Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - The Freedom of Love

Episode Date: July 19, 2024

How could the idea that you’re saved by grace alone be any incentive to live a good life? Paul says the gospel of salvation through free grace, not works, is actually a greater incentive to a life of honesty, sacrifice, and love than anything else. He’s talking about how we change the human heart, and he says the motivation behind what we do is all-important. Paul tells us 1) what the new motivation is, and 2) how the new motivation works. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on March 29, 1998. Series: Galatians: New Freedom, New Family. Scripture: Galatians 5:5-12. 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.

Are you seeking to change something in your life but find yourself falling into the same habits? Is there any hope for lasting change? This month, Tim Keller is preaching through the book of Galatians, which is all about how Christians can experience true transformation in Christ and how our issues are not solved by our good works, but by allowing the gospel to transform every area of our lives. 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 Life in the Gospel quarterly journal

with articles that feature how the gospel is changing hearts, lives, and communities, as well as highlighting other gospel-centered resources. Subscribe today at GospelInLife.com. We're going through the book of Galatians and tonight, you know, this is sort of like, you remember how God said to Gideon, ah, we don't want too many people. I want to get more glory and he cut down the numbers and it's hot tonight and it's beautiful out and if you have come here to this service, I'm going to treat you as the mature, grown-up people you are and I'm going to give you a little more theology than I usually do, so I want you to concentrate and think. I'm just going to read from Galatians 5, just from verses 5 down to 12 that we'll cover

tonight. Galatians 5, 5 to 12. But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you.

A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough. I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion will pay the penalty whoever he may be. Brothers, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been abolished. As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves." Okay? And this is God's word. Now, which tells us a few things, and that's what we're going to look at. The subject, you know, if you don't come regularly, what's the subject? Since we're going through the book of Galatians, what's the issue? What's

the occasion? What's the context? It's this. Paul planted a series of churches in Galatia, and he's right into those churches. Because when he planted those churches, he gave them a basic charter, a basic understanding of Christianity. And he said, this is Christianity. You believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you're saved, and as a result you will obey God and live a good life. Change life. But there's a group of teachers that came to the same churches and they said no no no that's not quite right. It's good that you believe on Jesus Christ but it's not believe and then you're saved and then you'll live a

good life as a result but rather you have to believe and you have to live a good life as a result you'll be saved. to believe and you have to live a good life as a result, you'll be saved. Belief in Christ isn't enough. Faith in Christ isn't enough. You've got to live a good life. You've got to obey the law before you can have any confidence that God will bless you and favor you.

So Paul had come to them and said, once you believe in Christ, no matter what you are, what you've done, your sins can never bring you into condemnation. Your children of Abraham and this group have said, no, it's not true. And they said, good works has got to be part, along with faith, of the basis for why God accepts you or how God accepts you. Now, this is a big issue. And in some ways, what we're looking at in chapter five is the answer to the people who pretty regularly come up to me and they say this.

They say it after sermons, they say it in question and answer, and they say this. They would say, I don't see how in the world it's possible that telling people that God accepts them no matter what they do could be any incentive, could result, could be any kind of engine or energy for good life, for a good living. And the illustration I used last week is I had my two oldest sons have gone through this situation where the junior, the end of the junior year and the beginning of the senior year they busted hard, got great grades because they wanted to get into good colleges.

And once they got their college acceptances, once they knew the colleges couldn't see what they did in the second semester, their grades fell off and I would look at them and I would say, why are you falling off in your grades? And they would say, the colleges don't see that. I'm in. So people turn and say, okay let me ask you a question. I mean that's natural, it's natural. If the colleges have already accepted them and they're already in, why should they work hard in the second semester of their senior year? Why should they and in the same way if you go to people and say look God in a sense doesn't see those sins They're covered the Bible does say that blessed is the man whose sins are covered

You see they're covered God doesn't see them and if they're covered and God doesn't see them How in the world could that be any incentive? How could this idea that you're saved by faith alone? You're saved by grace alone apart from your works How could that be any incentive to live a good life? I don't see how it could Here Paul explains how in chapter 5 Paul explains how it is that the gospel of salvation through free grace not works is actually a greater incentive to a life of honesty, the life of sacrifice,

the life of love, a life of holiness than anything else. And just as we started looking at it last week, we'll look at it this week and we will actually continue to look at it next week, let me pause for a second to explain or to help us understand how important this is. When Paul talks about this stuff in Galatians 5, and it is so incredibly important, in a way the heart of the whole thing is right here in verse 6. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision or uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith energizing itself, expressing itself, resulting through love. Faith creating an energy of love. All right, now that's kind of the heart. And Paul is talking about what changes the motivation, what changes the heart so that we want to live

lives of sacrifice, we want to live lives of love, we want to live lives of goodness and so forth. Now the reason this is so incredibly, incredibly important, do you know that this is the thing that all the heads of state, this is the thing that all the smartest people in the world, this is the thing that all the experts are after? This is the thing that we're all after? There was a, I have to occasionally quote it in the past, but it's been a while, there was a woman named Beatrice Webb who was also named Lady Passfield. She and her husband Sidney lived in the late 19th century, early 20th century in Britain and they were, they're considered the founders of the social welfare structure of Britain. Now I'm not trying to knock the social welfare structure with what I'm reading but it's pretty interesting. They formed it, they were very typical, smart people,

the intelligentsia of that time, they decided that though they've been raised in the church, they renounce Christianity. And in 1925, near the end of her life, Lady Pastiel Beatrice Webb wrote this in her diary, she's actually not in her diary, she wrote this in an essay. She said, somewhere in my diary in 1890, I wrote, quote, I have staked everything on the essential goodness of human nature. But now 35 years later, I realize how permanent are the evil impulses and instincts in man, and how little we can change these. For example, the greed of wealth and of power.

We must continually be asking for better things from our own and from other persons, human nature, but shall we get any response? And without a response, how can we shift social institutions from off the basis of brutal struggle for existence and power, and onto that of response? How can we shift social institutions from off the basis of brutal struggle for existence and power and onto that of fellowship? No amount of knowledge or science will be of any avail unless we can curb these evil impulses and set free ourselves for good. Can this be done without the authoritative ethics associated with faith and a spirit of love at work in the universe?" Now here's what was going on. Here's a lady in her early days said, I have staked everything on human nature, the goodness of human nature.

And she set things up so that through education and social welfare, people would be free to respond and fellowship. By the end of her life, she said, I have finally come to realize that there are evil impulses in human beings, a desire for power, pride, selfishness, violence, and we can't stop it. She says, how in the world are we gonna have a world? We keep asking people, and they won't respond.

And then near the very end she says, unless there's a God, is there any hope? But you notice she doesn't quite say that. She's afraid to say that. She never did. She says, how can this be done without the authoritative ethics associated with faith and a spirit of love at work in the universe? Now that's a pretty wimpy way of putting it, but you see what she's moving toward.

She realizes, in fact, she realizes that the question is how in the world do you deal with the human heart? How do you change the human heart so that there's a desire to love and to sacrifice and to be generous? That's not the way the human heart, how do you change the human heart so that there's a desire to love and to sacrifice and to be generous? That's not the way the human heart works. I was intrigued and I thought it was pretty interesting. There's a good editorial in the New York Times, this week in review, section of the paper today. And it was good because it was talking about the shooting in Arkansas, it was talking about the two boys that killed five children, other children. And the New York Times did a pretty good job of saying that everybody

is jumping on the bandwagon to use it to advocate their causes. And the point was that there were shallow causes. So liberals get in and say, see, this is why we need to have gun control. And conservatives say, this is the reason why we need to have more control of the entertainment industry and the violence of films and parents aren't taking care of each other kids and the breakdown of the family. And yet at the very end of the article, they quote a guy I never heard of. Well, I did probably hear of him. Anyway, they quote a man who's a literary critic and he says the response, the sound bites, the pat answers, the spin is very bad and then he says imagine Dostoevsky. He says now Fyodor Dostoevsky actually had

a diary and what he would do is when he heard of some incident that really struck him that he wanted to reflect and meditate on, he would write it down in the diary and so many of his great novels and great essays were based on incidents that he reflected on his diary. And this man says that, I didn't know this, but Dostoevsky's diary had at least two incidents exactly like the Jonesboro Massacre. In other words, children killing a whole lot of other children. This happens, this has always happened. And Dostoevsky had a couple of incidents in his diary. And this is what this man says. He says, imagine what Dostoevsky would do with that.

There were incidents like this, two boys killing other children, that he put in his diary. How would he deal with the transcendentally important question of evil in the child? But today, the editor would write up, would call up and say, Theodore, tomorrow, please, your piece. What? Don't tell me you need ten months to think about it. Theodore, tomorrow, or else. Now, it was trying to say, ah, we need to think about it,

but it was great. Look at that. He's absolutely right. He says, Dostoevsky realized that the issue wasn't gun control, it wasn't entertainment industry, it wasn't MTV, it wasn't, you know, the breakdown of the family. This has been happening for centuries. The thing that we want to believe is that we're innocent and something makes us go wrong. The thing we want to believe in is if we live out in little homogeneous communities in, you know, beautiful rural areas, these sort of things won't happen. We want to believe

that evil is an external thing, evil is an odd thing, evil is something we can control. It turns out that it's in deep, in deep. It's in the human heart, it's even in the child. It's in the thing that we think is so innocent. It's the transcendentally important question of human evil, even in the child. Now, Dostoevsky spent a lot of time meditating on it, and he wrote great meditating on it, and

he wrote great novels about it, and of course the editor was trying to say how silly we are, we don't know how to deal with these issues, and we don't. But Paul is, Paul is saying that this is the only hope, this is the thing that Beatrice Webb gave her life to, actually in some ways barking at the wrong tree because she didn't know about this, and near the end of her life she realized this is what we need. There's a transcendentally important problem. Evil in the heart. The human heart. How do we change the human heart? How do we do it? Gun control? See, I'm not against gun control by the way. You know, censorship of movies, I'm not against that either. Social welfare, I'm not against that either. But you see, this is

the important thing. This is the important thing. Now, what Paul tells us is this. I'm going to be very prosaic. I'm going to go through this passage. I'm going to show you what he says. Basically, what Paul is saying is that the reason we obey God, the reason we do good things is all important. The difference between Paul and these false teachers was not that Paul said, oh, now that you're saved, you can commit adultery and lie. He didn't say that. Paul said, you can't commit adultery or lie.

You mustn't. And the teacher said, you can't commit adultery or lie. You mustn't. But the point was not that one said it was okay, one said not. They both said it wasn't okay. But the reason they gave for why you should obey God was utterly different. And Paul says the reason is everything. Let's take a look at that. Paul says the reason is everything. So he says it's the motivation. The reason you obey God is everything. So

first of all he tells us that the new motivation is crucial. He shows us what the new motivation is and he shows us how the new motivation works. You know, that is crucial. This new, different motivation for obedience. First, that is crucial, what it is and how it works. First of all, that is crucial. Look in verse 7 and 8. You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you. Now this is interesting.

First of all, notice he says, you have to obey the truth. He's not saying, well, now that you're accepted in Christ, you don't have to obey. You do have to obey the truth. He's going to say, the real question is why? You must obey, but where's the must get its power? Why must you? That's the important thing. You must, but why? What will happen if you don't? What is the reason why you should feel constrained? Yes, you feel constrained, but why are you constrained? So first of all, there's no issue that we have to obey the truth.

But then secondly, look here, very interesting. It says, who caught on you and kept you from obeying the truth? Do you realize how weird this is? The Galatians think that they're getting more obedient. The Galatians are about to undergo a regimen of the most fastidious and conscientious obedience to every single aspect of the Mosaic law. And yet Paul says, you are about to. conscientious obedience to every single aspect of the Mosaic law. And yet Paul says, you are about to, you've been cut into, you're being pulled out of obeying the truth.

And this means, see here's the implication. Paul is actually saying that if you obey God for the wrong reasons, it's as bad as if you were disobeying God In other words if you obey God formally in your behavior, but out of the wrong reasons God still sees it as disobedience They're gonna be obeying the rules, but not obeying the truth. In fact the word truth is probably pretty interesting It's probably it's probably Deliberately chosen he doesn't say obey the law he says obey the truth and here's the reason why if you obey We this is actually some of this is common sense. If you obey a rule, but your heart is filled with pride or anger or fear, you see, in other

words all those things, all the opposites of the fruit of the spirit, in other words if you obey the law of God, but your heart's not right, then it's like disobedience. Okay? of God, but your heart's not right, then it's like disobedience. Okay. I mean, I think almost everybody knows that formal, a formal conforming to a law, but with a malicious intent is just as bad as if you, you know, it's immoral formal morality with, with an ill intent to hurt somebody, to rub their nose in it. You know, we would say that that's not right. But even, I'll go a little further.

When Paul says, if you think obeying the law can win you God's favor, what you're actually doing is disobeying the law in the sense that you're not listening to the law. I've had people say to me, I don't need Jesus Christ, I don't need the Savior, I don't need all that doctrine, incarnation, to atone, and all that stuff. I'm a golden rule Christian. I've had people say this to me. I focus on the golden rule, I listen to the golden rule,

and as long as I live according to the golden rule, I think I'm a Christian. I don't need all that other stuff. And the problem is, when somebody says that, you can't say, well, yes, you're listening to the golden rule I think I'm a Christian I don't need all that other stuff and the problem is when somebody says that you can't say well yes you're listening to the golden rule but you also have to know you don't say that what you have to say is fine go ahead listen to the golden rule you're not because if you really look at the golden rule and you see what it asks for and you see what it's after it's utterly just to say I will always treat people the way I would

want to be treated. But nobody, nobody does that. Nobody comes close to that. And if you are really listening to the law of, the golden rule is saying, do unto others as, you know, you would have them do unto you, but the golden rule is saying something else. The golden rule is also saying, and you can't do it. If you actually listen to the law of God, that's why Paul says the law of God is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. If you really listen to the law of God, that's why Paul says the law of God is a school master to bring us to Christ If you really listen to the law of God, you will know that though this is right and this is just and this is something you ought To try to do you'll never in a million years do it which means anybody who says I'm following the golden rule

I don't need Jesus Christ is not following the golden rule because the golden rule does not just tell you how to live It leads you to seek a Savior Every aspect of the law of God if you're really listening, it leads you to seek a savior. Every aspect of the law of God, if you're really listening to it, anybody says, sure, I obey the law of God, I'm a good person, you are not listening to the law. The very thing you say you're obeying, you're not.

And so these people who think they're about to really incredibly obey the law or obey the rules are actually being cut in on, and they're not gonna obey the law or obey the rules are actually being cut in on and they're not going to obey the truth at all. How can we best understand the freedom we have in Christ? What is the relationship between the law of the Bible and the grace that Jesus offers? In the book Galatians for You, Tim Keller takes you through a rich and deep study of

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

So the motivation is everything. The motivation is crucial. Let's just move on. Okay. I don't want to spend much more time on that. Well, let me say this. Let's just move on, okay? I don't want to spend much more time on that. Well, let me say this. One of the things that really gets some people, really gets them going,

is when they hear that some prisoner in prison who's lived a terribly cruel, vicious life says, I've become a Christian, you say, good, that's great. That means they were living a vicious, cruel life, now they're gonna live a moral and decent and responsible and loving and sacrificial life one of the things that people cannot understand people who don't really Get this motivation. They don't see the heart of the motivation what they can't understand is there are lots of people

There's some of them in this room Who have all their lives live very conventionalized very traditional traditional morality, very nice people, parent pleasers, you know, sweet natured, kind, incredibly responsible, you know, and all that kind of thing. And then suddenly, these people will suddenly say, I've become a Christian. And you watch them, and they don't seem, at least on the outside, to actually be changing their behavior. And you say, what are you talking about? And they say, well, I'm doing everything to, I mean, say, well, I'm doing everything, I mean, on the inside, I'm doing everything

for a completely different reason. I've totally become a Christian. I wasn't a Christian, I was a very wicked person before. And of course you won't understand it, unless you see the motivation is everything, the reason is everything. Okay, now, that is crucial. Secondly, what the new motivation is.

Now look carefully, oh, in 9 and 10 somebody's gonna say, what does this mean? A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough. I'm confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion will pay the penalty, whoever he may be. That's almost a footnote. What he's saying is,

a little yeast works through the whole batch. That's a way of saying, this false persuasion, this false reasoning, this false motivation that you've been given. See, that kind of persuasion, this is a unique word, this persuasion is a word that literally means the convincing. When you ask somebody to convince you of something, what are you asking? You're saying, why should I do it? And Paul says, the why behind your obedience, if it's wrong, is as good as disobedience. And he says, this kind of motivation is like a little yeast that works itself through the whole batch. This teaching is pernicious. This teaching is like cancer. This

teaching could spread and destroy the churches. But, he says, I don't think that you're gonna bite. I don't think it. He's affirming them. And then he says the one who's throwing into confusion will pay the penalty of whoever he may be. It's a little odd because it's one of the first places he refers to an individual. We don't know who that is and it almost seems to me like he hasn't met the person either. He's just heard about him. Okay, now what is the new motivation? It's this. It starts with offense. Down in verse 11, it says, brothers, if I'm still preaching circumcision, why am I being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been abolished. Now, I'm going to get back

to the word offense later because he actually brings this up in chapter six, but here's what it means now. The gospel always starts this way, offensive. If you've never been offended by the cross, if you've never been offended by the gospel, if you've never really felt it, you probably don't understand it. The difference between the two approaches is this. The approach of the teachers on the inside is very demeaning and very negative, but on the outside seems very affirming and positive. Whereas the approach of the gospel on the inside

is incredibly affirming, incredibly positive, but on the outside, it's extremely offensive. Why? All right, well, look at this way. The teachers say on the outside, be good, be noble. Nobody's ever, nobody has ever been offended by that. An Anglican evangelical minister, I heard, read this I think,

he went to preach at a chapel of some boys' school in Britain and right afterwards the wife of the headmaster came up and said, in all the years I've been here, in all the chapel speakers we've had here, you're the first one who ever talked to us as if we were sinners. And he said, what are you talking about? What do you mean?

And here's the point. If you tell people, be good, work for world peace, love one another, you can make the world a better place. You know, that might seem like a lot of pressure, but it is absolutely, it's ennobling, it's affirming. But when you come and say, the cross, you are so far from being able to live a good life that nothing less than the death of the Son of God

on the cross was necessary. You're so lost, you're so weak, that nothing less than the death of the Son of God would save you. That's offensive. So on the outside, the teachers look like they're affirming, and on the outside, the Gospel looks like it's offensive. But on the inside, it's exactly the opposite. Because when the teachers come to you and say,

the reason you've got to obey is, if you don't, God will get you. If you don't, God will reject you. But on the inside of the motivation of the gospel is, why should you obey? Because God will never reject you. Because God will never, ever, ever leave you. So on the outside, one is offensive and one is complimentary.

But on the inside, it's the other way around. On the inside, the teacher's approach is absolutely fear-based, absolutely negative, absolutely demeaning. You better live up or God could just cast you off. And this is the reason why over and over again I've had people say to me, if I believed like you that once I became a Christian, I would never be afraid of being rejected, no matter how I lived. If I felt that, if I felt my sins could never condemn me, I'd have no incentive to live a good life. And my answer is always, always, always, always the same, almost word for word. What I say is, if when you lose your fear of rejection by God,

if when you lose your fear of rejection, you've lost all your incentive to living a holy life, then the only incentive you had for living a holy life was fear. Now, you see, after the offense of the cross, which on the outside looks very demeaning, on the inside, what is the new motivation? Verse 5. But by faith, we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope.

For in Christ Jesus, alright, for which we hope. Now the word hope in the Bible means the thing that we know will happen. What? Yes. You see, for example, here we're going to give you an example. Hebrews chapter 11 verse 1, it says, now faith is being assured of what we hope for. It's the certainty of things we don't see. The word hope, the English word hope translates a Greek word here that means the absolute conviction. At first, you know, the word hope looks like we eagerly wait to the Spirit, the righteousness for which we hope. And you know what you're probably going to say the first time you read that you're going to say, wait a minute, this is talking about the fact that someday in the future righteousness always means the beauty of God,

the acceptance of God, the glory of God will come down on us. We'll be absolutely perfect. We'll be righteous. Wait a minute, I thought we already were. What is this talking about? We hope. We don't know? The word hope means certainty, in fact, and the giveaway is the word eagerly. Here's what Paul is saying. A Christian is absolutely assured and convicted in a way that no other person is of the glory

and beauty that's waiting you in the future. A Christian is galvanized by the thought of your future. If you are a secular person, you have no idea where you're going to be a billion years from now, except possibly you're going to be nothing but molecules spread out through the universe, period. And if you are a member of any other religion, you don't know either. You have no idea whether you're gonna live up.

You might be feeling right now, if I died, I'd go to heaven, but I don't know whether I'll keep it up. Nobody but a Christian can say, by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. Christians are galvanized by the knowledge of the beauty and righteousness and glory that we are going to be, that we know we're going to be enveloped with, which is guaranteed, which we're certain about. And what that does, you see, that absolute

opposite of fear, the absolute, absolute opposite of fear, completely changed their motivation. That's the new motivation, not fear, hope, not flattery, humility. Well, you say, but how does it do it? Now, you want the answer? Here's your theology. I told you a story last week, which I'll recall, but let me give you a theology. Turn to the front of your bulletin. See, free theology in the bulletin. The bulletin costs you nothing.

Right? You go to Barnes & Noble, you buy something this big, five bucks. Now here, Jonathan Edwards, in a couple of his works, I put this together. This is what he says about Galatians 5-6, and read it and listen carefully. The apostle teaches in Galatians 5-6 that faith works by love.

A truly Christian faith always produces good works, but all the good works which it produces are by love. Now, here, listen. No matter how many of our acts of justice, generosity, and devotion, there is nothing given to God if God is not the end or ultimate aim for what is given. If your aim is the gaining of reputation and love, then the gift was offered to your prophet. Indeed, in such cases the gifts are but an offering to some idol. But in gracious, that means grace-filled gratitude, Christians are affected by God's goodness

and free grace not only as it benefits them but as infinitely glorious in itself. A result of faith working by love is freedom. On this basis obedience is called evangelical, gospel-based. The obedience of children to a father done with love and delight as opposed to legalistic, slavish, and forced. God is now chosen for his own sake, holiness is chosen for its own sake, and for God's sake. Now, you know what he's saying? It's quite simple. If you say, how does this work? It's as simple as this. The thing every one of us wants, the thing every one of us wants is to be loved for who we are in ourselves. It's to have someone consider you a beauty. You know what? When you find something beautiful,

it means that you find it an end in itself. You appreciate it for what it is in itself. Not for what it gets you, not what it gives you. If you find music beautiful, you sit and you listen to it. If you see a work of art beautiful, you sit and you look at it. Why? There is no why. For what? For itself. Just being in its presence builds

you up. That's beauty. That's aesthetics. All right? Now, Jonathan Adwords is saying, if you are not sure you're going to heaven unless you live a good life, then every good thing you're doing is never for forgot, it's for you. And not only that, every little old lady you help across the street, sorry little old ladies, but every little old lady that you help across the street, you're saying I need to do this so I know I'm going to get to heaven.

You're not loving her for who she is in herself. You're not doing this just for the sheer value of who she is. You're not doing the deed for the sheer glory of holiness itself, and you're not doing it for God. You've never done anything for God until you know you can do nothing for God at all, and that you are completely accepted in Jesus Christ and you don't need anything from him

anymore because you have it all. And it's not until you are actually doing responding simply because you love me for who I am in myself. When Jesus Christ died on the cross for me, his value for me must have been an aesthetic joy. It could not have been anything, because there's nothing that he gets out of us. There's nothing we could possibly do to help him.

He needs nothing, Paul says in Acts 17, nothing. And therefore he loves us for who we are in ourselves. And only when we see that are we so transformed that we begin to say, he loves me for who I am in myself. We begin to find him a beauty. We're not doing things in order to get things from him. We're not using God until you see that you're saved by grace alone without works.

You're using God, you're not serving God for the joy of who he is in himself. And that's what he's saying. And here's what's so interesting. This means two things about our obedience. It's a hot night, I'm gonna close up on this. I gave you more information and inspiration tonight. But it's very, very, very important.

This is the heart of everything. The heart of everything. First of all, Edward says that this obedience would be limited. The only obedience to God would be unlimited, would be obedience that boots off of grace. Here's why. If you obey God

like most people do, and that is I'll obey God, but why isn't he answering my prayers? I'll obey God, but why isn't this and that happening in my life? What does that mean? You're obeying God, but why isn't this and that happening in my life? What does that mean? You're obeying God really not for the joy of who he is, not for the glory of who he is, not for appreciation as it says right here,

as infinitely glory in himself. You're doing it because you want prayers answered. You want a comfortable life. You want your life to go in certain ways. And therefore your obedience to God is really negotiable. Whenever your life goes bad, if you're a Christian, whenever your life goes bad and you start to go clutch underneath, it's God coming to you and saying, now we're gonna see whether you got into this religion to serve me or whether we got into this religion to have me serve you.

Those really are two different religions, according to Edwards. Two different personalities result. One condescending, one limited, one begrudging, one slavish, one impersonal, and the other one, absolutely personal. Now I'm obeying a father, not a boss. Absolutely aesthetic. It's booting off of beauty.

It's booting off of the sight of the beauty of God for who he is in himself. And therefore, aesthetic joy and assurance of our future beauty. In other words, aesthetic joy in the beauty of God and the conviction of our future beauty to him as well as our beauty to him now is the new dynamic. Now somebody says, how do we actually work that out? Well, I told you we're going to keep on going.

We're not done with this chapter. But when it says the apostle teaches in Galatians 5-6 that faith works by love, and he says, for by the Spirit we eagerly hope, we eagerly await, by the Spirit, through the Spirit, we eagerly await for the righteousness for which we hope. Now listen, you know, whenever I used to read the sermons of David, Martin, and Lloyd-Jones, I always could tell, especially when I read his sermons on the witness of the Spirit and when I read his sermons on the experience of love, he

talked in such deep experiential terms. And I said, there must have been something that happened to this man. But he never talked about it. However, after he died, before he died, he talked to a biographer about the most, well, really one of the most, oh, one of the most seminal moments in his life,

which he never spoke of. And here's what happened in 1949, which he never spoke of. And here's what happened in 1949 when he was in, he took the whole summer off because he was burned out. He was a preacher in Britain, but he went to Wales where his homeland, he spent the entire time there, but basically in a state of spiritual depression. One day early in the morning, 6 a.m., he woke up and he was not sure. You know, he felt very burdened. He felt very far from God.

But as he was getting dressed at 6 a.m., his eye just happened to look over at a book that was open, a book of sermons by A.W. Pink, and it was open. And his eye just happened to notice the bottom, the last word on the bottom line of one of the pages, and it just had the word glory on it, just the word glory. And when as I hit the word glory, suddenly the glory of God came down on him. And for two hours he couldn't speak, for two hours he couldn't stop weeping, for two hours he got this the deepest conviction through the spirit of the righteousness for which we hope. And by the way what's interesting is that happened to him that

day and about a week or two later at another place it happened to him again. And you know what he told the biographer was look we know when Paul had to speak about these experiences in 2nd Corinthians 12 he felt like an idiot. Remember in 2nd Corinthians 12 Paul said felt like an idiot. Remember? In 2 Corinthians 12, Paul said, let me tell you about some of the things that God has shown me. And you made me a fool. You're forcing me to do it. And he had reasons why I had to do it. Nobody likes to talk about it. I'm not going to tell you about mine. And Lloyd-Jones didn't tell you about his. The fact is it's through the spirit that this assurance that's pretty much a matter of the head for a long time becomes a matter of the heart.

I am not saying that this is the solution, a snap solution. Thomas Chalmers wrote this wonderful, wonderful sermon that I'm going to bring back to you and give you some quotes out of it. It's called the expulsive power of a new affection and in it he says the only way anybody's heart is changed is this at the heart of every heart there is an object of the greatest beauty and a heart cannot live without it. You can replace the object of the greatest beauty in your heart, but you can never remove it. You can replace it with a more beautiful object, but you can never remove it.

And therefore, you can't just stop being proud. You can't just stop being addicted to love. You can't just stop lying. You can't just stop these things because the whole reason is there's some other kind of righteousness that you are eagerly waiting for, that you put your hope in. And it's only as Jesus Christ becomes the most beautiful

and your hope in him through the spirit becomes the most vivid, that it can replace the other things that your heart is grabbing onto. And therefore this isn't a snap, but this is the way. This is the thing that Beatrice Webb couldn't find out. This is the thing that Dostoevsky did know something about. This is the thing. His arms are the only arms. These are the arms you've been looking for. His heart is

the only heart. This is the heart you've been looking for. Faith working through love. Nothing else counts. Let's pray. Fathers, we continue to look at this material. We ask that you would illuminate us. I pray that when we're all done with this, we can really have quite a, we can have a great deal of hope and we can have some very practical ways in which we can see ourselves change more and more into the image of your son. It's in his name that we pray. Amen. Thanks for listening to today's teaching. We trust you were encouraged by it and that it gives you new insight into how you can apply God's Word to your life. You can find more resources from Tim Keller by subscribing to our quarterly journal at GospelandLife.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 recorded in 1998. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel in Life podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.