this is a disaster.

Rejoice not that the demons are subject to your name. Here they are coming back, rejoicing in their performance and in their power. In other words, the reason that they are excited, oh yeah, they're excited that people's lives are changed, but what they're excited about is how those changed lives reflect on them. They're really somebody now.

They're important. They're leaders. Now I know God loves me. Now I know I'm significant. I won all kinds of arguments with him about the existence of, you know, about the deity of Jesus Christ. And you know, about the deity of Jesus Christ. And you know what Jesus says? Rejoice not that the demons are subject to you,

but that your names are written in heaven. Now that's a little bit lost on us right off the bat because, you know, we have lots of writing. We've got printing everywhere. But this is back in the days before there was printing. There weren't a lot of documents. And where were the lists of names? Where would a person's name be listed?

The person's name would be listed in the role of the town or the role of the region and only if they were citizens. And therefore it was very significant to have your name on the list. But Jesus Christ says that you need to realize that even though you're still living your life and you're still doing good things and bad things and all that sort of stuff, your name's, you're already a citizen of heaven. You're already a citizen of heaven. Why do you need to look out there and say, I never get invited to those parties. I can't get a date. You know, I haven't really done very well in my career.

I never made the honor roll. You know, my names aren't on these lists. I know, I'll go into mission. I'll be a Christian. I'll evangelize. I'll argue with people. I'll go out there and help the poor. And then I'll finally feel good about myself.

And Jesus says, people will know that you're doing this to control them. People will know you're doing this out of self-righteousness. And you won't have any effect on them. Here's what I want you to rejoice in. That you're already accepted by grace. That you're already a citizen of heaven.

Your name is on the invitation list of the ultimate party. You have the name of the ultimate family. You have been invited into the heart of things. The beauty you've always wanted, the love you've always wanted, the honor you've always wanted, it's waiting for you. It's guaranteed. You know why? It's not something you can lose because you didn't win it. I won it. There's a place where Moses, who knows that God says, if my people do not obey me, I will blot their name out from my book of life.

And there's a place where Moses on the mountain, in a wonderful moment, says, I know my people have sinned, but blot my name out of the book of life so that they can be your people. And God says says forget it. You know why? Because later a true Moses came.

And his name was blotted out so our names could be written down. And that's the reason why we can read in the book of Hebrews, you have not come to Mount Sinai to a mountain that could be touched, but you've come to the heavenly Jerusalem, to the church of those whose names are written in heaven, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant whose sprinkled blood speaks

better than the blood of Abel. If you know you're saved by grace, if you rest in that and in that joy, then you can say please watch the video but if the person says no or I didn't get anything out of it, you might be sad, but you're not angry. You don't come across as a person trying to control, and your mission will be effective. You've got to be happy enough to do mission. You've got to grasp the grace of Jesus Christ deeply and not have any residual works righteousness

or self salvation or moralism about you or any effort to do justice even or certainly spread the truth is going to be a disaster. There's one last thing. Consolation. If you're a person who wants to do mission in the world you're going to find you're always frustrated because people don't listen to you because you pick up you know you're always frustrated because people don't listen to you. Because you pick up, you know, you try to work against poverty and after a lifetime of it, it doesn't seem to be any better. Mission can be pretty doggone frustrating. However, at the very end

here it says, and then the land will yield its harvest and God, our God will bless us. Now, what is then? May all the peoples praise you. Most commentators believe, I'm sure almost certain they're right, that the word then is looking way into the future. It's saying we actually don't build great community, we don't share the truth well, we don't do justice, but a time is coming when the land will yield its harvest. It's talking about the new heavens and the new earth. It's talking about the ultimate springtime

after which there'll be no more winter. The ultimate harvest after which there will be no lands lying fallow. It's looking forward to the time in which God ultimately blesses us, renews the new heavens and new earth. All the peoples of the world begin to praise him. So it's looking to the time in which God ultimately blesses us, renews the new heavens and new earth, all the peoples of the world begin to praise him. So it's looking to the very end. I had a great experience this last June

when I was doing one of the little courses that we teach in the summer. And I had a chance to read Tolkien's essay on why fairy tales still move people. You know, modern critics hate the fact that so many of the biggest movies, so many of the biggest selling books are still about dragons and knights and witches and stuff like that. And they say, come on, let's get realistic. And Tolkien has this great essay on why we will never stop reading and never stop watching or writing fairy tales.

The reason is, and this is from a book about Tolkien's essay, he says, Tolkien says that fairy tales move us in a way that realistic fiction does not. Even the best realistic fiction is moving, but he says fairy tales move us in a way that realistic fiction cannot. Why? Because fairy tales speak to several deep human longings that we are almost ashamed to admit and that we never can discard. We long to survey the depths of time and space.

We long to get outside of time altogether and escape death. We long to hold communion with other living things, like angels. We long to find a love that perfectly heals and from which we can never part. And we long to triumph over evil finally and totally. When you are in the middle of a great fairy tale, the fairy tale lets you live even briefly with the dream that love without parting, escape from death, triumph over evil are real and realizable. That's why the stories stir us so deeply and why we will go on reading and writing them no matter what the critics say. But the gospel's message is that through Jesus Christ every single one of these things that the fairy tales talk about is true and

will come to pass. We will hang out with angels. We will fly. We will have loves from which we're never parted. We will see an absolute triumph over evil. There is a beauty who will kiss you in all your beastliness and transform you. There is a prince who will save us forever. Let that be your consolation and mission. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you that every single week when we worship, after we've heard the

gospel that our names are written in heaven, that someday there will be a new heavens and new earth, that everything sad will become untrue and all of our deepest human longings will come to pass. In the knowledge of that, we can go forth into the world to serve as those who love our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ out of thankfulness. We pray that you'd send us out, and today, knowing what we're going to do, sensing your love on our heart and we pray that you'd make us as a church, a church for this city, a church for this city. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.

Thanks for listening to today's teaching. We hope you were encouraged by it and that it gives you deeper appreciation for God's grace and helps you apply His Word to your life. You can find more resources from Tim Keller by subscribing to our quarterly journal at GospelofLife.com. When you subscribe, you'll receive free articles, sermons, devotionals, and other valuable resources. We also invite you to stay connected with us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter. Today's sermon was preached in 2008.

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.