Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - The Problem of Injustice (Part 1)

Episode Date: May 24, 2024

A lot of people are mad at God. People who believe. People who don’t believe. And people who don’t know what they believe. And in Psalm 73, we see Asaph get mad at the way God seems to be mishandling the world. Asaph has been living a self-controlled, compassionate life, but everything is going wrong. On top of that, he sees all sorts of people who live abusive, immoral lives, and they’re having a great life. Yet we’re told that Asaph finally comes to the conclusion that God, in spite of it all, is good.  How does he get there? We’re going to look at this psalm over two weeks. This week I want to show you 1) the situation he was in, 2) how he escaped it, and 3) how he finally came to say, “God is good, no matter what happens to me.” This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on November 21, 1993. Series: Modern Problems; Ancient Solutions. Scripture: Psalm 73. Today's podcast is brought to you by Gospel in Life, the site for all sermons, books, study guides and resources from Timothy Keller and Redeemer Presbyterian Church. If you've enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to support the ongoing efforts of this ministry, you can do so by visiting https://gospelinlife.com/give and making a one-time or recurring donation.

Welcome to Gospel in Life. Our culture places so much faith in empirical reason, technology, and personal experience that it's easy to wonder, does something as old as Christianity have any relevance to the problems of modern life? This month, Tim Keller invites us to consider how Christianity is more relevant than ever in offering answers to the deepest longings of our hearts. So we're going to spend two weeks on the psalm and two weeks on the theme because I think as you will see, it's tremendously relevant, tremendously practical, and especially, by

the way, as we go into the holidays, you're're gonna find there's a you many of us will have a particular need to grasp the teaching of this passage. Psalm 73 reads and it's printed in your bulletin surely God is good to Israel to those who are pure in heart but as for me my feet had almost slipped I had nearly lost foothold, for I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They have no struggles, their bodies are healthy and strong, they are free from the burdens common to man, they are not plagued by human ills. Therefore, pride is their necklace.

They clothe themselves with violence. From their callous hearts come iniquity. The evil conceits of their minds know no limits. They scoff and speak with malice, In their arrogance they threaten oppression, Their mouths lay claim to heaven, And their tongues take possession of the earth. Therefore their people turn to them, And drink up waters in abundance. They say, How can God know? Does the Most High have knowledge?

This is what the wicked are like. Always carefree, they increase in wealth. In vain, surely in vain, I have kept my heart pure. In vain, I have washed my hands in innocence. All day long I have been plagued, I have been punished every morning. If I had said I will spook thus, I would have betrayed your children. When I tried to understand all this, it was oppressive to me until I entered the sanctuary of God. And then I understood their final destiny. Surely you put them on slippery ground. You cast them down to ruin. How suddenly they are destroyed, completely swept away by terrors. As a dream one awakes, so when you arise, O Lord, you will despise them as

fantasies. When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you. Yet I am always with you. You hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Those who are far from you will perish, you will destroy all who are unfaithful to you, but as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge, and I will tell of all your deeds." and I will tell of all your deeds." God's word. Now, I hate to do this because, in a sense, I know next week on a holiday weekend many, many, many of you won't be here, but I tell you, this psalm and the teaching of this psalm is something I so much want to get into

you as a community and as a body that I've got to give it time. And if you're not going to be here next week, I urge you to maybe get the tape or something like that. Listen, a lot of people are mad at God. People who believe, people who don't believe, and people who don't know what they believe are mad at God. R.C. Sproul,, I heard him tell his story, he was out golfing and his golf partner

insisted that he wasn't religious and R.C. probed a little bit and at one point he turned to him and said, I can't believe in a God who let my little baby die. Now you see what you've got there? There's such a thing as true doubt, when you just don't find the evidence for God compelling. But that's not what that was. You can't be mad at somebody. You're sure it doesn't exist. An awful lot of what one thinks, and an

awful lot of what's going on in this room, in a lot of your hearts, which you think is doubt, and you think it's intellectual doubt. I just can't see the evidence, but actually you're mad at the one that you say you doubt in. And it's not just unbelievers, it's not just people who are doubtful or skeptical, it's not just people who don't know what they believe. I'm suggesting to you, it could be that underneath an awful lot of your so-called skepticism and intellectual doubts, you're just mad at the way your life is going and at the way

God is running the world. But I'm also suggesting to a lot of those of you who say, I'm a Christian, it could be that underneath a lot of your doubts and a lot of your troubles and a lot of your struggles, you're mad. You know, the counselors will tell you there's nothing that we deny more than that. Anger. And in your typical church, people will say, mad at God? Oh, a good Christian would never get mad at God.

And yet here we have one of many, many extremely honest and very realistic passages in the Bible. Huh? When my heart was grieved, my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant. I was as a beast before you. What is he saying? I was mad at you. You know, there's a place in Psalm 44 where it says, all this has come upon us, though we have not forgotten thee, or have been false to thy covenant. Nay, for thy sake we were slain all the day long. Why sleepest thou, O Lord, awake? Do not cast us off. Why dost thou hide thy face? Why dost thou forget our affliction and our

oppression? Wake up, God. What's wrong? All through the Bible we've got people who are realistic, and I hope you will get realistic. Some of you who say, I'm not a Christian, you really, I don't believe in God, I'm mad at God. it's your real problem. Some of you who are Christians, you're saying, well the real problem is I can't grow, or I worship is nothing, my quiet times are boring, I don't understand, God doesn't seem to be very real to me, you're mad maybe. Now this is one of the classic, maybe this is the classic place, that tells you what happens when you start to get mad at the injustice of life. It's a classic place that tells you what happens when you start to get mad at the injustice of life, mad at the way God seems to be manhandling, mishandling the world. You look and here's a person, that person catches, discovers the cancer in time to catch it,

and here's somebody else who doesn't and he or she dies. It all seems random, It all seems unfair. Now, this man, his name is Asaph, the writer of this song, tells us about a problem that he had. I want to show you how typical it is. You see, on the one hand, he tells us, up in verse 13 and and 14 that he has been leading a very exemplary life. He has kept his heart pure. He has washed his hands in innocence.

He has worked tremendously hard to lead a decent life, a good life, a religious life, serve God, and so on. But we are also told, secondly, that though he does this, he has been afflicted. Now we're not sure why. In verse 14 he says, he says, I have been, all day long I have been plagued and I have been punished every morning. It could be that there's sickness in his life. It could be that there's trouble in his family. It could be there's an economic disaster.

It could be there's some terrible disappointment. I think most of us over the years who have read Psalm 73 are kind of glad that he doesn't tell us what it is. He says, I've done my very best to live a good and moral and decent life and yet every morning I'm plagued. Every morning the pain is there. Now we don't know if he means emotional pain or psychological pain or physical pain or what. And we're kind of glad, I hope, all of you are glad he doesn't tell us, because when you read the thing you can just fill in the blank with your own trouble. So it makes it easier to identify.

So he's been living a great life, you know, a self-controlled life, self-denial. Then on the other hand, secondly, everything is going wrong. But thirdly, and worst of all, is that he sees all sorts of people who are making no effort to live compassionate lives, they live abusive lives. They're making no effort to lead moral lives, they're leading immoral lives, no effort to lead lives of self-denial, they're leading lives of selfishness and conspicuous consumption, and they're having a great life. And you know, if you read verses four down to verse 12, they have no struggles.

Their bodies are healthy and strong. They look great, they feel great. We also see that they're abusive to people. They're proud, they're arrogant arrogant if you read through the verses. And you know, it's a tremendous picture of an awful lot of people in this world who are successful and who are powerful and who are influential. Those of you who get close to those people realize that in so many cases they are abusive, in so many cases they are shallow, in so many cases they are cruel, in so many cases they are abusive, in some many cases they are shallow, in some many

cases they are cruel, in some many cases they are impulsive, they are emotional wrecks, and yet they go on from success to success. And this man says, I almost broke under this. Now he tells us these three things. I'm trying to lead a good life, I'm having a lousy life, and people who are not trying to lead a good life are having a wonderful life. And those three things all together just about crush him.

And he tells us something about the nature of where he was. In verse 15, pardon me, in verse 16 and 17, he says, I tried to understand this, it was oppressive to me. It means that he was tremendously perplexed and confused. And his thinking was going around and around in circles, he was getting nowhere, he couldn't make any progress. And not only that, as we already read in verses 20 and 21, he had become embittered toward

God. He was mad, he could feel the anger churning. But actually, the most, you might say, the greatest problem or trial or difficulty that he really faced, you can see in verse 2 and 3 where he says, As for me, my feet had almost slipped. I had never lost my foothold. What's he mean by that? Well, he was saying that because he was confused and because he was mad, he had gotten to the place where he was about to lose his basis for living.

He was about to slip. The image, the picture, is here you are on a mountain. You're going up a mountain and you lose your foothold and you begin to slip. The next thing you know, you're in danger of just going over the edge, down into a ravine and plunging to your death. And when he talks about losing his foothold, he's talking about losing his grip on the basis of his life, what he bases his life on. Now, you know, Paul Tillich over here,

who for many years taught at Union Theological Seminary, a great theologian of the 20th century, many people considered him, Now, you know, Paul Tillich over here, who for many years taught at Union Theological Seminary, a great theologian of the 20th century, many people considered him, he used to always say that every human being bases his or her life on one or more ultimate concerns. That's the way he put it. Ultimate concern. Everybody's got bottom lines to their life. Everybody's got some things that they base their life on. What are you living for?

What are the things that really make you tick? What are those things? And he would always say the ultimate concerns always were your priorities, which led to your ethics. How did you decide how you spend your time? How did you spend what you're really living for? Will determine how you decide what is right and wrong. So in a sense, there's a whole worldview, everybody has a worldview based around your ultimate concern, what really is your God, what really you worship,

what really you base your life on. Now this man, of course, bases his life on serving God, that's what he lives for, and obeying God. That's how he decides what's right and wrong. And he says, I was about to lose my foothold. And that's his way of saying, I was about to throw the whole thing over. I was about to lose my old basis and completely chuck it. You can see that down in verse 12, where he says, this is what the wicked are like,

always carefree, they increase in wealth. And then he says, in vain I have kept my heart pure, in vain I have washed my hands in innocence. And what he's saying is, it's in vain. Here I'm living for God,

and I'm getting nothing out of it. Here I'm living for God. The thing I have my feet on, I'm starting to lose my grip on it because I'm saying, what good is it? And he's about, he says, he was just about to lose his foothold, which means to start living for something else.

Maybe live for fame, maybe live for power, maybe live for comfort, maybe live for pleasure, maybe just live for himself, and he didn't even know. Live to satisfy his impulse. Live to find out what he really wanted and what his deepest desires were. He was about to get an entirely different basis for life. He almost lost it all. And yet, we're told in verse 1, he finally came to the conclusion that God, in spite

of it all, is good. Now, how did he escape? But before we go to that, and that's what I want to talk about the rest of this morning, the time we have next week, because I want to show you that this is the situation he's in. That was the situation he's in. But before I go and show you how he escaped it, how he got his foothold back, how he finally came to say, God is good. I believe in the goodness of God. I know he's good no matter what happens to me. So you see he had his

feet back on the ground by the end of the song. But how did he get there? Before we talk about that, I want to say that this song makes a point that I'd like to drive home for a moment or two that's very important. This kind of problem is inevitable. The better a Christian you are. You see, there's an awful lot of people that would say, mad at God, well, a really good Christian wouldn't get mad at God. I've never been mad at God.

That kind of attitude shows tremendous ignorance. Don't you see why this person is in the position he's in? Don't you see why? If he hadn't been washing his hands so much, if he hadn't been keeping his heart so pure, if he hadn't been doing such a good job, he wouldn't be in this situation. You see, the better you are, the more self-disciplined you are, the more

self-denial, the more you give your money away to people in need, the more you put yourself at their beck and call, the more you take part in the worship of the Church, the more you pray and read the Bible, the more you do all these things that are considered, you know, religious things, Christian things, the more terrible it's going to be when you see how the world goes. This is inevitable. In fact, I go so far as to say that if you've never been in this position, you aren't trying very hard. You're making very few efforts in the Christian life if you've never seen this. I'm saying that this situation is something that anybody can be in. You can be a Christian or not a Christian

or not know whether you are a Christian. I'm saying everybody can be here, but I'm suggesting to you, and I'm pressing you to see that this is actually not a problem that only comes to kind of weak minds or not together people or not really good Christians. My dear friends,

if you want to deal with the real God, you're going to find that a lot of things he does doesn't make sense. And if you are really doing the kind of job Asaph does, you're going to be sometimes in deep perplexity. In fact, let's go so far. Let's go to the Garden of Gethsemane for a minute and look. Here's the best person ever. Here's the best person ever. Here's the greatest one ever. Here's the one who really did keep his heart pure.

You see, Asaph was just talking relatively. His heart's not pure. Nobody else ever had kept his heart pure. His hands aren't completely clean. He's just talking relative to other people. But there's one person who really did keep his heart pure, keep his hands clean. and near the end of his life he was in utter, utter complexity. He says, is there not some other way? Isn't

there some other way we can do this, oh Father? And he asks for something, he says, let this cup pass from me, and he gets an answer from heaven, no. He's struggling and he's wrestling with it. Don't you see, the better you are, the more likely you are to be wrestling like this at some point. In fact, I go so far as to say, as I've already said once, but I'll say it again, if you've never felt like this man, you're really not trying very hard to find God you're not trying very hard to lead a decent life you're not trying very hard I don't know you're probably living the

selfish life no don't you see this is an inevitable problem but now let's let's begin to look at how this man gets out of it because anybody anybody who's thoughtful frankly is going to feel like this guy did sometime, anybody. Now, there's really two ways to read the solution of the problem, and I'm only gonna look at it one way today, and I'm gonna try to give you a more extensive look at it next week.

There's actually four steps, and I'll just tell you enough to tantalize you, four things that he does to get out of the depths. He's about to fall. He's about to slip right over the precipice. But the first thing is he grabs hold of a negative. It's not much, but if you're about to fall off a cliff, you know, any old thing will

do to grab. He grabs hold of a negative. If I spoke thus, it would offend thy children. But he first grabs a negative, then he goes into the sanctuary. He says, until I went into the sanctuary, I didn't understand. Then thirdly, he says, I saw their end. He says, I stood back and saw the big picture. And then fourthly, he asks the ultimate question.

You know what the ultimate question is? The ultimate question comes near the end, where he finally says, whom have I in heaven but the, and on earth I have nothing besides you. So he has four steps, and I'm not gonna look at them all today, I can't. Time is rushing and that's what I'm doing next week,

but I'm just gonna pull one out, because I think it's the key one in some ways. Why does God allow suffering in the world? How can one religion be right and the other is wrong? Has science basically disproved Christianity? Tim Keller addresses these questions and more in his book, The Reason for God. Drawing on literature, philosophy, real-life conversations, and potent reasoning, this book will challenge you to gain a deeper understanding of the Christian faith, whether you're a believer seeking reassurance or you're reading it with a friend

who is searching for answers. When you give to Gospel in Life during the month of May, we'll send you two copies of The Reason for God, one for you and one to give to a friend who is exploring Christianity. It's our hope that through reading the book with a friend, you can have conversations about the claims of the Christian faith. The books are our thanks for your support of this ministry.

To receive your two copies of The Reason for God, simply make a gift at gospelonlife.com slash give. That's gospelonlife.com slash give. That's gospelonlife.com slash give. We also encourage you to check out our short podcast series, Questioning Christianity, for people exploring the claims of the Christian faith. To listen to this short series or share it with a friend, visit gospelonlife.com slash questioning. That's gospelonlife.com slash questioning.

Your gift helps the message of Christ's love go out all over the sanctuary, he says, I was oppressed, I was confused, I was upset, and it wasn't until I went into the sanctuary that I saw their end. I saw the big picture. I saw the whole thing. I saw past and present and future and eternity, whereas before I was just looking at the present. He saw the big picture. Now let me lay out the principle and then show you how it works out because it's absolutely critical. If you would get this down a lot of you wouldn't have to come see me. I hope you come see me

anyway, but if you got this down you wouldn't have to come see me. I hope you come see me anyway. But if you got this down, you wouldn't have to come see me. Listen. Whenever you feel like this man does, when you get mad, when you get oppressed, and you get confused, you can't understand why, when injustice, the injustice of life just starts to press you down, your problem is that you're not seeing the big picture. If you're in too close to something, you don't have the appropriate vantage point from which to see the true shape and dimensions of the thing you're looking at. Somebody some years ago put it this way, truth is cubical.

It's not a, the truth is a cube, not a square. Now what he meant by that, when he said it, was he says you can tell a square, and you can see the whole square, from one vantage point, but you can't see a cube from one vantage point, you have to move around it. So, for example, if you were looking at a house, and you want to see the true dimensions of the house, you can't see it from one angle, you've got to go around it. You've got to see it from several angles. That doesn't mean truth is relative. Oh, we're not saying that. We're not saying truth is relative at all. We're not saying

that truth is all a matter of opinion. By my moving around the house, it doesn't mean that, oh, you know, if three or four people move around the house to look at it, it doesn't mean one person's going to see a ranch house, one person's going to see a split level, one person's going to see a two-story colonial. What we're saying is unless you see all the sides, you're not going to see what the house really looks like. You've got to go around it. That's not only true physically, it's true mentally. Then I'll show you spiritually. It's true mentally. Prejudice is reductionism. What is a racial stereotype?

A racial stereotype is taking something that is very often true of a lot of people in that group and reducing people to it. See, a square instead of a cube. That's what prejudice is. It's refusing to see the whole. 50 years ago, no, before Einstein came along, the physicists thought that light only operated on a wave model. Einstein comes along and says it also operates on a particle model. And if before Einstein came along, you had said light is not only a wave, it also sometimes operates as a particle, and the physicists would have said, you're crazy. That's ridiculous. Why? Because they didn't see all

the sides. Now we know that light probably isn't a wave. This is what they'll tell you in the encyclopedias, light probably isn't a wave or a particle, because sometimes it operates as one, sometimes it operates as another. It's something we don't know yet. You have to move around, you have to get all the facts, you've got to see it all. Now, this is the essence of what Christianity says is the nature of truth. When Christianity says, ah, this philosophical system and this philosophical system and this philosophical system are wrong. They're mistaken. They're not just saying they're mistaken, they're saying they're too simple.

Because of the essence of spiritual thinking is seeing the whole and seeing every aspect of the truth. And heresy and false teaching and confusion always, always comes from reductionistic thinking. Spiritual thinking is seeing the whole. Look, for example, 60 years ago, there were people who insisted that you could explain all of human history as human beings evolving and civilization evolving

to higher and higher forms. It was called social Darwinism. Where is that theory today? Sixty years ago, an awful lot of people were Marxists. Where is that theory today? I'll tell you where those theories are. They've gone to the same place that enlightenment liberalism and enlightenment conservativism will go to as well. There are people in this room who doubt a lot of the Christian teaching. You doubt a lot of the message of the Bible. And you know why? Because you are influenced by systems of thought

that seem so compelling. Everybody, all your friends believe it. All your friends know it. You understand the Christian teaching that the Bible teaches this, and we know today that that's not true. And the Bible teaches this, and we know today that that's not true. There are systems of thought that have you captured and are making it hard for you to believe in the gospel message. Do you know where those systems of thought are going to be a hundred years from now?

Do you know where they're going to be? They're going to be on the scrap heap. And people a hundred years from now will be laughing at the things you, if you write what you believe today, and they are not Christian doctrine, people a hundred years from now will be laughing at you on the basis of new systems that will also go to the scrap heap. Why? Because every one of them is reductionistic. I can tell you one thing, 200 years from now there will still be a Christian church because

the gospel and the Christian truth is eternally vital. It never goes out of date. It'll be still here if history is still here. Transforming lives and transforming communities because it looks at the whole picture. Here's one view of humanity. Here's one view of economics. Here's one view of society that says human beings are valuable and dignified and yet that this particular system assumes that people are going to live rationally and nobly and it completely misses the doctrine of sin.

Ah, but over here, here's another system that hates that of you and says, yes, we're anti-utopian. And yet when you read it, even though it seems to be aware of human selfishness and greed and wickedness, it treats the human beings pretty much as a bag of conditioned responses, as sheep. And it forgets the fact that what the Bible teaches, that human beings are in the image of God, that we are infinite in value, that we're semi-divinities. That's what the Bible teaches. Every single anti- and unchristian system of thought that puts itself up against the Christian message will be on the scrap heap in another hundred years,

it will be gone because they're all too simple. They don't see the whole thing. That's the difference between spiritual truth, that's the difference between Christian truth and all these other approaches. And I'll tell you another thing, don't hook your wagon to them or you will become a dinosaur too.

Now, if you are perplexed, if you are oppressed, if you don't get it, if God looks like he doesn't know what he's doing, I'm telling you, you're in too close. You're looking just at the present and not at the end like this guy does. Or you're looking only at isn't God loving? Yes, but he's holy. Or if you just look at, isn't God holy? Yes, but he's wise. And it's not until you stand back and begin to look at all the sides of things. Are human beings sinful? Yes, but also they're made in the image of God. Are human beings valuable and dignified? Yes, but also they're wretched, wicked sinners.

Don't you see? Only Christianity looks at the whole thing. And if you're in a problem right now, and if you're in trouble right now, your problem is you've got to do what Asaph did. You've got to do what the Thomas did. You have to go into the sanctuary. Then I understood. What did he do? He stands back. He sees the big picture. And let me just show you, again briefly, because I'll go into it in more detail next week, what he sees. First of all, he sees that he has been a beast. You know, whenever you think God doesn't know what he's doing, you're only gonna be mad to the degree

that you are blind to your own arrogance. Let me put it this way. Elizabeth Elliott some years ago told this story I've never forgotten. She said she remembers watching a shepherd take his sheep and throw them in a vat of insecticide. Bind them up, throw them into a vat of insecticide. Put the little heads underneath. You know, the sheep are trying to get up, push the heads down. And if they don't do this once a year, the sheep die. I mean, they practically are eaten up by the insects. But why do you think the sheep feel when the shepherd is doing that? Well, the sheep must think, you don't know what you're doing. If I could get out of here, I'd kill you. And of course, as Elizabeth, as Elizabeth Elliott says, it's only sensible to imagine, to understand that if the shepherd is of a higher order of being than the sheep, it's

only sensible to believe, to understand that many of the things the shepherd does will not seem sensible. It's only logical to understand that a higher order of being will not seem logical to a lower order of being. But the difference between a sheep and you and me, animals are not supposed to be self-aware. They don't have self-reflection. They're not self-conscious. You and I can at least know that we're a lower order of being.

And when we forget that, we act like the beasts. We bellow at him, we bite him. Some years ago, I pulled a little cat who was about to be killed out of a rushing torrent and he just bit me and scratched me all the way up. Why? Because the hand that was saving him, he thought, was the hand that was binding him.

And if I let him go, he was basically saying, let me go, I know what I'm me go I know what I'm doing. I Know what I'm doing And if I let him go he would have been free To be dashed on the rocks and killed now listen Animals can't know they're animals. They can't know that there's higher orders of being But we are different. Do you believe there's a God at all?

At all? If you don't believe there's a God at all, you have no right to be mad. I mean, there's no such thing as justice. There's nobody to hold accountable. But if you believe there's a God, then you have to understand, if you want to deal with a real God, you're not going to understand them all the time. And it's arrogant to think you always will. And to the degree you understand that, to the degree you understand that you're acting

like a beast, which is what he saw, to that degree you'll start to get some freedom. In other words, if you deal with God, you should never be confused about your confusion. You can be confused, but don't be confused about your confusion. You can be perplexed, but don't be perplexed about your perplexity. Don't you see? The first thing you've got to see, you're a sinner. You're a lower order of being. It's only sensible that a real God will not always seem sensible to you.

Do you see that or not? If you don't, if you don't start to go around and see the different sides of things, you're going to be locked, you're going to be stuck. And that's the first thing he sees. God is higher than me. God is holy. God is great. God is above me.

And I'm acting like a beast. And there's a second side he sees. And that is, he begins to see the wise justice of God. What's so interesting is this very interesting verse where he says, I went into the sanctuary and he begins to see the wise justice of God. What's so interesting is this very interesting verse where he says, I went into the sanctuary and he begins to see everything. He says, and then I understood their destiny. You put them on slippery ground. Oh my gosh.

See, he finally begins to get this. He says, you know what? It's hard to believe in God. That's slippery ground to believe in God. There's a lot of things about God, as we just said, that don't make sense, but it figures. So there's nothing contradictory about a worldview that says there is a God as the God of the Bible, and he doesn't always make sense to you. That's perfectly coherent. But if you decide to reject God, if you decide to put your feet on something else but God, what are you living for?

Are you living for your looks? They're going to be gone. Are you living for your career? That's going to be gone. Are you living to be on top of things? That will go. And you could be gone in a minute, in a second, over the edge. And anything you put your feet on besides God is the real slippery ground. Because anything else you live for is vulnerable. Anything else you live for is fragile. Anything else you live for is temporary.

Why, then, that? Listen, you want to know what real slippery ground is? The person who says, I can't believe in a God who would allow such suffering and injustice. Don't look down if that's what you believe. If that's what you say that don't look down because you are in the most slippery intellectual ground possible. You say I can't believe in a God who would allow such evil and suffering. Therefore, I believe that maybe there's a God, maybe there's not. all truth is relative. I once had somebody say to me, since all truth is relative and all morality is relative, we have to be tolerant of each other. And I said to her, wait a minute, if all truth is relative, then why don't I just punch you in the mouth?

Because as soon as you say all truth is relative, but you have to be tolerant, there's the non-sequitur of the ages. Dear friends, if that truth is relative, you haven't even got a basis to complain about the injustice of life. If there is no God, you don't even have a way of defining injustice. It's just something that you happen to believe. You have your standards of justice.

You have your standards of justice. Don't you see that? You get rid of God because you think evil and suffering is terrible, and you've cut your ground out from underneath you. You know, you're on the most slippery intellectual possible footing. You cut away your ground for an appeal for even a complaint. That's why C.S. Lewis puts it. He says, people that say all truth is relative.

And then they say, but we have to be tolerant and compassionate. That's like pulling out the heart and demanding circulation. Removing the organ and demanding the function. Laughing at honor and finding traitors in our midst. Telling everybody the truth is relative and then be amazed that everybody's living selfishly. Castrating the goldings and biding them being fruitful. Can't do it. Deny God and you are on the most slippery ground.

He began to realize that, he says, you know what, as slippery as it is to believe on God, it is more slippery to not. As slippery as it is to live for God, it is far more slippery to live for anything else. Because I may slip if I base my life on God, but you will slip if you don't. It's inevitable. It's there. Intellectually, emotionally, psychological, every way. He started to feel better because he was looking at all sides.

Lastly, and this is the end, he not only saw God was holy, and that humbled him, and then he saw God was wise and that comforted him, then he saw God was gracious and that humbled him. And then he saw God was wise and that comforted him. Then he saw God was gracious and that transformed him. He says, I was stupid and ignorant, yet you hold me by my right hand. Just imagine yourself about to fall off of a mountain and suddenly somebody grabs you by the hand and pulls you up, your feet dangling over the edge,

you're looking into the face of your own death and somebody grabs you back the hand and pulls you up, your face angling over the edge, you're looking into your, into the face of your own death, and somebody grabs you back and says, I got you. How do you feel toward that person? If you think about it, that's how you have to feel toward God. He began to realize that God was holding his hand while, while he was being senseless and ignorant and beastly. Some of you need to realize that the reason, the evidence that God loves you is the fact that you're still here even though you're mad at him.

Why can't you get away from him? Why are you confused? Why do you feel bad about the fact that you're mad at God? Don't you see that that's grace? Grace! Even feeling bad about the fact that you're mad at him shows that he has never let go of you. He's got you by your hand. And you know, I think the real reason the psalmist remembered that God, or the loving God, was because he went into the sanctuary and in their sanctuary that he went to, he didn't have a stage with a microphone what did he see he saw an altar he saw a sacrifice and you must all look if you want to stop if you want to get out of the place

where you are if you want to keep from slipping you've got to look and see Jesus on that altar you know what Jesus is saying he is saying don't tell me about injustice I'm the only person who ever really experienced injustice. I'm the only person who was really innocent. I'm the only person that really kept his hands pure. You never have. And I willingly suffered and took your punishment so that on the last day when I finally wipe away the

evil and brokenness of the world, I won't have to wipe away you. The results, Isaiah says, the results of his suffering he will see and he will be satisfied. If you believe on him by looking at the fact that he holds you by your right hand in spite of the fact that you've been a beast to him, that he has sacrificed himself on the altar so that if you believe in him your punishment is forgiven. If you look at that, if you remember that, he says the results of his suffering he will see and be satisfied. That means on the last day he'll say, I was tortured, I experienced injustice, I experienced

brokenness and it's all worth it because now we can be together. Look at his love, look at his wisdom, look at his holiness, keep going around and around and around, get the big picture, and you will be able to say, surely the Lord is good. Can you do that yet? Then don't stop going around and looking. Don't stop going to the sanctuary and looking until you can. He's waiting to help. Let's pray. Thank you for joining us today.

If you were encouraged by today's teaching, please rate and review it so more people can discover the Gospel in Life podcast. This month's sermons were recorded in 1993. 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.