Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - The Community of Grace

Episode Date: January 27, 2025

This passage in Hebrews seems like an anti-climax. Throughout the book, the writer gives us something to help us face the brutal realities of life. But then, Hebrews 13 seems different. At first it looks like a to-do list, like miscellaneous ethical prescriptions, but that’s wrong.  This is not an anti-climax. What we’re being told is that we’ll never make it in life without being deeply embedded in a robust community of people who have experienced the grace of God. This passage tells us about 1) the importance of that community, 2) the intensity of the community, 3) the openness of the community, and 4) where we get the power to create it. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on April 24, 2005. Series: Christ: Our Treasury (The Book of Hebrews). Scripture: Hebrews 12:28-13:9. 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.

This is Gospel in Life. The book of Hebrews was written to a group of people who were so exhausted by the sufferings of life that they were shaken to the core and were about to give up. In today's message, learn what the writer of Hebrews teaches to help keep them going. After you listen, we invite you to go online to GospelinLife.com and sign up for our email updates. When you sign up, you'll receive our quarterly newsletter with articles about gospel changed lives as well

as other valuable gospel centered resources. Subscribe today at GospelInLife.com. Tonight's scripture reading is from the book of Hebrews chapter 12 verses 28 through chapter 13 verse 9 and it's found on page 9 of the bulletin. Therefore since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe for our God is a consuming fire. Keep on loving each other as brothers. Do not forget to entertain strangers for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it.

Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who were mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering. Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. So we say with confidence, the Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid, what can man do to me?

Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by ceremonial foods which are of no value to those who eat them. This is God's word. Every single week we've been seeing that the Book of Hebrews is written to people who are so beaten down, so hurt by difficulties and suffering and persecution that they're about

ready to give up. We've also seen that every single week the writer of the Hebrews gives us something, gives his readers something that helps them face the brutal realities of life, that helps them stand solid when everything around them is shaking apart, falling down. Now when we come here to chapter 13 as we have tonight, it seems like a ‑‑ it seems different than the rest of the book. It seems like an anticlimax. It doesn't seem like we're getting any kind of prescriptions for power and strength and fortitude. Instead it looks like a kind of to‑do list. Miscellaneous ethical prescriptions, miscellaneous ecclesiastical things we're supposed to be

doing in the church and so on. But that's wrong. This is not an anticlimax. What we're being told here is that you will never make it in life without a community. You will never make it in life without being deeply, strongly embedded in a robust, thick, close community of people who have experienced the grace of God. This passage tells us about the importance of that community, the intensity of the community, the openness of the community, and the power to create it. The importance of it, the intensity of it, the openness of it, and where we get the power to create it. The importance of it, the intensity of it, the openness of it, and where we get the power to create it. So first, the importance of it. And we see that because at the end

of chapter 12, which we've printed the first two verses of that chapter, we see it's talking about what we looked at last week, which is the consuming fire, the presence of God. That's what's at the heart of the universe. What's at the heart of the universe is the royal presence of God, the Shekinah glory of God, the consuming fire of His nature. Now what does that mean, consuming fire? Can you break it down? Yeah. Yeah. At the heart of the universe is the love and joy, the exploding love and joy that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have as they each defer to, glorify, center upon, rejoice in, and adore the others. Each one is doing that to the others. And we said last week that that's what we are designed for. Every human being is built and designed to stand

in the presence of God and not to center on yourself but to defer to, glorify, center on, rejoice in, and adore the glory of God supremely. And we said last week, that is the love that you're looking for in every set of arms. That is the beauty you're looking for in any face. That's the gold you're looking for in all your competitions. That's the rest that you're really looking for in all your homes and all your houses. Nothing else is going to satisfy the deep places of your soul because that's what you're built for. Now, when the presence of God came down on Sinai,

again we saw this last week, chapter 12, and it came into the tabernacle so that you could approach this presence of God, the presence of God was terrifying It was traumatic. It was fatal if you touched it directly and Of course now we have the presence of God, you know through mediated through Moses in the tabernacle and the first question that comes up is How do you Acceptably worship God in his presence? How do you appropriately and acceptably approach him and behave in his presence? Now the answer to that was the book of Leviticus. Now I know you don't see a lot of blood on it but it's there, you know why? Many many many people over the years have said I'm going to read the Bible from front to back. That's a very virtuous thing to do.

That's a very spiritual thing to do. I'm going to start in the beginning, I'm going to read, and I'm going to read right through. Now, as you get through, now Genesis is long, but you usually get through it. There's a lot of sex and violence, and it's interesting. And you know, it's tedious sometimes. There's a lot of it you don't understand. You get through it, but then you get to Leviticus, and many people, everybody, dies in Leviticus. That's the end of your good intentions. Why? Why is Leviticus so incredibly boring?

Because details, details, details. What you have to eat, what you have to wear, ceremonial foods, referred to in verse 9, everything, your rituals, because the way you acceptably worshiped God in the tabernacle, the way you approached the terrifying presence of God mediated through Moses was doing everything just right. Ritual, performances, observances, infinite number of them. But, chapter 12 says that through Jesus Christ, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the presence of God can come right into our lives. That which used to be fatal, that which was traumatic and terrifying can come right into our lives.

Now if we have the presence of God through Jesus Christ, now the question comes up again, and it's actually mentioned here in verse 28 and 29, now what does it mean to worship God acceptably? Now what does it mean to live appropriately in the presence of God, the presence that's mediated through Jesus Christ? Now what does it mean to worship God acceptably with reverence and awe? And the answer is missed. It's radical. But the answer is missed. And you know why? Because of the chapter divisions of the Bible. Do you know that when the Hebrews author wrote what he wrote, when Paul wrote, when John wrote, when all the authors of the Bible wrote, they didn't divide their books into chapters. We divided them into chapters years and years later just for reference. When the Hebrew's writer was writing, there was no division, no chapter division

between verse 28, 29, 1, 2, and 3. It wasn't there. And therefore, you hear what his answer is? Here is how you worship God acceptably with reverence and love one another as brothers and sisters. Entertain strangers. Open your life to prisoners. I'm going to say this three or four ways because it takes that long to sink in. In fact, it's still sinking into me. Now, the way we worship God is through being involved in radical Christian community. Now the way in which we experience the presence of God in our lives, the way in which the glory of God shapes us now is not through performances and through rituals and through observances but through deep participation in the radically new communal practices, the practices of life together that the grace of God creates amongst people who have experienced his grace.

The way we experience his consuming fire presence, the way we show the world glory of God, is not through rituals and observances, but it's through radical new relationships between brothers and sisters in the church and with our neighbors in the city. Radical new relationships. That's how we worship. That's how we experience the presence of God. It's saying nothing less than that and it's let me put it a couple ways.

Before Jesus' death and resurrection and after Jesus' death and resurrection, what was he doing? What was he doing? You say he was teaching, he was preaching, he was, yes, but what was he doing? He was creating a community. He wasn't writing a book. He was creating a community. A community that was going to model and reflect the future of God, the new humanity. Jesus was continually saying to his disciples, you're a city, said on the hill. You're a flock. You're a new society.

You're a new nation. Now you can't be a new city by yourself. This text is saying, Jesus came to earth to create a community. Are you part of a community? This text is saying you don't worship anymore just by coming to services. You worship by being deeply, integrally involved in a community. If you just come to a service and you're not part in your daily life,

in your personal life of a deep, intimate, intense community with other people who've experienced the grace of God, you're not worshiping God. You're not experiencing the consuming fire, empowering presence of God. That's what it says. In other words, chapter 13 is our Leviticus. It's the gospel Leviticus. This is how we worship God acceptably, through community, through relationships. That's how it's done now. That's the importance of Christian community. Secondly, now this will help, let me keep pounding this in.

Let's look at the intensity of Christian community. Verse 1, keep on loving each other as brothers and sisters. Or another, you know, it says basically there, practice brotherly love. Phil-Adelphia, that's the Greek word. Practice brotherly love. Now one of our problems is brotherly love. Yeah, brotherly love. To us it sounds very vague.

It was radical then, it's radical now. Lucian of Samosada, who was a pagan Greek intellectual, wrote about the scandalous behavior of Christians toward one another. It was scandalous. And this is what he says in one of his writings about Christians. Listen to this. He says, their founder persuaded them that they should be like brothers to one another, therefore they despise their own privacy and view all their

possessions as common property." Hmm, you never thought of that implication. You say, oh yes, this is my brother, this is my sister. Lucian of Samosata realized the radical nature of that claim. This image that every person, if you experience the grace of God through Christ, this statement that every other person that's experienced the grace of God in Christ is your brother, is your sister, because you've been brought into the household of God. It's a commonplace. I mean, it's something we don't even, we don't even think about the implications of it, but it's the most radically intense kind of metaphor possible.

This is family, this is brothers, sisters, this means the community, our community is radically intense. Let's just think about this for a minute. First of all, this is talking about the intensity of our unconditional commitment to one another. Think of your siblings. In many cases, your siblings aren't people you like at all. They're people with radically different values. They're people radically, they don't approve of their life.

They're not the kind of people you would ever hang out with. You don't like them in any way, but guess what? In spite of all of that, in spite of all the fights you've had over the years, in spite of the horrible things you've, they're still your brothers, they're still your sisters. You feel a bond of obligation and you're right. You didn't choose them, but you feel a bond of obligation. And this is your parents' children. This is your flesh and blood. You were raised with this person and no matter how weird they are, no matter how different they are,

no matter how much, you know, these are the kind of people that you would never hang out with or never wanna be with otherwise. There's a bond, there's an obligation, and so it must be with your brothers and sisters in grace. Secondly, let's think of the intensity of intimacy. Your siblings wiped your nose and wiped your bottom, or else you wiped their nose and wiped your bottom or else you wipe their nose and wipe their bottom or else

at least you saw those things being wiped and as a result you can't put on airs anymore they know who you are you know forget about your makeup they know what you look like without your makeup they know what you are they know who you are you know there's you are. You know, there's a transparency. There's an intimacy. There's a reality, and so it must be. With your brothers and sisters in grace. Do you know how economically radical this is, just to say, these people are your brothers and sisters?

Lucian knew. He said, because these people consider themselves brothers and sisters, they have given up their privacy and the right to use their possessions the way they want. Of course, because think of siblings. You share the same home. You share the same inheritance. And that means brothers and sisters have a claim on your wallet. They have a claim on your resources. They have a claim on your living space.

It's economically radical. It's economically radical, it's an intense, it's, oh it's racially and culturally radical and intense. Think about this. If you've experienced the grace of God in Christ, then the other people who have done it, no matter what their race, no matter what their culture, no matter how different they are, they're your brother, your sister in grace. There's unconditional commitment, there's transparency, there's economic sharing, all those things are still the case. And most of all, most interesting of all, this metaphor not only shows us the intensity of our commitment and all these other things, but it shows that this is the single most shaping influence

possible in your life. A lot of you look very young, and therefore you're probably still flattering yourself that you are the product of your own choices. You say, well, I am who I am because I have chosen, you know, you've used your decisions, you've used your choices, you've used your little thoughts, and you said, I want to think like this, I want to be my own person, and you think you're the product of your own choices, and the older you get, you're going to realize you are the product of your family. To a great degree, you are the product of your family. The people that you lived with seven days a week, 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, that is what

shapes you more than anything else, more than your choices, more than your thinking, more than your decisions, more than your classes, more than your programs, more than your therapy. It's who is your community. And here's what a community is. A family. See, if you go to a class or you go to a club, those are people you relate to at one point. You allow one point of contact. Okay, your bird watching club. So you go to and you talk to the people about bird watching. But what if one of them says, I don't know why you're dating him, he's no good for you. You say, excuse me, we're here to talk about bird watching. Mind your own business. At work you spend a lot of time at work.

You spend a lot of time at work and sometimes because you spend so much time, community starts to break through. But basically you have a professional relationship with people. You connect here. But a family, a community, all points of your life connect with all points of theirs. You eat together. You play together. You work together. you study together, you argue together, you open up about your problems, you share living space, you share resources, you share

decisions. That's a community and that's what shapes you. And so let me summarize the second point. Let me summarize the second point. If you think by coming to a service, or by coming to a great teaching, and every week, two or three times a week, coming to a major event at a church,

but you do not give up your privacy, you do not become accountable, you do not give up your privacy You do not become accountable You do not actually get into deep relationships where your personal lives and your daily lives are connected to other people Other other brothers and sisters in grace then you're part of a Christian club You're not part of a Christian community and you are not going to be shaped like you think Unless you are relating to other like you think. Unless you are relating to other brothers and sisters in grace at the brotherhood level, not the club level, not the, you know, not the class level, the empowering presence of God isn't working through you. If you

think, for example, if you think you're learning by coming here and listening to things saying, oh that's very inspirational, that helps me a great deal. But you're not part of a community where you're pounding this into one another and you're thinking about how does this apply and you're holding each other accountable and you're trying out models of how it would apply. You're not learning. You're not being shaped. You're shaped by your community. You're not shaped by cognition. You're shaped by what you talk about. I went to seminary and I had all these great teachers. I really did, an awfully good set of teachers. But what shaped me was there was a group of friends, very, very close friends, and we ate together and we talked together and we argued and we pieced together the framework of thinking that we were going to, and of faith, that we were going to build

the rest of our lives on, the rest of our ministries on. We picked and we chose and we worked it out and we argued and we developed it. It was that group of friends, it was that community that made me a minister, not the teachers. These are people that I still go on vacation with. These are people that really, that's where I got molded. Not my professors, not the information. I recommend it. I married one of those people. I recommend it. It was very, very intimate. I married one of those people.

Now see the importance of community. See the intensity of community. Thirdly, I want you to see the openness of this community. Now this is very surprising because when you think of community that is intense That there's real belonging. There's real accountability You know there's real intensity those communities are almost impossible to break into isn't that right? You ever seen groups of people they're very intense, but then they're not open and of course There's other communities that are very open, but that's because there's like no standards. You know

Of course, there's other communities that are very open, but that's because there's like no standards, you know? There's no intensity. But not this community, or at least not the way the Christian community is supposed to be. It's supposed to be a community of incredible intensity and incredible openness at the same time. We all long for a home, for a place where we can truly flourish and belong. In One with My Lord, a new book by Sam Albury, he shows how the Bible promises that there

is a place like that for all of us, but it doesn't have a zip code. Instead, the key to home and the very heartbeat of the Christian faith itself is that we find ourselves in Christ. For the New Testament writers, this phrase was so important that instead of using the term Christian, they referred to followers of Jesus as those who are in Christ. Jesus is not only our Savior, Lord, teacher, and friend.

He is also our home and our location. Each chapter of One with my Lord is short enough to be read as a devotional, and in it, Albury examines what being in Christ means, giving us a fresh lens to view the gospel and all that it means for our hope, purpose, and identity. We believe this new book will help you grow in your relationship with Christ. To request your copy of One with My Lord, visit GospelAndLife.com slash give.

That's GospelAndLife.com slash give. That's www.gospelandlife.com slash give. Now, here's Tim Keller with the remainder of today's teaching. Now the way this comes across is by noticing two interesting balances and let's keep moving through the passage. Two interesting balances. The first balance is very, very surprising. Verse one, keep on loving each other as brothers. Verse two, do not forget to entertain strangers. Now that doesn't strike you as much as you read in English, but in Greek is very striking. Because verse 1 says work at Philadelphia, which means brotherly love.

Love of brothers and sisters. But verse says work at philoxenia and the word philoxenia means love of strangers isn't that amazing? verse 1 says work like crazy at loving the insiders loving the people with the same beliefs loving the people that you know but verse 2 says make sure you work incredibly hard at loving outsiders see this intensity and openness Verse two says, make sure you work incredibly hard at loving outsiders. See this intensity and openness. The word philoxenia, and I've always wished that right down the road from Philadelphia

somebody had started a town called philoxenia, but they didn't. However, philoxenia, the word zinia in Greek means a stranger, but as a verb it means to take in a guess. So philexenia is an incredibly strong word and a very gospel word. Philexenia means to love, to open your living space, to open your wallet, to open your resources to people who otherwise you'd be suspicious of. People who, and the reason why this is so radical was that in the Greek Roman world, and of course this is true today too, as soon as I describe it you'll know it right away, in the Greek or Roman world everything was about the patronage system.

What was the patronage system? Well you did invite people into your home, people whose homes you wanted to get into. You did do things for people, people who then owed you so that you, and you would do this things for people who could open doors for you, who could get you into circles you wanted to get into, see? So that sometimes you could call your chips in and then sometimes they would call their chips in. And that's how things work, that's how things still work.

But not in this community. You're supposed to open up to people that you have absolutely no certainty that they can give you anything back. You don't even know who they are. You're supposed to open up to the stranger. You're supposed to open up to the person who's different, the newcomer, the person who you're really not sure about. You don't just say, in other words, this is not a community where you have to prove yourself

before people are even warm to you. Not at all. It's very different. And notice something interesting. It says, do not forget to hospitality to strangers, for by doing so, some people have entertained angels without knowing it. What is that a reference to? Oh boy.

It's a reference to the fact that in Genesis 18, when Abraham brought in three strangers into his home to refresh them they turned out to be angels envoys from God and in Luke chapter 24 on the road to Emmaus when those two men Invited in another stranger and gave him hospitality and opened their table to him, it turned out to be the Lord himself.

And what this is saying is this is how the Christian community is supposed to work. You do not love those who you know will be able to repay you. You do not lay yourself out for the cool. You do not lay yourself out for the well-turned-out, the people who can help you get ahead. You do not base your relationships on what's in it for you. And if and only if you base your relationships on sacrificial service, you'll find a lot of your needs getting met. Angels come into your life. See, if you go looking for angels, I want to ask that person because that's an angel. I think I'll have that person over to dinner. That's not how it works. Only when you're looking for

strangers do you find angels. Only when you're reaching out to people that can't help you will you have all the help you ever need. So that's the first weird balance, is it not, between intensity and openness? But there's another balance here which is just as amazing and shows you the unique communal patterns, the countercultural patterns of the Christian community. Verse 3 says, remember those in prison as if you were a fellow prisoner and those who were mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering. Verse 4 says, let the marriage bed be kept pure for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. Now look at that. Verse four says, social

justice. Be strong for social justice because the word mistreated means oppressed. Find the people who are victims of injustice and care about that. Be strong for social justice. That's verse three. But verse four says, no sex outside marriage. Because the word, it's very specific, the word adultery means if you're married you can't have sex with somebody that you're not married to, of course, but the word sexually immoral, the word pornea, means sex outside marriage period. Premarital sex. No, no sex outside marriage. Now do you see how radical that is? First of all, it was completely radical in that day. Completely different in that day. We have an early Christian document. It's not in the Bible, but it's an early Christian document called Epistle

to Diagnetus. And in one place, it's describing Christians, the early Christians, and it says, they share their table with all, but not their bed with all. They are poor, yet make many rich. They are short of everything, and yet have plenty of all things. Now see how different that was? Christians shared their table with everyone. Their food, their money, their resources, they shared their table with all, but not their bed with anybody, but their spouse. But that's not how the Greco-Roman world worked, it was the other way around.

They shared their bed with everyone, but they didn't share their table or their food with people. Why? Because it was a radically selfish, a radically selfish society. See, if you're willing to have sex with people, but you're not willing to marry them, that means you're putting your selfish individual need over community. The individual is more important than community. If I have sex without marriage, but I don't share my table, I don't share my money, that's because I'm putting my individual happiness over anything else. But the gospel completely changes the way you use sex and money. Think about this. In the gospel, money becomes a way to community. According to the Bible, if you're making money,

if God is blessing you with money, it's from God, it's not yours, and it's for the purpose of building up community, building up the people who are weaker, strengthening the social fabric, building up the community. So the money is not for your own selfish happiness, it's not yours, it's for the community. But sex is too, for building community. In the gospel says sex is for building community. You do not have sex with somebody who is not willing to commit him or herself exclusively to you for the rest of their lives. That's called marriage and that's called community. Sex is not for you, it's for community. Money is not for you, it's for community. And the gospel makes you unselfish because of the radical unselfishness of Jesus Christ by which you were saved.

And when that changes you like that, then suddenly you become not only, the Christian community becomes not only radically different in ancient times, it's radically different today. Think about verse 3 and 4. Think about it. Today, the people who are crying for social justice are also crying out for sexual freedom. You know, they want verse 3 without verse 4. And the people who are crying out against sexual freedom and for traditional values are very, very, very weak on social justice. They have verse 4 without verse 3. Now why would that be? And I'll tell you why it is. Because in our society, we are every bit as selfish as the old pagan society. In

fact, conservatism in western society is really a form of individualism, because it says, your money is yours. Your money is nobody else's but yours. You've earned it. You have a right to it. That's not what the Bible says at all, but that's the individualism of our Western culture that becomes conservative. But then, liberalism in our Western culture is just as individualistic. It says your sexuality belongs to you. It's for sexual fulfillment. You should be able to be free to do what you want with it. No, the Bible says no. Absolutely not. And you know what? The West, Wall Street Journal had an editorial before the pope was elected and the name of the editorial was, Are ready for a third world pope. Now of course we didn't get a third world pope but it was still an

extremely interesting editorial. It said do you know that Christianity is growing explosively in Africa, Latin America, and Asia, many of you do, but do you realize that those growing Christian communities never went through the Enlightenment, they never went through Western individualism, and so they're not reading it into their Christianity. And as a result, the Christianity growing in these parts of the world where it's so vital is like this. It's verse three and verse four. It's not the way it's falling out in America between fundamentalists and liberals.

It's just not that way. Oh, no. If you go to the grassroots Christians in those vital parts of the world, Africa, Latin America, and Asia, they are not for sexual freedom because they know the strength of the family is crucial to human flourishing. But they're also deeply against the unjust distribution of wealth and resources in this world. They're against social justice. And they're not going to fit into conservative or liberal categories, at least not in the West. But here's what I want you to consider. You are smart people. You are sophisticated people. You're educated by and large in the West. You are sophisticated urban professionals. But if you want to be

Christians, are you going to let the world squeeze you into its mold? Are you going to become an ideologue of the left or the right? Verse three without verse four? Verse four without verse three? Are you going to let the gospel shape you into a new kind of community that the world has never seen outside of the gospel? So there is the importance of the Christian community. There is the intensity of it and there is the paradoxical openness of it. And that leaves us with the final question, which is where in the world do you get the power to create a community like this? A community that's intense. There's accountability. You know, it's sticky. It's thick. It's robust. And

yet it's open to outsiders. And it's nonjudgmental. And it reaches out to strangers. And it's open to outsiders and it's non-judgmental and it reaches out to strangers and it's got this balance that is so unique. Now where in the world do you get the power for something like that? And the answer is in the last part of the passage. Now in some ways you can see it at the very end. Verse 7 says, Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Now what's that? That's the gospel. And what's the gospel? It's there in verse 9. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It's good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace and not by performance and observance.

You're saved by grace. You're saved by radical grace, not by your works. But if you really want to see how that is the dynamic, that is the dynamic for the creation of this unique community, I think it's in verse 5. There's the secret. Let's read verse 5. Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have because God has said never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. Now listen, first of all notice it says, something happens internally to a believer that frees you from the love of or worry about money because you're

content. You're not anxious about it? You're not desirous for it? Having things is no longer all that important to your significance. And having things is no longer all that important to your significance. And having things is no longer all that important for security. And now what that means is money just becomes money. Something you can use to build a community. It's no longer such... It's no longer so emotionally significant to you. Well, what will create that kind of change? Believing what God has said. Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. Now, create that kind of change, believing what God has said. Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

Now, in the Greek, there are five negative particles in that verse that are so, therefore it's a little hard to translate it, but let me give you a literal translation. God says, I will never, never, never, never, never, leave you alone. I will never forsake you. I will never, never, never, never, never, forsake you or leave you alone.

Some of you are so frightened about being alone that you're doing things that you know you shouldn't do. You're violating your conscience. You're staying in relationships you know are no good, but you're just so afraid of being alone. Others of you aren't doing anything like that, but you're still freaking out over being alone. And a lot of the rest of you, a lot of the rest of you are saying, I'm not alone. I've got a great spouse. I've got friends. I've got everything I want I've got everything that I want and you're all wrong. You're all wrong because unless God is Someone you know intimately unless you know God intimately at the center of your being you are absolutely alone

And I'll tell you why because everyone else will forsake you. The best friends will forsake you, the best spouse will forsake you, the best parents will forsake you. You say, why, well how? Well, first of all, a lot of them will just fail you because of their flaws. But they'll all die on you, or you'll die before them.

And do you know what? When you face death, you will face it alone. Your spouse can't be there. Your brothers and sisters can't be there. Your friends can't be there. Only God can be there. And that means if God isn't at the center of your life, if you don't have God in the center of your life, you are

alone no matter what you think. And if you have God, you're not alone no matter what you think and if you have God you're not alone no matter what you think and he says I will never never never never never forsake never leave you alone well you say that's wonderful if only I could believe it how can I know that how could I know that here's how you can know it on the cross Jesus Christ was forsaken he experienced the opposite of verse 5, and in fact it almost seems to contradict verse 5. Because on the cross, Jesus said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? God forsook him, why? Here's why. I just said, think

about it, if you don't have God, you are alone. You are alone. And if God is not at the center of your life, therefore you are into cosmic You are alone. And if God is not at the center of your life, therefore you are into cosmic aloneness necessarily. That's the automatic result. But Jesus Christ took our cosmic aloneness. Jesus Christ took that aloneness so that God could say to us, no matter how we are, because Jesus paid the penalty, God can say to us I will never never never never never leave you alone

lo I am with you always even unto the end of the world David said if my mother and father might forsake me but the Lord will bear me up." Or put it another way, do you know the places where in Ephesians 2 where it says, you were strangers but God has brought you in. We've received God's hospitality. We were strangers. We had nothing God needed but God brought us in. Why? Because of the homelessness of Jesus. Because of the cosmic homelessness of Jesus. Jesus said, foxes have holes, birds have nests, but the Son of Man doesn't have a place to lay his head. Why did he go through all that?

The ultimate hospitality was Jesus lost his home so we could be brought in through God's hospitality. And to the degree you see Jesus taking your cosmic aloneness for you, to the degree you sense that affirmation, that joy, the knowledge that he will never now leave you, never now forsake you. To that degree you get the freedom to give your money. To that degree you have the freedom to start reaching out to people not calculating, not saying I'd like to be with that person because if I was with that person, that person would make me feel better about myself but I don't

want to hang out with these people. These people will just make me feel worse about myself. You don't need to think that anymore. Now you're part of a community that's liberated. Liberated based on the radical hospitality of God. The way up is down. The way to be truly rich is to give it away. The way to be truly powerful is to serve. The way to get angels into your life is just to seek the destitute.

Listen, if you've received God's hospitality, now we have to be vehicles for that hospitality. The more we're hospitable to others, to our neighbors, to our brothers and sisters, the more we open our lives, our wallets, our resources, our hearts, our secrets, our privacy. The more we open up to other people, the more we'll experience the power and the presence of God. I suggest five acts of urban hospitality. Very, very simple. Let's do these. Number one, open your home to the people in your apartment building on your floor.

At least start doing that. Open your home, open your heart. Invite them in, do hospitality to them. They're New Yorkers, so two thirds of them won't come anyway. Because they won't trust you. Because they live in a different world. But a third of them will. That's my experience.

And that's a lot, a lot more. So first of all, invite, do hospitality to the people in your apartment building, the people in your floor. Secondly, invite some of them to church and then take them out to eat. Do hospitality like that, number two. Number three, help, sponsor, lead, or help somebody else sponsor or lead a small group. See if if you just come to large group services but you don't really get into one another's lives, that's the place at which you pound the truths you learn in these meetings

into your lives. That's where your personal narrative links in with the great narrative of what Jesus Christ has done for history and changes your life. If you're not in a small group or if you're not in some relationships of equivalent intensity, you're not really in the church. You're in a Christian club. Hospitality your neighbors, hospitality by bringing them to church, hospitality by being in a small group. Fourth, volunteer. Be an usher, take care of the kids, work on the welcome table, do that stuff.

Do you know what that is? That's hospitality, that's not just busy work, that's hospitality in a very fairly impersonal city. That's hospitality, do that. And last of all, care for the poor, the prisoner, the oppressed, the stranger. Open your life to the destitute and you'll find angels coming in. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for the community of grace.

Thank you for all it means to us. Thank you for your radical hospitality by which we live. Make us hospitable to one another. Teach us how we can practice what you have told us in here and what you've shown us in your Son Jesus Christ who came not to be served but to serve and give his life a ransom for many. It's in his name we pray, amen. Thanks for listening to today's teaching.

It's our prayer that you were encouraged by it and that it equips you to know more about God's Word. You can find more resources from Tim Keller at GospelInLife.com. Just subscribe to the Gospel In Life newsletter to receive free articles, sermons, devotionals, and other resources. Again, it's all at gospelandlife.com. You can also stay connected with us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter.

Today's sermon was recorded in 2005. 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.