Timothy Keller Sermons Podcast by Gospel in Life - Your Plans, God’s Plans

Episode Date: January 31, 2024

You make or break your life on the basis of your choices. In Hebrew Scriptures, the word for guidance is usually derived from the word for rope because the ropes were the method of navigation for sailors. They used ropes to lower or move or raise the sails. Without them, they’d be blown totally off course. So the question is how do you get God’s guidance? How do you get God’s navigation, so that when you have all these choices, you know the right course to take?  By looking at these proverbs we can see 1) the guidance God does, 2) the guidance God gives, and 3) the guidance God purchases for us. This sermon was preached by Dr. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on December 12, 2004. Series: Proverbs: True Wisdom for Living. Scripture: Proverbs 11:3; 12:5, 15; 15:22; 16:1-4, 9, 25, 33; 21:5; 27:1. 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. For many of the decisions we have to make in life, moral values alone can't tell you what choices to make. You may be weighing several options in a decision, and they all could be morally allowable. So how do you choose the right one? That's where God's wisdom is critical. Today, Tim Keller is speaking about how we can grow in using God's wisdom. The scripture tonight is found all over the book of Proverbs, and it's on page 7 of your bulletin.

The integrity of the upright guides them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity. The plans of the righteous are just, but the advice of the wicked is deceitful. The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice. Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisors they succeed. To man belongs the plans of the heart, but from the Lord comes the reply of the tongue. All a man's ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the Lord. Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will succeed. The Lord works out everything for His own ends, even the wicked for a day of disaster.

In His heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps. There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death. The lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the Lord. The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty. Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth. This is God's word. Okay, we're gonna continue to look at proverbs

and at the subject of wisdom. And each week we've said that wisdom is basically ability to make wise choices, right choices. Our life is basically made, you make or break your life on the basis of your choices. Is this the right person to hire? Is this the right career for you? Is this the right job for you? Is this the right amount of freedom to give to your child at this age? Is this the right person to confide in? Is this the right person of freedom to give to your child at this age? Is this the right person to confide in? Is this the right person to give this responsibility to?

Is this the right person to marry? Was it right not to marry that person? And every one of those situations, the options in front of you are many, and most all of them are moral, most all of them are legal, most all of them are allowable, but most of them aren't wise. So we need guidance to make decisions. And in the Bible, in the Hebrew scriptures, there's a word guidance that comes up quite a bit, especially in the book of Proverbs. In fact, it shows up in the first

verse at the top, and whenever you see the word guidance in most all the time in the Hebrew Bible, it comes from a word for rope. And it's derived from the word for rope because the ropes were the method of navigation for sailors in those days. You use ropes to lower the sails when the wind was in your favor or to move the sails when the wind was in your favor, or to move the sails when the wind changed, or to raise the sails and tie them up when the storm came up, otherwise you would be blown totally off course. So ropes were ways of navigating. Now the question is, how do you get God's guidance? How do you get God's navigation so that when you have all these choices, you know the right course to take?

How do you do that? How does that happen? We'll find out by looking at these Proverbs and understanding, first of all, the guidance God does. Secondly, the guidance God gives. And thirdly, the guidance God purchases for us. The guidance God does, the guidance God gives, and the guidance God purchases for us. Okay, first, the guidance God does, according to this list of proverbs, there's two ways in which God does guidance. He guides paradoxically and he guides non-obviously.

He guides paradoxically and non-obviously. What do I mean? All right, paradoxically. Take a look at the second last and the third last proverb in the list. Second last proverb is something that's probably nobody's, not going to raise any eyebrows. It says, the plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty. The word haste might be a little better translated impulsive, and the word diligent can also be translated strategic, thoughtful, reflective. And it's saying, if instead of just letting life happen, if you act, if you plan ahead, if you're strategic, your life will go better. Making choices, making decisions, acting makes a difference.

Okay, fine. But look at the verse just above it. Look at the third last verse. The lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is from the Lord. Now lot casting was a way of doing a lot of things. If you wanted to know, okay, casting a lot is very much like flipping a coin. If you said, okay, which one of you gets to go to do that? Or drawing a straw, okay?

It was just a way, you know, who kicks off first? I guess if they had football back then they would have cast lots, not flipped a coin. But look what it's saying. Every little detail, every coin toss comes down exactly the way God planned. Even the smallest things are fixed by God's plan. Now we do not know as human beings how to hold those together. Human categories of thought

cannot hold those two things together. We feel like either our choices matter and they're significant and they have consequences, and that means our destiny is not fixed. It's history is open. Or we believe everything is fixed and therefore if everything is fixed, who cares how you live? It doesn't really matter what you do. But not in the Bible.

In the Bible we're told, and you can see it, that we are absolutely free and we're absolutely determined at the same time. That's even the words it uses. In fact, even though as we're going to see, there's many other places narratively where this is spelled out. There's places where the Bible shows us in actual accounts of people's lives, how this works out. There's no better place to think in the Bible that puts the principle in a nutshell than right here. If you take a look at the fifth proverb down, and then at the ninth proverb down, which is, this is chapter 16 verse three, and chapter 16 verse nine.

Verse three says, "'To man belongs the plans of the heart, but from the Lord comes the reply of the tongue.'" And then down to verse nine, "'In his heart a man plans this course, but the Lord determines his steps.'" What is that? Here's what it's saying.

Very, very interesting. It says, "'Your plans are yours. Your choices are yours. You are responsible for them. No one's forcing. God's not forcing you in any direction on that, see? It's yours. If you do something stupid, if you do something wicked, if you do something selfish, if you do something cruel, there's going to be bad consequences, and people are going to hold you accountable, and they should. And God will hold you accountable and he should. Your plans are yours. But what actually happens as a result of those plans, what actually happens in history, whether it's words in verse 3 or actual deeds in

verse 9, those are absolutely controlled and totally fixed and set by God. Nothing happens as not according to his plan. Your plans belong to you. Your choice is belong to you. And what actually happens is completely set. It's completely fixed. Both at the same time. Not 50-50. Not like 50% free and 50% fixed. Or 2080 or 60-40 or 40-60. No, 100% free and 50% fixed? Or 2080 or 6040 or 4060? No, 100% free, 100% determined under the sovereignty of God. Now, of course, I said human categories can't work that out. We just don't think that can happen. It's all well in water to us. It's one or the other or some mixture. And if it's a mixture, like I said, it's 50-50 or 60-40 or something like that. Now let's go to literature just to show that human beings really basically say, look, either things are basically set or things basically

are free and open. So let's take the more fatalistic approach, the famous legend of Oedipus. Oedipus, when he's born, the Delphic Oracle says he will kill his father and marry his mother. That's his fate. And he grows up and he hears this, by the way, he hears the prophecy, and he does everything he can to avoid it. Everything he can. It makes all of his choices to try to avoid it, but in the end, he kills his father and marries his mother. In other words, his choices have no connection to his destiny. His destiny is fixed in spite of his choices. There's no connection between them at all. He can choose and do everything he wants. It doesn't matter. It's going to happen. Now let's take another famous figure in literature, Marty McFly. And at the end of the Back to the Future trilogy of movies, Doc Brown explains the message of that profound set of movies, which I love. Completely, I

watch it any day it's on, any time, any time. And what does he say? Remember what Doc Brown says at the very end? It sums up the message of the three movies. Your future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one. And of course, everyone who's ever been in a focus group, and that's the reason why they did it, says, that's what I believe, and that's what U.S. popular culture believes. Your future is not set, it's not written, it's whatever you make it, so make it a good one. Now, it may be true that intellectually it's almost impossible to hold together this biblical concept that we're absolutely free and absolutely determined.

We either believe we're determined or we believe we're free, but if you believe either of those, you're cooked. It's almost impossible to live a decent life that way. For example, if you believe everything is fixed no matter what you do, that there's no connection between your choices and the destiny, you're going to be totally passive. You're going to be totally bored. You're going to be totally cynical, totally hard, totally indifferent. Who cares? But if, as U.S. popular culture believes, not the way the fatalists believe, that there

was no connection between your choices and the destiny, if you believe there's a total connection that your destiny is completely set by your choices. If you really believe that and you thought about it, you wouldn't get up in the morning. If you believe that and you're happy and you say, that's wonderful, you're not thinking, it wouldn't even get out of bed in the morning. When I was 22, 23, I've used this illustration for other things, it's very helpful in many ways. I did everything I possibly could. Everything I possibly could, like Oedipus, you know.

Everything I possibly could to get married to a woman who if I had gotten married to her would have been the wrong woman. And as I look back at my 22 year old self, I now think that probably about two-thirds of the things I wanted were wrong, were bad, bad things. If I'd gotten them, they'd been very bad. Two-thirds.

Now here's the thing that scares me. What's my percentage now? Now, you know, I think it's better. I think it's a lot better. I hope it's a lot better. I mean, I think it's getting better because, you know, I'm old enough now I can think of my 30s and it wasn't two-thirds. It was better than two-thirds.

It might have been half. It might have been maybe half the things I really wanted would have been okay for me and the other half would have been bad for me. But you know what, when you're in the age you're in, you don't know your percentage and it's something. What fool, knowing how little we know, would want to live in a universe where your future is completely and totally fixed by your choices? Here's what's so fascinating. The biblical understanding, which is intellectually so wild and so weird and so intellectually difficult to hold on to is utterly practical.

Because the Bible does not say your choices have no connection to your destiny or that your choice is to determine your destiny, but rather God in His sovereignty relates your choices partially to your destiny, but He is the one who fixes everything. And therefore you are held responsible. You are completely free and yet you can relax. See if everything was, if everything was, it's all fixed to be no incentive. But since your plans are yours, they belong to you, you have every, and any consequences will come from it, from bad choices. You have every incentive to work with every fiber of your being, to do well and to do right and to be wise. But on the other hand, since everything is under the control of God, who is working things together for good, you can relax. This is the reason why

and not freak out. This is the reason why Paul, when he was in the boat in Acts 27, acted the way he did. He was in a boat. There was a terrible storm that came up. He was in a boat, there was a terrible storm that came up. He was in a boat with soldiers and sailors and the Mediterranean, the storm was so bad that the men were afraid for their lives. And God came and spoke through an angel to Paul and said, I am the Lord and I'm telling you that though the storm is bad and you might lose the ship, no one in the boat will die. God told Paul that. Then Paul gave the prophecy to everyone else. And by the way, prophecies in the Bible, if you get a prophecy and it doesn't come true, you're a false prophet and you're put to death. Book of Deuteronomy. Paul knew that. Once God had told him that was the way, that was the way. And yet the next day, in the midst of the storm, when the sailors try to abandon ship, Paul grabs the soldiers, takes them to the part of the ship and forces them to stay and says, the sailors, unless

you stay on the ship, we're all going to die. Okay. You say, all right, well, okay, if we're all going to die, then it's not sure that they're all going to live. But if it's absolutely sure they're all going to live, who cares how they act? But don't you see, if either of those is true, you're not going to be wise in the storm. You're going to be passive, or you're going to be paralyzed. But Paul's cool, because he understood that he's absolutely free and absolutely in the hands of God. So God guides paradoxically. Secondly, God guides non-obviously. Non-obviously, yes, because here in the middle, pretty much in the middle of the page, it says, this is a little halfway down from the middle, this

is chapter 16 verse 4, the Lord works out everything for His own ends, even the wicked for the day of disaster. The Lord works out everything for His own ends, even the wicked. Now you know what that's saying. It's saying not only are little things part of God's plan, but bad things are part of God's plan. The evil do or the deeds are part of God's plan. Now if you had not just been through what we just been through, if you hadn't thought through 16.1 and 16.3 and 16.9, you would say, oh no, if bad things are part of God's plan, God is the author of

evil. But you see, the plans of a man belong to him, that is to say, were to her. That is evil deeds belong to the evil doer. They are responsible for the evil deeds. God does not force anybody to do evil deeds. They are yours. He hasn't made you do that. And yet, God is going to overrule and work and weave in even the worst things into an ultimate good. In the end though it says, in the end. Now the perfect example of that is Joseph. Joseph, you remember the story of Joseph and you have, he's one of many brothers and Jacob was utterly poisoning that family, destroying that family system because he was favoring Joseph over the rest of his brothers. And Joseph was on

his way to becoming proud, becoming cruel, becoming haughty, becoming shallow. He was on his way to being wrecked. And his brothers were all becoming murderously bitter. And of course we know what happened. The brothers threw Joseph into a pit and sold him into slavery. And then when he was in Egypt as a slave, then he was accused of rape and he was thrown into a dungeon. And if you read the story of Joseph, you'll see that years go by, over and over he's thrown into these dark pits basically, and he cries out to God, no answer. God seems to be absent. No answer.

Year after year after year, one thing goes wrong after another thing goes wrong after another thing goes wrong. There's slavery and there's injustice and there's screaming and fighting and running and crying and everything's going wrong and yet only because every one of those things has gone wrong. Years later, does it become obvious that only because of all those bad things, Joseph becomes a man of greatness. His brothers and the family are completely healed psychologically. And in the end, the family is saved from starvation as is most of the rest of that part of the world. All because of all those bad things, only in the end. And that's

the reason why Joseph is able to say in his famous summary, but it's an actual, it's almost an exact restatement, though it happened earlier, of Proverbs 16 verse 3, when he looks at his brothers and said, you meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. Now, what does that mean? It means this, never, ever, ever, ever, ever think that God's not working, no matter how much it seems like he's absent. And at the same time, never, never, never, never think you're going to be able to figure out for a long time what he's up to. Because it's only at the end, at the end, at the end. Don't say, he's got till Saturday to tell me, or, you know, why he's letting this happen.

No. God works not obviously, but God works. Now, do you see, this is the first point, but let me show you how important it is. Do you see how important it is? People are always saying, I need God's guidance. I need God's guidance. You know, I've got to figure out His will. But God's guidance, according to the Bible, is more something God does than something God gives. And so, you know, when somebody says, I need God's guidance, I need God's guidance, you're standing in it. You're in the middle of the current. It's moving you right along. You're being navigated.

You just may not think so. So first of all, if you want to live a wise life, if you don't want to freak out, if you want to be calm in storms like, uh, like Paul, and therefore, you know, have the wherewithal to make decent choices, storms like Paul, and therefore, you know, have the wherewithal to make decent choices. If you want to have the philosophical, you might say, worldview infrastructure of the relationship of God to things that actually happen. If you want to understand the relationship of evil and good, if you have that and you see God is guiding, you're standing right in the middle of it, then you will, like Paul, be calm and storms, make decisions that save the day. Secondly, however, we do have to ask the question, but how does God give guidance?

Because you do have decisions to make, and you do have choices to take, and you are at Forks of the Road, and you want to say, all right, how does God help me make this decision? I need to know. So how do we get the guidance God gives? And now, again, we have two principles. We get out of the Proverbs. You have to pay the price for God's guidance, and then develop the wisdom for God's guidance. You have to pay the price and develop the wisdom. Now why do I say pay the price? Well in chapter 16 verse 5, which is smack it practically in the middle, and perhaps

the most intriguing of all of these proverbs, we read this, commit to the Lord whatever you do and your plans will succeed. Commit to the Lord whatever you do and your plans will succeed. Now you read that and right away you say, that's great, and I'll bet you you think you know what it said. And I thought I knew what it said, but you know you've heard of the meat of the word and the milk of the word. The Proverbs are the hard candy of the word. You don't just swallow it. You don't just bite into it. You have to dissolve it very, very, very slowly on your tongue. You have to meditate. You have to think about it. And we

know what all the commentators point out. This is a complete reversal of the way people think. You would think, they would say, commit your plans to the Lord, and then your deeds will succeed. In other words, commit your plans to the Lord. Oh Lord, bless my plan. And then the execution will succeed. That's what you think it's saying. It's not saying that.

It says the opposite. It says, commit your deeds to the Lord, And then the execution will succeed. That's what you think it's saying. It's not saying that. It's just the opposite. It says, commit your deeds to the Lord, and you will become more and more a person who makes smart plans. More and more become a person who makes successful plans. It's exactly the opposite of what you might think. And this is what it's saying.

The word commit is a word that literally means to roll over onto, to put all of your weight on. And this is saying, unconditionally trust God for all things that happen in your life. Unconditionally trust God. Radically, unconditionally trust God, and you slowly will become a person who makes wise plans. Plans in accord with reality, plans in accord with who God is, who you are, human nature, things. Why do I call this paying the price? Now, I'll show you in a minute. I don't mean by paying the price, paying the price earns guidance. I'll tell you about that in a minute. But I'm saying paying the price receives guidance, not the same thing. But I'm saying paying the price receives guidance, not the same thing. In the midst of life's uncertainties, where do you turn for wisdom?

The Book of Proverbs is filled with wisdom to help guide us in all aspects of life. In Tim and Kathy Keller's devotional book, God's Wisdom for Navigating Life, you'll get a fresh, inspiring view of God's wisdom each day of the year from the Book of Proverbs. This devotional book will help you unlock the wisdom within the poetry of Proverbs, and guide you toward a new understanding of what it means to live the Christian life. This resource is our thanks for your gift to help Gospel and Life share Christ's love with more people. You can request your copy of God's wisdom for navigating life when you give today at

gospelandlife.com slash give give today at gospelandlife.com slash give. That's gospelandlife.com slash give. Now here's Tim Keller with the remainder of today's teaching. Why do I call it paying the price? Elizabeth Elliott in a book she wrote years ago on guidance, puts it like this. She says, the more we pay for advice, the more we are likely to listen to it. The more we pay for advice, the more we are likely to listen to it. The more we pay for advice, the more likely we listen to it. Advice from a friend which is free, we may take or leave. Advice from a consultant we have paid much for personally.

We are more likely to accept, but it's still our choice. We can take it or leave it. But the guidance of God is different. First of all, we do not come to God asking for advice, but for God's will, and that is not optional. And God's fee is the highest one of all. It costs everything. To ask for the guidance of God requires abandonment. We no longer say, if I trust you, you will give me such and such. Instead, we must say if I trust you you will give me such and such Instead we must say I trust you give me or withhold from me whatever you choose as John Newton says What you will When you will

How you will See she says Finding God's will is not coming to God and saying if I trust you you will do and such. That's the way we read the proverb before we thought about it, right? She says, no, if you want guidance, you come to God and say, I trust you. Give me or not give me whatever you choose. Lord, what you will, when you will, how you will. Now, what does it mean to unconditionally trust God for every part of your life? It means, I think, to say, Lord, from this moment on, it would be wonderful if some of you would do this tonight, from this moment on, I will

obey anything you tell me, whether I understand it or not, or not, and I will accept anything you send me whether I understand it or not. But I'm not going to bail on you, no matter what. And the Bible is saying, only if you go through life like that, not bailing on God, obeying unconditionally, trusting unconditionally, committing everything, will, as time goes on, both your good times and your bad times will turn you into the kind of person whose plans are wise, whose plans you plan more and more successfully. You said, why would that be, how would that be? Okay, some years ago I was studying this story of Joseph in a Bible study, I can't

remember who was in it. I can't remember how long ago it was either, but I do remember that somebody said, all this slavery and injustice and years and years of agony, and was that really necessary to do that? Why couldn't we do it the way it always happens untouched by an angel? The angel shows up and everybody goes, oh, or maybe God shows up with all his glory and effulgence and says, okay, I'm going to settle this right now. We don't need 40 years of misery and pain. No. You, Joseph, you're turning into a spoiled brat. Stop it. You know, I mean, he'll say, oh my gosh, all right. And he's, all of you people, you brothers, you're turning into murderously bitter people. Jacob, watch out. They want to kill him. They want to summon a slavery. Don't let them do it.

Okay, and Jacob you've got to stop your favoritism. And oh by the way, everybody, 25 years from now, there's gonna be a terrible famine so you better start saving up. Otherwise you're gonna die of starvation. All right. Just like that. Half an hour maybe. No, that's Hollywood. Let me tell you how it works in real life. In reality, you never ever ever ever ever ever become wise like that. Nobody has ever learned they were a sinner by being told. No one has ever learned about their flaws by being told. You have to be shown.

You have to be shown. Your mother's been telling you about your flaws for years. You had to be shown. And until you about your flaws for years. You had to be shown. And until you see your flaws and until you see your flaws and the only way you'll ever see your flaws is in experience, they're going to control your life. And secondly, no one ever learned that God loved them by being told. You know, I tell you every week practically. And you go home and say, well, the preacher told me that I love, I believe that. No, you don't. No, you don't. You wouldn't live the way you do. If you believe that,

you know what you need in order to really know? You have to be shown. Over and over and over as life goes on, you have to be in positions where you're absolutely sure God has abandoned you and then find out later on you were wrong. That has to happen over and over and over. You can't bail. You have to commit everything to Him, but as time goes on, you will find that you are finally becoming wise. You're understanding for the first time your flaws and therefore your plans are more careful than they would be otherwise. And secondly, you're learning that God loves you, and therefore your plans are more bold than they would be otherwise. And therefore, by paying this price, by committing everything to Him, by then saturating yourself in His Word, so that you not only see the

solid lines to your decisions, but the dotted lines. You understand that? There are a lot of things that biblically are technically okay, but you can see inferences out of biblical principles. The more you saturate yourself and seek to do what this verse says, commit your entire life to Him, unconditional trust, you will become more and more a wise person. And you can see it in all these on all these verses. For example, look at the first proverb, the integrity of the upright guides them, but the faith... now what does that mean? Honest people. Your honesty guides you, it says. Well now, wouldn't it be better to say God guides honest people? Yes, of course that's true, but don't you see what it's saying? God does not so much tell you how to get guided, but how to become the kind of

person that gets guided. How to become the kind of person that makes wise choices. Look at the next verse. The plans of the righteous are just. Now see, only if you do this commitment, rolling everything, paying the price, unconditional trust, and therefore find over the years, you finally are learning truly about your flaws, and you're finally learning truly how much he loves you Only when that happens do your plans become more and more smart wise just fair proportionate for example We've talked about this every week It's okay to love your children But if you just completely build your whole life around your children if they're your meaning in life, right?

If you trust your children more than God if you look to your children more than God, then what happens? You're going to have stupid goals for them, destructively bad goals for them, wrong goals for them. If it's okay to want somebody to love you, to be in love with you, right? But if you've got to have it, you've just got to always have a lover, you've got to have somebody really in love with you, you know what's going to happen? You're going to need to date people that you shouldn't. You're going to stay in dating relationships that you really should have broken off. In other words, your goals will be wrong. They'll be destructively wrong. But what happens is, as time goes on, you become the kind of person whose plans become better and better and wiser and wiser.

And there's only no... that's the only way to do it. You become a wiser person from this radical commitment. And look at all the other verses which tell you, look at the third verse, the wave of full seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice. Plans lack for... plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisors they succeed. Here's how you make your decisions. Here's how you get God's guidance. You commit yourself to Him utterly. That slowly turns you into a person of wisdom. Because of the humility you get, you turn to everybody else. And so you generate lots of options. You're not a fool. You don't think you know everything. And because of the love that you feel from Him, at the same time you're bold, you're diligent,

and you make plans, and that's how God shows you what you should be doing. Now this isn't necessarily, however, what most Americans want to hear. When most people have come to me over the years, as a pastor, they come to me and they say, I have decisions to make, and I want God's guidance. I want to discern the will of God, and I always say, make a decision. And they say, how spiritual? I mean, I thought you were a pastor. I'm trying to find out the will of God. How do I know what God wants? I've been praying and I've been getting peace about this, but I haven't been getting peace about this. I need to know which one... How do I discern the leading of the Holy Spirit?

I said, make a decision. In the Old Testament, you had the Urim and the Thymim. We don't even know what that was. It was in the breastplate of the priest. And it was a way of getting a yes or no answer from God. We worked on a binary system from what we can tell. And that means that it was either a couple of stones or a couple of sticks. And you could maybe throw them in the air.

And if they both came up like this, it was yes from God. If they both came up like this it was yes from God, if they both came up like this it was no from God, if they came up like this it was no answer. We know that one time, you know, at one time there's many places in the Old Testament where people went to the Urmin Themim and there was no answer from God, that is they didn't get a yes or no answer. One time David went and asked God a question with the Orman themum. He said, he was on the run from Saul and he said, if I hide in that city and Saul pursues me there, will the people of the city give me up to Saul? And God said, yes.

So David didn't go there. So, you know, we read that and we go, that's what I'm talking about. I want to know that. That's what I want. I want guidance. There's no talk of that when you get into the New Testament. There's no talk of that at all and you say, well what's going on here? Here's why. Why doesn't God do that? Of course we create our emotional urums and themams. That's what the peace thing is. So I have peace about this, but I don't have peace about this. I'm praying about this and it feels good. I'm praying about this, it doesn't feel good. In other words, we don't want to make a decision. David didn't make a decision. He didn't need to make a decision. God just told him.

He didn't have to use any wisdom. He didn't have to figure out. He didn't have to know the people. He didn't have to know the human heart. He just...and that's what we want. Is that right? By the way, I am not saying don't even listen to your feelings. Sometimes when you say, I'm not getting peace about this, you're trying to talk yourself into it, but your conscience actually knows better. Sometimes you say, I don't have peace about this. You're trying to talk yourself into something, but you've got a reason why it's wrong, but you haven't been able to articulate it yet. You need to talk it out with somebody else. I'm not saying ignore your feelings, but I am saying if Jesus decided on the basis

of some emotional or anathemim, what the will of God was, if Jesus said, should I go to the cross or not? I don't have any peace about it. Of course he didn't have any peace about it. He would never have gone. Where would you be? Why doesn't God just do it? Why doesn't he give us the answer? Why does he make a decision? Imagine, some of you this wouldn't be hard to imagine, you have a four-year-old son. Your four-year-old son comes to you at five o'clock and says, Daddy, can I go out and play? And you say, well, I think your mother and I are creating dinner at 5.30, so don't go out too far. Just go over here and play, but I will call you.

Scroll forward. 16 years later, your son's 20. He's away at college. And he calls you up at five o'clock and says, Dad, can I go out and play? There's a bunch of guys playing frisbee in the quad. I was wondering whether I could go out and play. And you would say, what is wrong with you? I don't know.

You know your workload. You know what's going on. You're supposed to make this? Well, Dad, I just want you to make the decision for me. And listen, there are parents, believe it or not, who would like to have their children that dependent on them, that emotionally dependent on them, but God is not one of them. He wants you to be like Him. Make a decision. And when I came here to start a church, people were constantly saying to me, are you sure God's called you to start this church in New York City? And I used to always say, no.

I think he did. I mean, I've used my... I see an opportunity, I don't see anybody else going through, taking the opportunity, I feel an obligation to come. I think it's a good idea, I think God's calling me, but I can't be absolutely sure, I can be absolutely sure, I mustn't lie, it's in the Bible. I can be sure I mustn't bow down to an idol, it's in the Bible, I'm sure of a lot of things that are God's will without, you know,

but as far as I know, I won't be sure that I was called to plan a church until it happens. Then I'll know. I said, well, don't you have peace about it? I know. It was too hard. It was too scary. No, I didn't have peace about it.

But I know this. Guidance is as much something God does as something God gives, and therefore I knew by selling my house and coming on up here and getting started and signing a three-year lease, oh my gosh, that if I failed to plant a church, God was preparing me for something I couldn't envision. You see? So we have to understand that the guidance God gives does. Then we can understand and use the guidance God gives. They operate together. But then one last point,

and it's very important. When you read 16 verse 3, commit to the Lord whatever you do and your plans will succeed, which actually means unconditionally trust God. Make a radically unconditional trust commitment to Him and you will slowly become the kind of person who, you know, He will guide you. He will make you the kind of person whose plans are wise and you make good choices. But who does that? Who does that? Who commits completely? Who rolls everything over onto God? That word commit is an absolute word. Who puts all their weight? Nobody in this room, certainly nobody behind the mic. In that case, well, I guess we're not eligible

for his guidance, no. And yet, it still comes to people. The first time you really see this in the Bible, it's when the children of Israel are being led out of Egypt. And one day, you can read about this in Exodus 13 One day suddenly a pillar by day. It was a it looked like a cloud by night. It looked like a fire Went before the children of Israel to guide them

When the pillar stopped they camped if the pillar stopped for five days they camped for five days when the pillar moved forward they went guidance the presence of God. But the pillar, the shekinah glory of God, dwelt over the holy of holies. It dwelt over the tabernacle. It dwelt over the mercy seat, the place of atonement. In other words, they did not pay the price for guidance. In spite of the fact they didn't deserve it, in spite of the fact that they couldn't do this complete commitment, it came to them anyway, because in some way the sacrificial system indicated that somehow the price was being paid for them. Who do you think really paid that price? What is the ultimate guidance? What is the ultimate price pay? Who do you think did that?

When, last illustration about this whole idea of navigation, when Jesus Christ was in the boat, asleep during the storm, and his disciples are just flipping out, they're freaking out. Why? Because here they are in a storm and their navigator, the Lord, is sleeping. No navigation, no guidance in the storm, right? So they're freaking out, so they wake him up and they say, Lord, don't you care that we're dying? The carousel, not that we perish, is the old King James. Don't you care that we're dying? And Jesus gets up, he's actually pretty short with them. And he says, where's your faith? And I, you know, he's so often tender with people that I've often wondered why he was that sharp. I don't mean he was sinfully sharp. He was right. And here's why I think he was sharp with them.

I have to go back into my own parental experience to get to this. You know, at some point, your child is going to look at you and when you withhold something from him or her, you don't let your child have something they really want. And when they look at you and they say, you don't love me. And when that happens, it'll happen to you, sometimes, those of you with really little kids, just try not to blow up. And I'll tell you why it's so hard. You want to say, how dare you? You have no idea what I have done for you.

You have no idea the sacrifice. You don't know I have no idea the things that I've withheld for myself to raise you. You have no idea the sacrifices. You have no idea. And if you knew all I have done for you, you would never question my motive for withholding that from you. If you knew all that I have sacrificed for you, you would know I must have a loving purpose from withholding that for you. When they said, Master, don't you care that we're dying? I think Jesus was saying back to them, don't you care that I'm dying? When I said, Master, you're not really navigating it to the storm. Here's what Jesus is saying. There is a real storm

coming, a cosmic storm, a storm of God's wrath, a storm of eternal justice, a storm of the justice that we deserve for everything that we've done as human beings. And he says, I am going to bow my head before that storm and I'm going to take it for you. And I'm going to go through that storm without any navigation. The Father is going to abandon me. I will be the only righteous person in history who committed absolutely everything, rolled everything over onto the Father, and I'm going to sink. He's going to abandon me.

But don't you see I Am going through the ultimate storm without navigation so you can be sure that in spite of the fact you don't deserve it You will always have me at the helm I'm going through the ultimate storm without navigation I didn't abandon you to that storm and therefore I will not abandon you in this storm and you know it now Because I'm telling you look at Jesus look what he's done this storm, and you know it now because I'm telling you. Look at Jesus, look what he's done. And to the degree you know that, to that degree you will be able to commit everything to him and become the kind of person who makes wise decisions.

You know, there's a man who is very prone to clinical depression, who wrote a wonderful hymn. This is how he got through it. His purposes will ripen fast, unfolding every hour. The bud may have a bitter taste, but sweet will be the flower. E'er fearful saints, fresh courage take. The clouds ye so much dread, are big with mercy, and shall break with blessings on your head.

Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you that you have shown us that you guide us. We're in the middle of it. We don't deserve it. We can to some degree resist it and we need access to it for our decisions and that will come by unconditionally trusting you, committing all of our life to you so that you can shape us more and more into the image of your son in whom all the treasures of knowledge and wisdom are hid. We ask that you would so melt us and shape us by the knowledge of the storm he went through without navigation so that we can always know that you are

with us in all of our storms, guiding us and showing us the right course to take, that we will trust you. Now we ask that you would do all this in our lives and help us to apply this to our lives by your Holy Spirit. We ask it in Jesus' name. 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 life-changing wisdom of God's Word through this ministry. Just visit gospelandlife.com slash partner to learn more. This month's sermons were recorded in 2004. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Life Podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017, while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.