Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - The Sandals of Peace (Part 2)

Episode Date: February 16, 2024

When Paul talks about shoes, he’s talking about a kind of spiritual athleticism.  The idea behind the armor of God is that God has given us all sorts of things we aren’t using. The shoes were part of the armor, and the shoes of the Roman soldier had to be gripping, tough, and light. The only kind of shoes in our culture that need these qualities are athletic shoes.  We’re going to continue our look at the shoes of the readiness of the gospel of peace by looking at 1) what is spiritual athleticism, 2) what you have to have for spiritual athleticism, and 3) how to develop spiritual athleticism. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on March 1, 1992. Series: Spiritual Warfare – The Armor of God. Scripture: Ephesians 6:14-18. 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 and Life. If you're a Christian, God has given you everything necessary to face the storms in your life with peace and fortitude. But many times it can feel difficult to access. Today, Tim Keller shows how the idea of the armor of God can allow us to stand in the battles of life. The verses that we've been looking at for a number of weeks have to do with the whole armor of God. And we're going to look, let me just read to you verses 14 to 18. But of course tonight we're going to be looking again the second night, the second week out

of three that we're going to spend on this particular article of the armor of God, the shoes of the readiness of the gospel of peace. Let me just read you from verse 14 to 18. And Paul says, Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and

pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints. Now, remember Paul is using the metaphor of a soldier putting on armor, breastplate in a helmet and and shoes and so on as A way of saying that when you become a Christian you get all kinds of privileges and benefits and resources and powers and strengths That you don't use It's the whole idea behind the metaphor. He says we have to wear them and This isn't the only place the Bible talks about, putting on mercy, putting on courage, adorning yourself. It's a way of saying that God has given you, when you become a Christian, all sorts of things that you just aren't using. There's many places

that hint at this in the Scripture. This is an extended metaphor, like the place in Lugate where when the apostles are panicking because Jesus is in the boat and he's asleep and he looks like they're about to drown. And Jesus, they say, Master, we're going to perish. He calms the storm and then he turns around and he says, where is your faith? And at a sermon that changed my life, it was a sermon I read some years ago on that passage that the minister pointed out that Jesus didn't say, gee, it's a shame you don't have enough faith. Gosh, you know, you guys have got to go get more faith. You know, you're just, you're scared, you're, you're, you don't have courage, you don't have confidence. Instead, Jesus said, where is your faith? Which is a very odd question. You

ought to have it out. Get it out. Where is it? What have you done with it? Is it in a trunk at home? Did you leave it at home? In other words, Jesus says, you have the implication which is brought out here, really, in this extended metaphor. The implication is you have, you're a Christian, you have absolutely every resource necessary to face that storm with peace, with inner calm, with fortitude, with understanding. And if you don't, go get it. You say, you've got everything you need. Go get it.

Where's your faith? That's what Paul's talking about here. Now, the shoes, we said it was part of the armor. And we said the shoes of a Roman soldier had to have three qualities. They had to be gripping. They had to give you traction. They had to be tough. They had to protect your feet from spikes and so on.

And they had to be light to give you mobility. And I'd like to develop this a little bit more than I did last week. The only kind of shoes that we, that in our culture need to have these qualities are athletic shoes. They need to be so light that you can run like crazy, but they have to be so gripping. That's why you're trying to find cleats. You're trying to find shoes that have got these great,

that are tough, that last a long time, but they're real light, so when you put them on your feet, you hardly feel that they're there. There are actually a lot of manufacturers who are putting an awful lot of money into trying to find the shoes that combine these qualities. But they're athletic shoes. Same thing though with the soldiers. And therefore, when Paul says, put on the readiness of the Gospel of Peace, we said last

week the word readiness is an unusual word. It's a Greek word etoy masia, which literally means nimbleness as opposed to sluggishness. And what we're talking about is a kind of spiritual athleticism. Now let's talk about what that is. I'll tell you in a minute what it really is, but let's talk about what spiritual athleticism is. The word athleticism I know is a coined word that probably didn't exist 10 years ago, but it has been for 20 years ago, but it has been brought into existence by who? By TV commentators, from what I can tell from sports commentators.

I'm sure athleticism isn't a real word. But what they would try to do is they used to grope for the difference between Larry Bird and Michael Jordan. See, Larry Bird can't jump. He can't run. He doesn't seem to be all that incredible an athlete, but he has practiced and practiced

and his tremendous perception as a result gets the job done and is a great, great, best basketball player. But then when you watch a Michael Jordan or a Julia Serving or someone like that, they try to say that the difference between someone like Larry Burden and Michael Jordan is Jordan's athleticism. What does that mean? He doesn't seem to have to deal with gravity the way the rest of us do. That's really what athleticism means. He can stop on a dime where the rest of us find that when we try to stop gravity,

it keeps a hold on us a little bit longer. Or he's up in the air and there's somebody else coming to stop him. So most of us, in order to change direction, have to come down again and get our feet on the ground and sort of take off in another direction. But not some of these guys. They don't have to. They're in the way to the basket and somebody's in the way, he'll just go around them. He doesn't have to get the ground.

And see, athleticism was a way of trying to say there is something about these people, something about Michael Jordan, Julius Irving, something about them that they do not have the same problem with gravity as the rest of us do. It doesn't seem to have as much of a hole on them. There's a lightness. There's a buoyancy. There's a sureness of foot. The rest of us find ourselves falling down, the rest of us can't move as fast, the rest of us can't stop as fast, the rest of us can't change as fast.

Now when Paul is talking about Ettoi Mesia, he is talking about the same thing in the realm of character. What Ettoi Mesia really is, is a beautiful athletic metaphor to talk about what elsewhere in the Bible is called joy. Now the reason I like the word Ettoi Mesia better than joy is because when you see the word joy, you immediately think so one dimensionally. You say joy, fun, laughter, haha. But joy is actually in the Bible, a buoyancy of spirit, an ability to keep your footing where other people are falling down. Joy is the ability to move on when other people are weighted down. Joy is this, when Paul says these slight momentary afflictions, you know,

the slight momentary afflictions, the stoning, the flogging, the beating, you see, the imprisonment. These slight momentary afflictions are preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. It outweighs my affliction. See what's happened to Paul is his grasp of the glory of God and the word glory means weight. His understanding of the glory of God outweighs everything else that the rest of us feel weighs us down. It's the same basic idea when you run with weights on your feet and then you take the weights off and you feel like you can run like the wind in the same way What joy is is a spiritual ability to have such a grasp of the glory of God

That the other that the things that used to wait us down that wait the other people down around us don't wait us down anymore They don't have the same hold on us anymore our troubles No longer have the same hold on us They got weighed by no longer have the same hold on us. They are outweighed by what we know is in store for us. Our sins don't have the same hold on us because they are outweighed by the glory of what Christ did on the cross. Our duties, the things that God has asked from us that used to be, oh gosh, I know I have to do this because I'm a Christian, but I guess that's the price you pay to go to heaven. I mean, oh gosh, I know I have to do this because I'm a Christian, but I guess that's the price you pay to go to heaven.

I mean that attitude, which is one of being weighed down, you get a grasp of the glory of God when you see what Christ has done for you, and you compare it. You compare it as Paul says, it's outweighed. What God has asked you to do, compare it to what Jesus has done for you. When God has, what God has asked you to do, compare it to what is going to be given to you in the future. See, our troubles are outweighed by the glory that is to come. And our sins are outweighed by the glory of what He's done for us. And our duties are outweighed by the glory of both the past and the future.

And a person who has this grasp of the glory of God and understands the truths of the gospel and understands them, gets this atoy masia, gets this nimbleness, this spiritual athleticism, this ability to defy gravity when other people are saying, what keeps you going? Why haven't you slipped and fallen down? I don't get it. Now let me tell you that in a sense, Christian joy I think has, in a sense, three levels of depth to it. At the most superficial level, Christian joy, this ethnomacial comes from a clarity of conscience. At the most, when I say superficial level,

I mean the thing that's closest to the surface. The joy of a clear conscience is very important, very important for lightness of step, for this joy, for this spiritual buoyancy. How do you deal with your conscience? When you fail, when someone criticizes you, do you go, I did it again, I blew it again, how could I have done it again? How do you answer your conscience? How do you answer the accusation? Now we won't go into that because we've actually spent some weeks on that under the breastplate of righteousness. Do you know how to turn and say the Lord has paid for this?

Do you know how to quote that hymn? By now you ought to. Well may the accuser roar of sins that I have done. I know them all in thousands more Jehovah knoweth none. How do you deal with your conscience? You think about the glory of what he's done on the cross and you deal with it and you think about the glory of what he's done on the cross, and you deal with it. And that gives you a lightness of foot. Now, one step below that, not only do you have a clarity of conscience, but the joy goes a little deeper. You also have a certainty of your salvation.

This atoimasia, this readiness that comes from the gospel, is very clearly an assurance of your salvation. Remember Remember we referred to it last week when we said what was it that gave Thomas Cranmer the ability to stick his hand, his right hand into the fire before he himself burned because his right hand had signed a recantation of the biblical faith. What has given the Christian martyrs over the years the ability to go singing to the lions? And the simple answer is they know that they're Christians. They know that God loves them.

There's an assurance. That assurance will only come from the gospel. If you believe that being a Christian is basically a matter of being a good person, you'll never, ever, ever know. And it doesn't matter if a particular team before the season, you know, spring training, is favored by a wide margin to win the World Series that year. The fact is they might be kind of sure.

They might be pretty sure. All the sportswriters have said they've got everything it takes. They've got a lot of confidence, but they don't know for sure. They're scared. In fact, the more people tell them how great they are, you know what happens to teams like that.

Very often they don't win because there's tremendous pressure put on them. As long as you think that it's your performance that will bring you to the throne of God, there will never be joy in your life. As a matter of fact, the better people tell you you are, just like the better people tell the teams that they are, the more likely they are to crumble. It's the reason why all the coaches of favorite teams want, that's why basketball coaches, you know, when the team is number one, they want the team to lose early in the season so that the guys get off of their high horses, so the pressure is off. In the same way, the

better people tell you you are, you're a moral person, you're a decent person, the less joy you're gonna have if you don't understand the gospel. The gospel is what says it's been done for you. Now we've been through this. Jesus has fulfilled the law for you. He's paid the debt for you. And therefore the gospel brings that certainty. The classic, and all of my reading on assurance, the classic case or the classic example, the classic statement of it was by Bishop J. C. Royle, the Bishop of Liverpool in the 19th century, an Anglican bishop who said this, assurance goes so far to set a child of God free from all sorts of painful bondage. It enables him, this is assurance, the

knowledge that you are in Christ, it enables him to feel that the great business of life is a settled business, the great debt a paid debt, the great disease a healed disease, and the great work, a finished work, and all other businesses, diseases, debts, and works are then by comparison small. In this way assurance makes him patient in tribulation, calm under bereavements, unmoved in sorrow, not afraid of evil tidings, in every conditioned content for it gives him a fixedness of heart. It makes him always feel he is something solid beneath his feet. See all this attraction metaphors, the buoyancy,

and something firm under his hands, a sure friend by the way, and a sure home at the end. See, that certainty brings you, the certainty of being a Christian brings you a nimbleness in the day out, in the day in and day out kinds of things that happen. When someone cuts you off, when someone does something wrong to you, is that going to throw you to the ground, cast you down? A person who has this nimbleness that comes from knowing that in the Gospel you're a Christian,

what do you say? If you're putting on the shoes, if you're a Christian, you've got the ability to do this. When someone has just done something to you that's about to ruin your week emotionally, you can say, in the context of eternity, what is this? In the context of my crown, in the context of my place, at the head of the family table, what is this? If I just won the gold medal and I was standing up there and listening to the

anthem being played, would it bother me that a fly had just lighted on my ear? I just brush it away. Would I say, oh, this fly! After all this work and after all of this achievement, After all this work and after all of this achievement, in my greatest moment this fly has ruined everything. I think camera probably picked it up. Mal-Ear-Itches. No, of course not. You wouldn't... Listen, you wouldn't know there was a fly on your ear.

You wouldn't even know it. You wouldn't even care. Because what is that to the gold? And you see, a Christian is somebody who says, what is this to the gold? What is this to my crown? What is this in the context of eternity? Look what I've got. The great debts paid.

The great business is over. And all other business and all their debts and all other problems are small things by comparison. Nimbleness. their business and all their debts and all their problems are small things by comparison. Nimbleness. That's why Macy is putting the gospel on your feet. And I said that there's levels. I said there's a clarity of conscience, which is the most important level.

I mean, in a sense, the superficial level. That means it's the thing that you've got to have day in and day out in order to keep that nimbleness of character, that spiritual athleticism. Then secondly, there has to be a certainty that you're a Christian. That comes from knowing the basis on which that you stand in access to God, not on the basis of your works, but on the basis of what Christ has done for you. But thirdly, there's the deepest kind, I think, of joy that really gives you the deepest sort of traction, the deepest sort of toughness, the deepest kind of lightness

and swiftness is something that, in a sense, we refer to. It's the hope of glory. See, the clarity of conscience comes from looking in the past, what God's done for me. And the certainty of salvation comes from looking at the present, that I'm in Christ now, that He stands before the Father, for me, my representative. But I think that the deepest sort of joy comes from the hope of glory. think that the deepest sort of joy comes from the hope of glory. That's the reason why Paul says that all these slight momentary afflictions that I'm experiencing are preparing for me, an eternal weight of glory.

He's thinking about the future. They're preparing it for me. You see, the Bible, the New Testament, is full of rumors about what we're going to be like. Romans 8 says that nature is subject to decay. It's groaning because it's not what it ought to be. It's not what it's supposed to be. It's not what it can be. It's not what it will be. And it says it's groaning and waiting for the revelation of the glorious liberty of the children of God.

Don't ask me. You know, you say, you're a minister. Tell me what that means. I don't know. But I know it's going to be great. I don't know exactly what it means, but what it means is the Grand Canyon, the Himalayas, you see, snow upon the mountain and lightning and the raging sea and the beauty of nature is nothing compared to even what nature is going to be and we're going to be greater than that.

Success, true love and the life you've always wanted, many of us have made these good things into ultimate things. We've put our faith in them when deep down we know that they cannot satisfy our longings. The truth is that we've made lesser gods of good things, gods that can't give us what we really need. In his book, Counterfeit Gods, Dr. Keller shows us how a proper understanding of the Bible reveals the truth about societal ideals and our own hearts, and that there is only one God who can wholly satisfy our desires. Dr. Keller's book is our thank you for your gift

to help Gospel and Life share the power of the Gospel. So request your copy of Counterfeit Gods at gospelandlife.com slash give. That's gospelandlife.com slash give Now, here's Dr. Keller with the remainder of today's teaching. That's the reason why, you know, here's one passage from a sermon. Here's a passage from a sermon, not my sermon obviously. It says, if we take the image of Scripture seriously, if we believe that God will one day give us the morning star and cause us to put on the splendor of the sun, then we may surmise that both the ancient myths and the modern poetry, though false as history, in Christ are prophecy. At present, we are on the outside, or on the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and the purity of the morning, but they don't make us fresh

and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendors that we see, but all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumor that it will not always be so. Someday, God willing, we will get in. And when human souls have become as perfect and voluntary obedience as the inanimate creation is in its life and so obedience, you hear that? It says, when human souls have become as perfect and voluntary obedience, that's God's job to turn you into that and He will. The good work He began in you, He will bring to completion on the day of Christ. It says, when the human souls have

become as perfect and voluntary obedience as the inanimate creation is in its lifeless obedience, then we will put on its glory. Or the greater glory of which nature itself is only the first sketch. The faint far-off results of those energies which God's creative rapture implanted in matter when He made the worlds are what we now call physical pleasure. Thanks far off results of those energies which God's creative rapture implanted in matter when he made the worlds are what we now call physical pleasure and even thus filtered there too much for our present management. What would it be then to taste at the fountain head that stream of which even

these lower reaches prove so intoxicating? Yet that's what lies before us. The whole person is to drink joy from the fountain of joy. It's from the sermon, The Weight of Glory, by C.S. Lewis. You see, it's the hope of that and the knowledge of that, and the feeding on that and the meditation on that that Paul says makes this 39 lashes. The fact that my back has been ripped up will probably never heal this slight momentary affliction is Outweighed by eternal weight of glory which actually my obedience here is just making greater

See now that Is something that you've got are you Christian see if you don't know that you are of course You don't know you haven't and of course, you don't know. You haven't. And I'll turn to you in a minute and say, here's how you get it. But if you're a Christian, you've got it. What's with you? Where's your faith?

Get it out. You ought to be here. Put it on. See, how are you dealing at this level with your conscience? How are you dealing at this level with your present irritations? How are you dealing at this level, at the deepest level, with your present irritations, how are you dealing at this level, at the deepest level, with the future, with your worries? In order, now this is something else, the last thing we have to talk about is in order

to get this etymazia, it says this spiritual athleticism, you have to put on the gospel of peace. Just like last week, I got part of the way in telling you what that means. The gospel of peace is Paul's way of talking about a certain aspect of the gospel. You can call the gospel a lot of things. It's the gospel of love, the gospel of joy. It's lots of things. But he calls it the gospel a peace because he says that spiritual athleticism, this tremendous joy that we're talking about will never happen unless first

of all you use the gospel to get rid of your anger at God. Remember we brought that up last week? I got a lot of questions about it but I'm going to try to seal it off right here and try to finish it up. What Paul is saying is You must use the gospel on your heart to deal With the warfare with the war Peace is the opposite of war the gospel brings peace for those who are at war with God You're not going to really be able to break through to the kind of joy that we're

talking about unless you're willing to see that you are an enemy of God, that your heart is full of anger and hatred and enmity toward God, and that when you look at the gospel, it shows you that you've been wrong and it sucks out that anger and it absorbs that anger You're not gonna unless you use the gospel on yourself in that way You're never gonna get this that's amazing the spiritual athleticism. I don't want to wreak I don't want to re go over what we said last week I'll just quote two scriptures to remind you what the Bible teaches Romans 8 7 says the natural mind is

enmity toward God, is hostility toward God. That's the natural inclination of the heart to be against God. Romans 5.10 says that when Christ died for us, we were still as enemies. And I told you, and a bunch of you went off and said, I got to buy this book. I don't know that you do, but I told you, and a bunch of you went off and said, I've got to buy this book. I don't know that you do. But I told you that Jonathan Edwards wrote a tremendous treatise. It's not even a book. It's almost like a very long sermon. Even longer than my sermons.

It's fairly long. Called Men Naturally God's Enemies. And what Edward says there, and I think he's right, is he says that the Bible teaches, very firmly, that at the deepest level, the anger and hatred we feel is toward God, ultimately, foundationally, before anything or anybody else. The Bible teaches that you hate God. That's your natural inclination.

Psychologists will tell you that if you can't make a hatred conscious that will distort your life, right? If what the Bible says is true then, it's everybody's duty and need to make conscious just how hostile you have been all of your life toward God. So the Bible is saying you may take that hatred and deny that it's really toward God and redirect it toward other things. You may decide to hate your parents. You may decide to hate the other sex.

You may decide to use it to hate the other races. You may even, Freud is right in saying, you know, Freud had an interesting insight. He said, he saw that that we have a libido. We had this tremendous drive for complete gratification. And since we find out that the world will not give it to us, this is really a very good insight for Freud, because the world will not give it to us. Every human being has deeply ingrained in him or her This is really a very good insight for Freud, because the world will not give it to us. Every human being has deeply ingrained in him or her, Thanatos, a self-destruction of

death wish. And what is he saying? What the Bible would say is it's Freud's right. But ultimately, even that anger, that death death wish is ultimately rebellion against God. The Bible has always seen suicide as not really anger at yourself, but the final act of rebellion against God. You can see that in Genesis 9. When you assault another human being, what you're really doing is assaulting God, because you're really mad at God. When you're that mad that you'd kill someone, even yourself. Now the question a lot of people came up with is why would we be so mad?

A number of people after the service last week said why would we be so mad? Jonathan Edwards in section three of his treatise says he answers the question on what account men hate God. And this is what he said. The general reason is that God is opposed to the worship of their idols. This is a quote. I just want you to know that I'm not the only one that says this. Listen. Listen. Every human being, he says, will either worship the true God or some idol. It is impossible that it should be otherwise. Something will have your heart, and whatever you give your heart to will be called your

God. Nothing will so soon excite enmity as opposition to that, which is dearest to your heart. A man cannot serve two who claim to be his master, who stand in competition for his service. If he serves one in that competition, he will necessarily hate the other. Matthew 6.24, no man can serve two masters. He either will hate the one and love the other, or he will love the one and despise the other. Listen, if a person loses his idol, they lose their all. To take their idols from them is more grievous to them than to rend soul and body asunder. But since God will away with their idols, therefore they hate them. Let me give you an example.

One thing you never ever ever ever ever ever do is stand between a mother bear and her cub. Why? Because even though this isn't a choice now, but the dynamics are the same, she lives for her cub. That cub is her body and soul. If you stand between her and the cub, she hates you. And watch out.

Now, what the scripture says and what Edward says, he's building an entire psychology on the biblical principle. The reason we hate God is because underneath everything we believe that to really worship God and to give ourselves totally to God is going to hurt us. The first lie, the serpent said Adam and Eve if you really obey God, he will oppress you. And the poison of that lie, as we said this often, has settled into our hearts. So that now we believe that if I get my career, if I have the right figure, if I get a good marriage, if I get these people to like me, if I can break into this professional field, if I can get this thing, then I'll finally be in charge of my life and I'll be

happy. And it's inevitable that we will find that we never can achieve that because things get in the way and the things are ultimately from God. And therefore ultimately we're constantly to one level of consciousness or another, the Bible says, angry at God because the things that we are absolutely sure will make us happy and will keep and will let us keep the mastery of our lives, we see obstacles out there. We see this person or we see that person, or we see this condition. But underneath it, all we know is from God. And therefore, we're angry at him.

Because he stands between me and my cub. Between you and your cub. Now, some people say, well, you know, I have a number of people say, I don't sense that I hate him. No. Edwards even has a pretty interesting theory about that. He says, why is it that more people say, why is it that so many people say, look, I don't sense that I hate God at all.

I'm not particularly religious, but I don't really hate God. And he says, probably because it's a combination. First of all, you've been taught that it's wrong to hate God. You've been taught that it's wrong. And so you repress it. You keep it down. You don't want to admit that you're such a nasty awful person who would hate God. I mean, only awful people would hate God. You're taught that. So you repress it. You keep it down. You know, there's a place in 2 Kings, chapter 8, where Elisha the prophet meets a Syrian general, Haseel.

And he's weeping. And Haseel said, why are you weeping? And Elisha says, because God has shown me that you're going to become king of Syria. And you are going to be the cruelest person. You're going to come down to Israel, and you're going to kill us. You're going to rip the unborn children out of the wombs of the mothers. You're going to take infants and spit them upon pikes. You're going to dash out the brains of our elderly men and Haseel looks at him and says,

do you think I'm a to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that.

I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. The vindictiveness was in his heart the self-worship the pride was in his heart, but it was sleeping Edward says you've got a lot of fears you don't want to admit you're a person like that But the other thing is Edward says you've got a lot of hopes You still hope God will let you have your cubs and you're still playing the game But wait till you get old enough to realize it's not gonna happen He says you use your fears to keep down your anger

But as soon as you have a midlife crisis as soon as you begin to realize that you're, you use your fears to keep down your anger, but as soon as you have a midlife crisis, as soon as you begin to realize that you're not going to get your cubs, watch the rage become conscious. Now, what are you supposed to do about it? Every single person in the Bible who fights with God, who's at war with God, Job, Jacob, remember who wrestles with God? Habakkuk who wrestles with God. You read them, you'll always see they always come down to the same thing. Job has everything taken away from him, his family, his career, his money, and he wrestles with God in a sense.

And he says, why have you done this? And in the end God opens up his heart and talks to him and reveals himself to Job. And at the very end, Job does not get an answer. All he gets is God. And he says, you know what? I heard of you with my ears. Now I see with my eyes, if you are my God, you're enough. I don't need the explanation.

I don't need the other things. If I have you, I have enough. The reason I was mad was I never thought you were enough I Never thought if I just had you I'd be happy You're enough Or Jacob Jacob literally wrestled with God See Jacob actually had been wrestling with God all his life and if you study the life of Jake could you see that? But one night a mysterious stranger showed up in the darkness and wrestled with him all

night. And he was so powerful that at one point he had actually, he just, with a touch of his finger, touched Jacob's thigh and put it out of joint permanently so he was lame for the rest of his life. Suddenly in the middle of the darkness, Jacob realized he was wrestling with God, and he holds on to God, and he says, I won't let you go till you bless me. What happened to Jacob was he moved from fighting and wrestling with God to clinging to God. And what he was saying there at the end, there was a great victory in a sense in that defeat. He said, all my

life I've wrestled with you thinking you're getting in the way of my happiness. Now I'm realizing instead of wrestling with you I've got a cling to you. You're enough. You are enough. And of course you know Martin Luther, this is his biography by Roland Bainton called Here I Stand, A Life of Martin Luther. Martin Luther hated God because he believed, see Martin Luther, his idol was religion. See some of your idol is the money and some of your idol is his relationships, but some of us are idols of religion. Can I be a successful clergyman? Can I be successful as a preacher in theology?

Can I be successful as a religious person then? Then, I like myself, but see Luther was angry at God because no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't make it. And in the biography, there's a place where Luther says, this is his own words, he says, I pondered. By the way, I read you this three weeks ago, but there's more to it. I couldn't understand the Gospel of the book of Romans. He said, I pondered until I saw the connection

between the righteousness of God and Romans 1.17 that the righteous will live by faith. I grasped that the righteousness of God is that righteousness by which through faith and sheer mercy God just makes me righteous through faith. I had never been able to love a righteous God, but I hated and murmured against him. He says, however, when I realize that the righteousness of God is something that Jesus Christ has given me, he says, if you have true faith and you see that Christ is your Savior, then all of a sudden faith leads you in and opens up God's heart. He who sees God in anger does not see Him rightly and does not see Him in Christ, but

looks only on a curtain as if a dark cloud had been drawn across His face. Listen, if you want to deal with your anger toward God, you've got to make it, you've got to say, it's real, it's true, under myself pity, under all of the things that I've done wrong, under all of my anger and depression, I'm mad at him because he hasn't given me what I think I need, but God is enough. Some of you have to realize that the reason you're afraid of surrendering is you say, if I give my life completely to God, He'll slaughter me. That very thought is an act of hostility. It impunes the integrity of God. You see that? That very suspicion is part of that

hatred. You surrender to a friend. When you surrender and give yourself and say, I know Jesus has taken away my guilt, Luther says instead of finding him something hateful, you'll realize that he's opened the way to himself and he's enough. And when you finally realize that, when you say, Lord, I thought that I had to have this, but if you're enough, then how wrong I've been You know, it's pretty amazing what Jesus did if you don't see that you were an enemy you'll never appreciate what he did ever Can you listen close this way can you imagine? Somebody drowning off the off out in the water and you're a lifeguard and you're getting ready to go and if the person says oh save me mr. lifeguard you're so wonderful

so strong so compassionate I'm gonna die if you don't come get me you'll feel hey I better save this person this is great but what if instead the person is out there saying I'm drowning and it's all your fault, Mr. Lifeguard. In fact, you're slime. As a matter of fact, the whole reason I'm even out here is because of your incompetence. As a matter of fact, don't even come and get me, because I'd rather drown than have you save me. Come near me and I'll scratch your eyes out. How would you feel?

What would you say? What would you say? You'd say, shove it. I'm not going to rescue you. The Bible says while we were yet sinners, while we were enemies, he died for us. He came down and died for people. That punched him until his eyes were swollen and said, if you're so smart. Consider. Take the gospel, use it on your anger, surrender to him, repent of that anger, and you will see the joy, the spiritual athleticism growing in your life,

let's pray. Father, as we take up the offering, we pray that you might give us a moment to reflect on what this means. Help us to spend some time just giving our hearts to you. Help us to remember what is available to us if we just put it on. I asked Father that tonight, you would enable us all to put it on, some of us maybe for the first time.

So thank you that you're God who helps us to put on this peace and this joy. We ask that you enable us through your spirit. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Thanks for listening to Tim Keller on the Gospel and Life podcast. If you were encouraged by today's teaching, we invite you to consider becoming a Gospel and Life monthly partner. Your partnership helps more people discover the truth of God's Word and the hope of the Gospel. Just visit gospelandlife.com slash partner to learn more.

This month's sermons were recorded in 1992. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel Unlife podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church. you