Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Wisdom: How To Live It

Episode Date: July 30, 2025

We live in a culture of choice. In our individualistic culture, our place and our parents and our social location don’t determine everything that we can do. We have some choices. Choices! What does that mean?  That means we’ve never needed wisdom more than we do now, because wisdom is the ability to make wise choices. Proverbs 4 shows us that if we want to lead a life of wisdom, our lives will be characterized by three things: 1) a glorious fight, 2) a guarded heart, and 3) a living word. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on September 22, 2013. Series: Wisdom in Life. Scripture: Proverbs 4:5-9, 14-27. 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 the Gospel in Life podcast. Many of the questions we face in life are complex and aren't always answered by simply following rules. Do I speak up now or do I wait? Should I take that job or stay where I am? That's why wisdom is so crucial. But how do we develop it? Today, join us as Tim Keller explores how we apply God's wisdom to the everyday complexities of our lives. After you listen to today's teaching, we invite you to go online to gospelonlife.com and sign up for our email. updates. When you sign up, you'll receive our quarterly journal and other valuable gospel-centered resources. Subscribe today at gospelinlife.com. The scripture this morning is from Proverbs, chapter 4, verses 5 to 9, and verses 14 to 27. Get wisdom, get understanding. Do not forget my words or turn away from them. Do not forsake wisdom and she will protect you. Love her, and she will watch over you. The beginning of wisdom is this. Get wisdom. Though it cost you all you have, get understanding. Cherish her, and she will exalt you. Embrace her, and she will honor you. She will give you a garland to grace your head and present you with a

glorious crown. Do not set foot on the path of the wicked or walk in the way of the evil doers. Avoid it. Do not travel on it. Turn from it and go on your way. For they cannot rest until they do evil. They are robbed of sleep till they make someone stumble. They eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of vials. The path of the road of the road. The path of the road. The road of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter till the full light of day. But the way of the wicked is like deep darkness. They do not know what makes them stumble. My son, pay attention to what I say.

Turn your ears to my words. Do not let them out of your sight. keep them within your heart for they are life to those who find them and health to one's whole body above all else guard your heart for everything you do flows from it keep your mouth from perversity keep corrupt talk far from your lips let your eyes look straight ahead. Fix your gaze directly before you. Give careful thought to the paths for your feet and be steadfast in all your ways. Do not turn to the right or the left. Keep your foot from evil. The word of the Lord. We live in a culture of

choice. Now I know that often is a, it's an advertisement, it's a slogan, but it's really true. You know, most places and most times in history, you didn't choose who you married. You know, it's a fairly recent idea that you decided instead of your parents. But of course, that's just the beginning. We are free to be who we want to be, live as we want to live, do the things we want to do, because our culture is the most individualistic culture in the history of the world, and therefore our place and our parents and our social location do not determine so much what we can do. We have choices, choices, and what does that mean? That means that we've never needed wisdom more than we do now, because wisdom's the ability

to make wise choices. It's not enough just to be good and decent. Here's two careers you could choose, and they're both morally permissible. Neither is sinful. Neither of them is, there's nothing wrong about either of them. But if you choose unwisely, if you choose the wrong one, one that doesn't fit you, you could lose years of your life, actually. It could be a disaster. So we've never needed wisdom more than we do now. So what we've been doing for three weeks, and this is the last of the three,

we've been looking at the early chapters of the book of Proverbs in the Bible. And we're looking at the themes of the book of Proverbs. We've been looking at what wisdom is. its competence with regard to the complex realities of life. We've been looking at how you develop wisdom. And today we're looking at this famous passage where we learn three things that characterize a wise life. If you want to lead a life of wisdom,

that life will be characterized by three things. A glorious fight, a guarded heart, a living word. Let's take a look. First of all, the way of wisdom is the way of, or a life of wisdom is basically, could be characterized as a glorious fight. Versus five to nine I'm thinking of. Get wisdom, get understanding. Do not forsake wisdom.

Though it cost you all you have, get understanding. Cherish her, embrace her, and she will give you a garland to grace your head and present you with a glorious crown. Now the words all through there are various words that get across diligent exertion and determination of will. So the word get that comes up four times is actually a word that means purchase and it means a costly purchase. So it's the language of sacrifice. And besides that, it says right there in verse 7, though it costs you all you have, get wisdom. Do not forsake in verse 6 literally means don't let go of.

Be dogged. Relentlessness. So there's sacrifice, there's relentlessness. Notice that there's a language here. It's a metaphor of pursuing a woman to marry. It says, don't forsake her, love her, cherish her, embrace her, and she will respond, and she will honor you. So that's the language of passionate pursuit.

So all through here, we're talking about determination of will, something that you actually have to fight in order to keep at the very center of your life. But it's a glorious fight because as it says, it ends with a glorious crown. Some of the other verses, which we won't take the time to look at, tell you about that.

Gradually, gradually, you know, see verse 18 and 19, the path of the righteous is like the morning sun shining ever brighter until the full light of day. The way the wicked is deep darkness, they do not know what makes them stumble. The contrast, the reason why wisdom is worth it is because as time goes on, a wise person gets more peace, not restlessness, as the verses talk about,

more clarity. They understand things that you never understood. Not more, more darkness, as it were. Things are going wrong. You're stumbling. You don't even know why. You're just getting more angry. Oh, my, wisdom is like a glorious crime. It's worth a fight. But why is it such a fight? Why is it such a fight? Why does it take such diligence? Why does it say, get wisdom, though it costs you all you have. Why does it take such determination of will? Now, here we can, whether you were here the last two weeks or not,

it's just as well that we recap a bit because it's good for us. And that means the answer to that question, why is it takes so much fight is because, first of all, we're naturally fools. We're not blank slates that we need to fill up with foolishness or with wisdom.

We come as fools, and therefore we're fighting our own nature. And secondly, because the basic things that are being told to, excuse me, sir, the blinking of the camera is very, very distracting. Forgive me, and I don't mean to embarrass anybody. And I've never done that in my whole life before, but it's been very hard. So I'm glad you're here. It just, it just, you know, years ago, my wife would say, I would have been a fool and not even said anything. But I'm wiser today. I'm just, I found a way to make it okay and you're okay and I'm okay, but okay.

Thanks. All right. Here's two reasons. Do you remember if you were here two weeks ago, look, you have a temperament, right? Having you taken temperament inventories that Myers-Briggs? Some are introverts, some are extroverts. Some are intuitive. Some are more analytical.

Some of us like closure, some of us like process. Do you remember we talked about a study that across three dozen, three dozen different cultures, we realize that there's three basic ways that were neurologically wired in order to deal with problems. Some of us retreat instinctively, some of us attack instinctively, some of us stand pat and wait. And if you remember what the psychologist said about all these temperaments is that since we habitually, you know, those of us are introverts, extroverts, rational, intuitive, closure process, you know, attack, hold back, we instinctively respond to situations the way we're wired or the way we've been raised or the way our culture has taught us. And only a small fraction of the situations in which we find ourselves

is that natural approach the right one. If you attack when you should be retreating, if you retreat when you should be attacking, if you stand and wait and see when you should be acting, you can die. And all of us are wired to instinctively act in a certain way in certain situations, which means we have temperaments. You say, well, what's wrong with the temperament?

Everybody's got a temperament. Yeah, that's why we're all fools. Because the world doesn't have a temperament. you see the world doesn't if the world was perfectly fitted to your temperament so the introverted approach or the extroverted approach the speak out or the wait and listen uh the come to closure or the or the let's let's let's let it go into process if the world had a temperament and you perfectly fit it you'd be perfectly wise but none of us none of us are and therefore we're all naturally fools and to become a wise person means that you have to be so in touch with reality

that you know how to get out beyond. You have a range of responses that goes beyond your inborn, your culture, your psychology, your neurology, and you know how to go against those and always act in a way that's wise. Very, very difficult. That's why it's always a fight to be wise. You're always having to fight against the normal way you do things,

But as time goes on, if you're becoming wise, you realize, look, I hate doing it that way. I don't like doing it that way. But this situation calls forth, so I'm going to do it. The other reason why it's a fight is because, as we saw when you looked at the book of Proverbs, Proverbs chapter 3, the things that the Bible says are, the things that develop wisdom are processes, and they are disciplines that you have to stay at for years and years and years. That's the reason why wisdom actually is always a gradual thing. The path of the righteous is like the morning sun shining ever brighter and brighter to the full of day.

Remember, one of the things the Bible says is in chapter three, that is the root of wisdom, is the fear of the Lord. Now, you hear that and you say, what is that? What we said? The fear of the Lord means to have a vital, existential relationship with God, not just believing in Him, but a vibrant, vital relationship. relationship in which his love and His holiness is real to you, which means a prayer life. And anybody who even just says, I'm going to pray 30 minutes a day, you know how hard that is.

It's unbelievably hard, just to keep your mind on it. We said another thing that brings wisdom is accountability. A fool is wise in his own eyes. So the definition of a fool is someone who only cares what he or she thinks. that's a fool and wise of my own eyes my eyes there's all that matter I see it that's the way it is

wisdom always is trying to see the thing through other people's eyes and so the wise person has got a company of counselors and a company of advisors and friends who are always

they're never making a wise person never makes decisions unilaterally but always comes and gets a lot of advice and takes it you have to be accountable. Do you have anybody, for example? Do you have four or five people? You get somebody who looks at how you spend your money?

You say, well, that's private. No, okay, that's also foolish. If you get nobody else's perspective, of course you're going to have all kinds of self-justifications. You might be very unwise in the way you spend your money. You'd be more wise if you were actually spending your money accountable to other people that you trust in community. That's hard.

One last thing, as we've said, I didn't tell the story on this side of the park, so I'll tell it to you now, is you've all heard that you've become wise by immersing yourself in the word of God. I think most of us say, when you read the Bible, that takes, it makes you wise. Now, it takes years and years and years.

I mean, after all these years of having to probably, I probably had a teacher preach on the Bible about two or three thousand times in my life. And I'm sometimes, I don't mean to discourage it. I'm just starting to feel like I'm starting to get it. In other words, passages that didn't used to make sense start to make sense because you've seen enough other passages. But here's the thing. It's not just the details of the Bible. It's not just, you know, I found a verse that says this. I didn't know I was supposed to do that. That doesn't happen that often anymore to me. But here's what you do have to constantly do. Alastair MacIntyre, a Catholic theologian, a Catholic philosopher,

tells a story in his book After Virtue, gives an illustration that's a lot of fun. The illustration is, imagine you are standing at a bus stop, and a man who you've never met in your life before comes up, never met him. And he says, hey, do you know that the Latin name for the common wild duck is histrionicus, histrionicus, histrionicus. And then he walks away. Okay, so how do you make sense of that? It must be some reason.

How do you make sense of it? And McIntyre says the only way to make sense of it is you have to put it into a story. Now, it could be a sad story, and you say, maybe he's mentally ill. And that would be a sad story, but that would make sense of it, right? It would make sense of it, yes.

The other possibility is a little more of a funny story, and that is that it's mistaken identity. He was at a library the other day, and he was asking a librarian. for a book on Wild Ducks, he got the book, and he sees you at the bus stop, and you look like the librarian, your hair or your lack of hair or whatever.

Look, you just reminds you, so he thinks you're the librarian. That's a funny story. That would make sense of it. McIntyre brings up one more possibility. He says, maybe the guy is a secret agent, and he mistakes you for his contact, and he's giving you the code words.

Now, that's outlandish, but it's possible. and what he says is unless you understand what happened in the light of a story, you don't know how to respond. Now, this world tells you that, well, this culture will tell you this.

There might be a God or might not. Nobody can know. That's what they'll tell you. And there might be an afterlife or not, but nobody can tell you that either. So this life is the place where you have to, If you're going to have any happiness, you have to have it right now. That's the story of the world.

The Bible tells you a different story that God created the world, and therefore you, and therefore everything you have is a gift. And he's going to renew the world, and if you believe in him, you're going to live in that world forever and ever, which means this life is like the vestibule to a mansion. Your entire life here is just the tiniest little beginning of it. Which story are you going to believe? depending on which story you believe and depending to the degree to which that you really take that into your heart it affects everything how do you spend your money how much money do you give away if you put it in

that story you're going to be your behavior with your money is going to be utterly different than if you put your money in this story over here the god the bible story and therefore it's not just reading the bible to get the principles and the rules out of it though there's lots of great principles and rules You have to read every part of the Bible. You have to read the narratives and the poetry and the history and everything. And more and more you do that, the more you become conversant with the Bible, the wiser you get. The more it affects everything you do. Even where the Bible doesn't speak as directly, say, here's how much money you have to give away exactly.

It doesn't say that. And yet it has an immense impact on the way in which you do, just how you spend your money daily, depending on the story. it's a fight to be wise. It takes years and years and years, but it's a glorious fight. Second thing, a wise life is not just characterized by a glorious fight, but by a guarded heart. Now, what do we mean by a guarded heart? That's the second thing here.

Remember, considering that the Book of Proverbs is all about, it's all about wisdom and getting wisdom. Verse 23 is pretty amazing, because essentially it's saying, and there's nothing more important than this, if you're going to be wise, Above all else, verse 23, guard your heart for everything you do flows from it. Now that is not the modern understanding of the heart. We believe the heart is the seat of the emotions.

We think that the thoughts come from the head and the emotions come from the heart. Now, we live in a day in time in which the emotions are privileged. We have lots and lots of science fiction. We have all, one of the, one of the metanarratives of all the Star Trek movies and television series is that machines have reason. You know, robots and computers have reason, but we only, we have emotions, and that's what makes us human. What makes us human is not reason, but it's emotion. See, that's what makes us not a machine, but a human being.

It's interesting, the Greeks and the Romans saw it exactly the opposite. They said the thing that makes us humans and not animals is that we have reason. But that's another sermon. Another story. But the point is actually, no, it's not totally different. Another story. Greeks and Romans and modern people have always pitted the emotions versus the reason. Are you looking for ways to grow in your faith this summer?

Or are you hoping to help new believers or kids grasp the heart of the Christian faith? For many of us, the summer months can provide more time to deepen our faith and our understanding of what it means to follow Christ. A great resource to start using this summer is the New City Catechism to be. devotional, God's truth for our hearts and minds. This devotional brings the historic catechisms of the Christian Church to life, offering a question to consider for each week of the year. In the introduction, Tim Keller lays out the case for catechesis, the rich and communal practice of learning and memorizing questions and answers that frame the foundational beliefs of the Christian faith.

Each week includes a scripture passage, a prayer, and a brief meditation that will challenge and inspire you. The included commentaries are by contemporary pastors. such as John Piper, Tim Keller, and Kevin DeYoung, as well as historical figures such as Augustine, John Calvin, and Martin Luther. This month, in addition to the New City Catechism Devotional, we're including a great companion resource, the New City Catechism for Kids, as our thank you for your gift to help Gospel and Life share the hope of Christ's love with people all over the world. So request your copies today at gospelonlife.com slash give. That's gospelonlife.com slash give. Now, here's Tim Keller with the remainder of today's teaching.

You think these things, you feel these things, and we live today in a time in which we say, well, owning your feelings and expressing your feelings and making them work for you and being true to your feelings, that's what it means to be an authentic, well-integrated human being. Two weeks ago, there was an article in New York Times Magazine called, Can Emotional Intelligence Be taught in schools? and today we don't have that concept of wisdom that the Bible has in our culture, but we do have the concept of emotional intelligence, which is almost the closest thing we've got.

Emotional intelligence, according to that article, is more predictive of success in life than academic achievement. And emotional intelligence, by that they mean the ability to know your own emotions and then manage them. So it's all about managing your emotions, reframing them to make sure that you're sure that they don't run away with you, but owning up to them, and that's considered wisdom. Now, I have to say, if you read the book of Proverbs, you understand why studies are showing that people who can control their emotions and understand their emotions have better life

outcomes than people who can't, because that's part of wisdom in the book of Proverbs. But it's not the most important part. Because believe it or not, when you're dealing with people's emotions and when you think, oh, I've gotten down to their emotions, now they've gotten down their feelings and I've got down to the bedrock of who they are. According to the Bible, no, you haven't. Because look what it says here. And then look at the verses afterwards. It says, guard your heart, for everything flows from it. You go through the rest of the book of the Bible and even just proverbs. You'll see often it talks about thinking with the heart or acting with the heart, not just feeling with the heart. This does not say the heart is the

seed of the emotion. The emotions flow from the heart, but the brain has, you know, reason. It's not what it says. Everything flows from the heart. And afterwards, it actually says what your mouth says, what your eyes perceive, and what your body does is all flowing from the heart. Why? Because the Bible believes that the heart is actually the seat of your most fundamental commitments, your most fundamental hopes and trusts. It is the things, let me say this carefully, I'll try to say it twice, just so it sinks in. It is where you hold the beliefs about the things you think you must have in order to receive life joyfully. Everybody believes there's some things we must have to receive life joyfully. If I have that,

then I can be joyful. Then my life has meaning. Then, you know, then I'm secure. Then I know I'm worth something. Everybody has a set of beliefs of things, if I have that, then I can receive life joyfully. And what your heart chooses to believe affects everything else. What the heart chooses, the mind perceives and finds reasonable, the emotions desire and find beautiful. The will does and finds practical. So what your heart believes you must have in order to receive life joyfully, what your heart most rests in, trusts in, hopes in, that is what sets your mind, your will, and your emotions. What you perceive, what you feel about what you perceive, and what you do about what you perceive. Because from the heart comes everything. Now, unless you get down to that

level, you won't understand yourself. You remember some years ago, two men, young men both engaged and in both cases their fiancés broke it off. Both cases the women broke off the engagement. I was pastually involved with both of them and they didn't know each other. These separate couples and they were both pretty devastated by, of course. And they were both pretty angry, angry, you know, feelings of anger toward toward the women. One man, however, did forgive. It was hard. Hard work.

Forgave the woman who broke up with him and moved on and dated other women and eventually found a woman and married her and had a wonderful, wonderful marriage. The other man couldn't get past it. Not at all. Stayed bitter. And it poisoned all the other relationships he ever had. because because he couldn't forgive that woman who had done that to him,

he didn't trust women. In other words, it flowed out. And so he didn't trust women. He assumed they all were this way or that way, and so he was suspicious of him, and therefore he was extremely unwise in the way in which he related to them. And relationship after relationship blew up, and he blamed it on women, you know.

It was actually him. A little bit like somebody who says, he got drunk on vodka and soda water on Tuesday night. He got drunk on bourbon and soda water. Wednesday night, he got drunk on tequila and soda water. Thursday night. And he says, so what is it that got him drunk every night? Obviously, the soda water. Why couldn't he get it through it? And you know why? Oh, he couldn't control his feelings. Oh, yes. So emotional intelligence. You have to reframe things. You have to realize, you know, you have to count a 10. You have to think, well, you know, maybe the woman was this and that. No, no, no, no, no.

they were both very beautiful women. In both cases, really, really beautiful women, physically beautiful. And they broke up. And the guy who forgave and moved on and got another woman and got married, she wasn't anywhere near as physically beautiful, but it wasn't so important to him.

But it was extraordinarily important to the other guy. Because down deep in his heart, he said, here's how I know I'm really somebody, and that is I got a beautiful wife, a wife that other guys are jealous of. See? There's a whole lot of reasons why if you make, if you do that, it would have been a bad marriage anyway, but I'll tell you, the fact of the matter was he couldn't receive life joyfully unless he had a really, you know, a woman who is just absolutely gorgeous that everybody would be jealous of. And he just didn't see anything wrong with that. He lost his heart. He didn't guard his heart. Oh, he didn't lose his heart to her. He lost his heart to something that he had actually given it to. It kind of is a heart. He didn't, he didn't savior, a kind of, this is what's going to make your life okay. If you know anything about the life of Jacob in the book of Genesis, it's kind of what he did with Rachel. If somebody like,

if a woman like that was willing to marry me, boy, then I would, that would heal all the rest of my nasty life. See, unless you're willing to get down to your beliefs, your commitments, your hopes, your trust, you're not going to have any ability to handle your emotions. So guard your heart. Now that leads us to the last issue. How do you do that? See, it's not, it's not now a matter of what in the world are you, what does guard your heart mean? See, when you first read that, you probably think, be careful about your emotions. Oh, it's a lot more, it's not more difficult than that. There are ways to manage your emotions. You can just stuff your emotions. You can learn breathing techniques. You can, no, you could read the New York Times article. There's a,

there was talking about reframing. You know, there was a little boy named Anthony. He's nine years old, and he did something in school, and all the kids laughed at him, and he was furious, and he started fighting, so they brought him into emotional intelligence session. It's in the article. And they sat down, they tried to help him to both control his anger. When he starts to get angry, he tells himself things,

and reframe it. What does it mean to reframe? I said, well, the teacher said, are you sure that the kids were laughing at you because they thought you were stupid and me, are you sure they just weren't nervous? And they didn't know what to say. So they were just being awkward.

So he thought about it. Remember he said? And he said, well, I think you're probably right about some of them. But some of them really meant, you know, some of them were just laughing at me. But you see, the teacher couldn't go down any deeper and say, well, okay, so now let's talk about, you know, what in the world are you?

So what if the kids laughed at it? You see, the teacher had to try to make him say, the children weren't really being mean to you. They were just being awkward. But he kept insisting, no, they were being mean. And then the teacher didn't know where to go. Now, listen, there is something a lot deeper, according to the Bible, than just controlling your emotions.

It's guarding your heart. How are you going to do that? Well, the answer is actually right here in verse 20, 21 and 22. It tells you, the teacher of the Torah, Now, the person who is addressing the young men or young man is reading the book of Proverbs all through the book of Proverbs, it keeps talking about, I'm going to give you my words, and you need to guard my words, and you need to take my words. What are those words?

The words of the teacher of the Torah, which is the law of God. It's the scripture. And the book of Proverbs, in fact, all the wisdom literature, is basically taking the law of God, the great principles of the law of God, and bringing them down to earth into... the into daily life applying the law of god the great principles and precepts of the law of god into daily life and so what he says is this listen carefully my son pay attention to what i say turn your ear to my words do not let them out of your sight keep them within your heart

for they are life to those who find them and health to one's whole body their life to those who find them and health to one whole body. Now that's interesting because you want to guard your heart, he says? Take my words. Now these aren't just a person's words. These are the words of the Torah. Take the words of the Bible, as it were, that I'm going to teach you, and put them into your heart. And you see how strong the claim is here?

He doesn't just simply say, live by them. He says, the words I give you are life. You put them in your heart, and that's going to guard your heart. Now, at one level, that makes perfect sense. Because how do you come to your beliefs, by the way? How do you decide if a really beautiful woman loves me, then I'll be okay? How did that happen? How do you decide if this or that happens, then if I have money, if I have wealth,

if my career goes well? You know, two people walk side by side in the same career. person's working himself to death, the other person is knocking off and why? Because this person over here, down deep in the heart, says, unless I'm incredibly successful, I make a lot of money in my career, I cannot receive life joyfully. Okay, how did that person's heart get there? It's got to be through words, experiences or some, and experiences are just interpreted things that happen to you. In other words, it's got to be through his own thinking about things or somebody else is thinking or what other people have said and therefore it's right you know when somebody says sticks and stones may break my bones

but words can ever hurt me we all know that that's not true to a great degree our self-image and what we believe in our heart is to a great degree affected by words that people have said that we can't forget sometimes a good counselor can tease them out a little bit and say so your father said that and you never forgot that no so that's in there so at one level yes if you want to guard your your heart, take these words and put them in there. But does it really make sense that, for example, that man who really needed a major redo of his inner heart and was bitter against women and had such a view of himself, that if he just memorized the scripture, for example, just took biblical principles, even relevant ones, and just memorized them and thought about them that that would do it? No. No. No.

you need a living word. You need a word of life, but let me tell you where you get it. You have to put the book of Proverbs into the context of the whole Bible, and here's what you see. In John 539, Jesus talks to the scribes and Pharisees,

and he says, you study the scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. Okay. You read the words of the Torah because you think that they give you the words of life.

And Jesus goes on for a second and indicates that they were right, but then he explains why. They testify of me, he says. You're right. The Bible does have the words of life, but you have to understand what the Bible's all about.

It's about me. In Proverbs chapter 8, there's this beautiful poetic chapter in which we see God and wisdom creating the world together. And wisdom is speaking. Wisdom is personified. And wisdom is saying, I was with God as he was creating the world,

as he was creating the human race. We did it together. And you read it and you say, beautiful, beautiful. Of course, it's poetry. And it's a way of saying God created the world in wisdom. Was it only poetry? Because when you get to chapter one of the book of John, it says in the beginning was the word.

Listen carefully. And the word was with God. And the word was God. And then it says through him all things were made. Without him, nothing was made that has been made. Wait a minute. Here again we have what, the word alongside of God, but the word is God, making all things with God.

Here's what the Bible is claiming. And here's what Jesus actually claims. Jesus is the wisdom of God because he is the living word. He's the word that if you grasp and you put in your heart will make you wise.

Now, I want you to think about this. It's actually just struck me this week. What is wisdom? It's not just knowledge, right? We say it's knowledge applied. Wisdom is knowledge brought down to earth. Brought down to earth, brought down to street level.

It's applied. That's wisdom. We know lots of people who are knowledgeable that they're just not smart. Or they're smart, but they're not wise. Wisdom is knowledge brought down to earth. Who is Jesus? He is God expressed. He is God embodied. He is God's wisdom. He is God literally brought down to earth. He is God brought into human form. Oh, we talk about the glory of God. We talk about the holiness of God, the love of God, but those are abstractions. And if you just memorize those abstractions, it's not going to change your heart. It's not going to make you wise. It's not going to pull your heart

off the things that you have given your heart to. But this will. Jesus Christ is God the wisdom of God. He is the wisdom. He is the living word. He is God. Come down to earth. Look at him. John chapter 3, John chapter 4. In John chapter 3, Nicodemus is a spiritual seeker. Jesus is very abrupt with him. You must be born again. John 4, the Samaritan woman, is a spiritual seeker. He's so patient. John 11, Lazarus is dead, a man is dead, two bereaved sisters,

Mary and Martha. Martha comes up and says, Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn't have died. Mary comes up and says, Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn't have died. Same situation. Two women saying the same thing. In one case, Jesus gives Martha a lecture.

I am the resurrection in the life. In the other case, he just weeps. Why does he weep here and preach here? Why is he abrupt here? Why is he patient here? Because Jesus Christ does not have a temperament. Jesus is consummate wisdom. He's supreme wisdom.

And he is God's wisdom. He's all this stuff you read about, you hear about, but it's all an abstraction. It's wisdom brought down to earth. It's the holiness of God embodied in a human being. And when you see him, and when you meditate on the glory of who he is as he's walking through the pages of the New Testament,

now you've got something that will change your heart, particularly, and actually I should say, only if you see what he did for you on the cross. Why does Paul say that the Greeks and the Romans saw the cross's utter foolishness? I'll tell you why, because the Greeks and Romans said, if you have a wise Messiah, why would he get killed like that?

Fools get punished because they deserve punishment. Fools, the rod for the back of fools. It's all through the book of Proverbs. Fools are always getting. punished because they deserve it and because there's too stupid to avoid it. If you're wise, you don't go to the cross. You don't get scourge. You don't get beaten. You don't get imprisoned. It's foolishness. No, but see, Jesus Christ is the wisdom of God. He's constant wisdom. But at the end of his life, he took our place. He took the place of the fools. He got the scourging that fools deserve. He got the

death that we deserve. And if you see him dying for you, you'll love him. And that's what changes the heart. Look at this. Love her wisdom. Cherish her. Embrace her. It personifies wisdom and says it's not enough for you just to try to study a bunch of rules. You have to be so passionately in love with wisdom. Well, here's the way to get passionately love with wisdom. Love him. Embrace him. Cherish him. You can do all those things literally if you see him dying on the cross. Because if you see him dying on the cross for you, then as you meditate on the glory of who he is in the page of the New Testament, His character will be burned into your heart. And you'll get your heart back.

Because there will be nothing. No beautiful woman. No great career. Nothing will be as beautiful as him. And you'll get your heart back. He's the living word. He's the living word. This is the way of wisdom.

Let's pray. Our Father, we ask that you would help us to see the, we can take this very, very literally. We can guard our heart because we love wisdom. We embrace wisdom. We pursue wisdom. We cherish wisdom because it's Jesus. And Father, as we see him walking and acting and behaving and doing things in the Bible in a wise way,

but then see him going to the cross, as we fall in love with him, then his example becomes more than an example. It really becomes a living word. brought into our hearts, reframing and reshaping us. Please, oh Lord, make us wise the way Jesus is wise. We pray in the name of him in whom all the treasures of knowledge and wisdom are hid. Amen. Thanks for listening to today's teaching.

It's our prayer that you were encouraged by it and that it helps you apply the gospel to your life. For more helpful resources from Tim Keller, visit gospelinlife.com. There you can subscribe to the the Gospel in Life quarterly journal. When you do, you will also receive free articles, sermons, devotionals, and other great gospel-centered resources. Again, it's all at gospel and life.com. You can also stay connected with us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and X. Today's sermon was recorded in 2013. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life podcast were recorded between 1989 and 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor

at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.