A (4:33)

And.

B (4:34)

And besides that, the important thing is crystal clear. The important point of the passage is absolutely clear. Every individual human life is sacred. Every individual person is of infinite value. The purpose of this passage is to get everybody in this room to feel the weight of your neighbor's glory, to feel the weight of the value that God has invested in every human being. That's very, very clear. And there's absolutely no way that you can miss that. And so God is saying that here. And if we get a sense of that as we go along, as we study the passage, real surgery can get done by this passage on our hearts. If you really let this passage have its effect and all the things that it says, you will come out saying to yourself, I cannot ignore people the way I do. I have got to treat people seriously. I've got to honor them. I've got to be aggressively compassionate. This passage, if you let it do a work on us, can make us into a people, a compassionate people that the world would marvel at. Now, let's look at it. And the way to look at it is, first of all, let's see how this passage makes a case for aggressive compassion. It makes a case for it. First of all, it says the case is that every human being is made in the image of God. And secondly, every human being is held accountable for that image. That's the case. And then, besides just making a case, the passage then calls us to not just believe that, but to a lifestyle of aggressive compassion, because we're called twice here to be fruitful and multiply and to fill the earth. Now, let's take a look. Look at the case. First of all, it tells us here in this very interesting verse, whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed. For in the image of God has God made man. What's that mean? First of all, some people immediately question this. It does look like a case for capital punishment, doesn't it? And instead of worrying about the issue about whether or not it's. It can be, the capital punishment is a good idea today. Let's keep this in mind. God was saying something that turned Israel into a radically merciful, just state. Because in those days, it was very, very, very normal in a society that if a wealthy or powerful man was killed, his murderer was put to death, and very often his whole family too. But on the other hand, if a peasant was killed by someone maybe of a higher class, it was normal for the. For the. The man of the higher class to pay a penalty to the family of the peasant. 10,000 shekels or something like that. Now, here's the problem. Here is the problem with that. The Bible says, if when you've murdered somebody, you pay $10,000 in penalty, what was the life of the dead man worth? And the answer is just 10,000 shekels. If you go to prison for 20 years, what was the life of the dead man worth? Just 20 years. And God says here and throughout the Bible, no, every human being is of infinite value. Nobody can pay, therefore, for human life. Life can only be paid for in its own currency, in a sense. And therefore in Israel we had this remarkable law that said if you murder somebody, you're put to death. And it was a way of safeguarding the sanctity of life. Whereas in other societies there are people who were not considered as important, you see, were not looked at as infinitely valuable, and you could pay a finite sum as a penalty. No, the Bible says every human life is of infinite value. Everyone. Why? For look at the Last half of the verse. For in the image of God has God made man. What does that mean? Well, the image of God is that which makes us different than the plants and the animals. The image of God is that which makes us rational, that that which makes us personal, that which makes us capable of love and communication and of creativity, the ability to envision that which is not. But maybe the best way to ever explain what it means that we're in the image of God is to think of us as mirrors. 20 years ago I read this passage. It's not, I didn't print it in here, but it's a passage from C.S. lewis that is probably my favorite quote, probably something that's changed me forever thinking about human beings. And Lewis says at one point, he says, God can make the feeblest and filthiest of us into dazzling, radiant, immortal creatures, pulsating all through with such love and energy and joy and wisdom as we cannot now imagine. We will become bright stainless mirrors reflecting back to God his own boundless power and delight and goodness. That is what we are in for. He says. Nothing less. Now, did you hear that? You see, if you look into a stone, the stone is incapable of reflecting back to me the light that I'm giving it. But when you look into a mirror, a mirror is built. It has a nature. It's built in such a way that it can reflect back to me on a smaller scale, on a one dimensional or two dimensional scale, the light that has come in. And the Bible tells us that is what it means to say we're made in the image of God. We have the ability to resemble God, his holiness, his love, his joy. It's possible for us to resemble him, to know him, to enjoy him, to relate to Him. You see, and yet the Bible tells us we've turned away whenever we decided to be our own masters. That's like the mirror turning away from the sun and, and facing the darkness. And you know what, what is the difference between a mirror and a stone in the darkness? What's the difference? Nothing. Because even though it's capable, it's not facing anything that it can reflect. And because we've turned away from him, our mirrors, in a sense, the image of God in us has become cracked and distorted and dark. If you've ever looked into a beautiful old mirror, gorgeous, big thing, but it's all cracked and dark and you can just see a distortion of your own face. That's how God looks at us. In fact, that's how we should look at ourselves and how we should look at other human beings. It's. When you look at a human being, it's like looking at one of these old castles in Europe. It doesn't even have a roof anymore. It was built a thousand years ago and it's, it's. Even though it's a ruin, even though it can't function anymore as what it was built to be, there's still a grandeur about it. There's still a nobility about it. And you want to treat it in a sacred way. Usually it is treated sacredly. It's landmarked, usually. You see? And that's how God looks at us, and that's how we look at one another. If you're a Christian, you realize even when you see a wicked person, even when you see a messed up person, it's like the ruin of a castle. And you say, oh, how I would love to see this thing restored. Imagine what it could be like now. Are you beginning to feel the weight of your neighbor's glory? The Bible says that every human being is that in the image of God, an immortal being. And when we say, when we say, do you feel the weight of the neighbor's. Your neighbor's glory? That means think about who every other person in the pew you may be sitting alongside or near people you don't even know. Now listen, the reason that gold was always made so valuable, why did the ancients value gold? Not because it was so scarce, but because it was timeless. Because it didn't go away, it didn't fall apart, it didn't rust, it didn't go to pieces. It was timeless. And listen, friends, billions of years from now, when the mountains out there that look so big are worn down to pebbles, when the sun, which looks so bright and strong now has just burned itself out, it's just a little, you know, three and a half by five inch red dwarf billions of years from now, when, when the mountains are pebbles and the sun is just about spent, the persons that are sitting around you in this pew will still be around. That's the Christian message. The Christian message is that human beings are immortal, nature is mortal. We will outlive her. We. Let me give you another CS Lewis quote to show you how radical a view of human beings this is. CS Lewis says it is maybe possible to think too much of your own potential glory hereafter, but it's impossible to think too often or too deeply about that of your neighbors. The weight of my neighbor's glory should be laid daily on my back. So heavy a weight it is that Only humility can carry it. It's a serious thing to live in a society of immortals. To remember that millions of years from now. The dullest and most uninteresting person you meet. May one day be an incredible creature who, if you saw him now, you would be strongly tempted to worship. Or a horror as you only now meet in a nightmare. All day long. We are, in some degrees helping each other. To one or the other of these destinations. It is therefore, in light of these overwhelming possibilities. It is with the proper amount of awe and circumspection. That we should conduct all of our dealings with one another. All friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people you have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization. These are mortal. And their life is to our life as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals with whom we joke, work, marry, snub and exploit immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. Your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. Now, maybe that's mind numbing and a little bit hard to take in. But it has the most absolutely practical ramifications. Both in terms of politics and lofty international policy. And down to the way in which you treat the people you meet today. Listen, if a government understands the Christian understanding. Has the Christian understanding of human beings that they're immortal, they last forever, that they're in the image of God. It's going to make a great deal of difference as to how they do public policy. If a government does not have the Christian view, it can reason like this. Well, we're here to set up a tremendous civilization that will last a thousand years. And if in order to do that, we've got to wipe out a few troublemakers. We've got to snuff out a few little human lives that only last for 60 or 70 years. And we're setting up a civilization for millions of people that will last a thousand years. Of course, it's all right to snuff a few people out. But you see, the Christian view is that every human being is in the image of God. And every human person is going to outlive not just one civilization, but civilization itself. We're going to outlive a thousand civilizations. And therefore not one single person can ever be snuffed out. Because there's nothing on earth that's worth that. There's nothing as valuable, you see, as a human being in the image of God. Don't you see? It changes everything. Do you understand that? But it also changes the way in which you deal with individuals. Do you feel the weight of your neighbor's glory? If I had just said, you know, remember when we passed the offering plate around? If I had said, oh, by the way, our offering plates this morning are on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They're made of solid gold. They're 2,000 years old. They're absolutely priceless. Would you have probably looked at those things a little differently than you did the ones that came by? Would you have treated them differently? Would you have just sort of instead of going, oh, here you go, would you have maybe treated them with the utmost care? You know, there would been a kind of reverence about it. You would have said, think, you know, think of the pharaohs that ate out of this. Think of. Think of how incredibly valuable it is. Look at the beauty of it. You would have treated it with fear and trembling. You see both a kind of a little bit of anxiety, a concern to really treat it properly, a sense of the sacredness of it, and at the same time, a joy of being able to even have the honor of touching something like that. My dear friends, those things are nothing compared to a human being if you understand the weight of your neighbor's glory.

A (17:42)

We all chase things like success, true love, or the perfect life. Good things that can easily become ultimate things. When we put our faith in them, deep down we know they can't satisfy our deepest longings. The truth is that we've made lesser gods of good things, things that can't give us what we really need. In his book, Counterfeit the Empty Promises of Money, Sex and Power and the Only Hope that Matters, Tim Keller shows us how a proper understanding of the Bible reveals the truth about societal ideals and our own hearts and shows us that there is only one God who can wholly satisfy our desires. This month, we'll send you counterfeit gods as our thank you for your gift to help gospel and life share the love of Christ with people all over the world. You can record request your copy@gospelandlife.com give. That's gospelandlife.com give. Now here's Dr. Keller with the rest of today's teaching.

B (18:38)

Now, let's be practical. Do people feel valued by you? Do people, having spent time with you, sense that you take them seriously, that you focus on them lovingly, that you're concerned no matter who they are? Do people go away feeling like making that you make them feel like a million dollars. Now, how do you know whether or not you are honoring people, whether you really treat people with that kind of infinite value. It's pretty simple. The people themselves come back, they feel affirmed, they feel honored. Generally, they'll want to talk to you about their problems. My question, friends, is do you make people feel like that, or are you cold? Do you look around and instead of saying, oh, look at all these valuable people, look at all these people. I wonder. I wonder how I can in some way show them the honor that they have due to them. How can I focus on them? How can I love them? How can I find out what their needs are? You see, do you treat them like that? Or else do you. Do you get up and you look around and say, do I want to be here? Are these the kind of people I want to mix with? Are we talking about the kinds of things here that I find interesting? Do you use people or do you love people? Those are two completely different philosophies of life, and they're built on two completely different understandings of what human beings are. Do you honor people? Do you have the guts to find out? Why don't you ask somebody, Ask people whether you're the kind of person that is approachable. Ask people whether you're the kind of person that folks want to seek out. Ask people whether you value people. Ask your spouse, ask your parents, ask your friends, if you dare. It's a scary thing. Of course it is. Are you feeling the case? Are you feeling the weight of the case for a life of compassion? Every human being is in the image of God. Then that leads to this remarkable statement that God moves logically from the idea that everybody is in the image of God to this and from each person, too, each man, to I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man. It's not enough just to believe in an abstract way that every human being is in the image of God. The Bible tells us that God lays that weight on us very specifically and holds us accountable for the life of other people. You know, the old it's not in the Bible, and I don't know where it originally came from. No man is an island. That that's the fact that that's true. That's a biblical truth. Even though it's not a biblical quote. You are connected, you are accountable, and you can't avoid it. Back in the 1600s, when the Protestant church was trying to get its bearings in. In England and was seeking to understand what the Bible taught was the duty of human beings to one another, it worked its way through the Ten Commandments. And there was a document written by a number of students of Scripture. And that document was called the Westminster Confession. It's fascinating to see as they studied the Bible and as they studied that commandment, thou shalt not kill, how they understood what the Bible was telling us we were responsible for. There was a man named Thomas Watson who wrote an interesting commentary on the. On the Ten Commandments. And he says there are five ways to break the sixth commandment. Do you want to hear them? Do you have any choice? Number one, you can break the commandment by killing somebody with your hand. Okay, we all knew that one. B, we can break the commandment by killing someone with the mind. Now, we're not going to talk that much about it this week. Next week we will. Jesus said that if you hate somebody, if you're bitter towards somebody, that's murder with the mind. And it breaks the commandment because ultimately the commandment is a commandment to love. See, A, B, C, you can kill with the hand, you can kill with the mind. C, you can kill with the tongue or the pen or the word processor. D. Now here, it's interesting. Thomas Watson says, you break this commandment if you withhold from someone who is perishing help that you had the power in your hand to give. And lastly, E, he says, and also the people who wrote the Westminster Confession some years ago, a couple centuries ago, said that you break this commandment when you withhold or withdraw or neglect to give to someone that which is necessary to preserve and strengthen their life. And they quote at this point, Matthew 25, where Jesus says, I was hungry and you didn't feed me. I was thirsty and you didn't give me drink. I was without shelter and you didn't take me, and I was sick and you didn't visit me. I was in prison and you didn't come to me. And you see here it says in Genesis 9, you must take care of people because they are in the image of God. God's mark of ownership is on them. In a sense. God is saying, if you don't treat them properly, I see that as an assault on me because my image is on them. In Matthew 25, Jesus Christ says, if you see somebody hungry and you don't feed them, you withhold from them that which is necessary to preserve and sustain their life. If you have the power to give them something, you don't do it. I take that as a personal offense. He says, if you haven't fed me them, you haven't fed me. If you haven't visited them, you haven't visited me. Don't you see, Matthew 25 and Genesis 9 are saying the same thing. When you look around the world, do you see people who are perishing, people who are being oppressed, people who are being denied their rights, people who are needy and need certain necessities to strengthen their life? And do you have any power in your hand to enable those folks to have their lives be strengthened? Do you have any power in your hand that you are not actually exerting? That's the way, Thomas Watson. That's the way the Bible students of the past understood the commandment. And that's true. To say that you're accountable for the life of your fellow men means look around yourself and say, are there people whose lives are perishing, whose lives are being weakened? And do I have a power to do something about that that I haven't exerted? For example, I don't know what the statistics are in New York yet, but when I was in Philadelphia, I read at one point in my studies that every year in Philadelphia, 30,000 homes full of people, 30,000 occupied homes go through the entire winter without any utilities. Now, I remember thinking when I was reading that and I was studying this passage, I says, do I have any power in my hand to do anything about that that I am not exerting? Could I find that there was one home like that that I would be able to make a contribution to, to at least keep the heat on? Have I even done the. Made the efforts to do that? I will hold you accountable for the life of your fellow man. Think about it. Now, don't you see? We come to this point. Aggressive compassion. The Bible says, oh, every human being is in the image of God. Do you feel the weight of your neighbor's glory if you do that? Don't you see what impact that will have on us as believers? Think of how socially active we will be. Think of how politically active we will be. Yeah, because if you have any power in your hand to help people who are perishing and you're not exerting it, you are not honoring this commandment. But not only that, it affects not just the lofty stuff, but the way in which you treat the people in the subway, the way in which you treat the people in lines, and in New York, you're always in lines. How do you treat the people around you? Do you treat them as infinitely valuable, or do you just treat them as furniture? And sometimes it's worse than that. How do you treat people? It affects everything. A lifestyle of aggressive compassion. Now, my question to you is, if you're Thinking, why aren't you depressed yet? Listen, you should feel terrible by now. We live in a brutal world, and even though there's a lot you could do to help people, it's going to be very difficult. And you're going to find yourself being beaten down again and again. And you're going to say, where do I get the strength for this? And that's the final point here. It's hinted at in this passage, but it's given more explicitly elsewhere. If you notice, at the beginning, at the end of the passage, we're told, be fruitful and multiply. Now, is this just a command to have babies? No, I don't think so. It's not just that. In the New Testament, we're also told this. We are supposed to go into the world and make disciples. And in the Book of Acts, we're told that as soon as the Gospel started running through the city of Jerusalem, the disciples multiplied everywhere. I believe when. When God says, be fruitful and multiplied, he's talking about the image of God. He is saying, I don't want you just to protect the image of God. I want you to restore and propagate the image and spread it everywhere. Well, somebody says, how do you do that? And the answer is, you have to go to Jesus, who is the image of God, meet him and have the image of God restored in you before you can restore and protect it in other people. Did you hear that? Listen. It says in Colossians 1:15, he is the image of the invisible God. And Ephesians 4:24 tells us that when we come to him, we become like him and our image is renewed. It's like our mirror turns back to him and the reflection begins to happen. The most important thing is when you look at Jesus Christ and you come to know him personally, the image of God in you begins to get restored, and it makes you capable of a lifestyle of aggressive compassion. When you look. When you take a look at what a human being ought to be, you see something pretty interesting. Recently I was reading about the medieval. The Middle Age heroic ideal of chivalry, and somebody I was reading said that it's fairly important to keep in mind that the medieval notion of knighthood was a particularly Christian ideal. The knight was a person. Now listen, a very interesting person. A knight was someone who on the battlefield was tremendously ferocious and was not afraid of blood and guts, but also was a learned person, a genteel person, a modest person, a loving person. You see a person who was at home as much at home on the battlefield as, as in the art gallery. You see, that was the. That was the noble ideal. And that's the reason why in more, you know, in the death of Arthur, when Lancelot dies, who is the ultimate knight? Sir Ector looks at his, his dead body and says, thou wert this. Thou wert the meekest knight who ever ate in the hall with ladies, and thou wert the sternest knight who ever pulled a spear out of a breast. And what he was getting across is medieval knighthood was not some kind of compromise between ferocity and meekness. No, a knight was supposed to be ferocious to the nth degree and meek to the nth degree at once. And everyone understood in the Middle Ages that was not possible apart from the spirit of Christ. Because without the spirit of Christ in your life, you will be either ferocious or you'll be meek. But never together. Never. And you can see history like that. The barbarians come on in and they set up the civilization. And three or 400 years later, all the barbarians have turned into civilized, wimpy, soft, self indulgent, debauched people and their civilization crumbles. And another bunch of barbarians come on in until they become meek and sweet. You can take a look at politics and you see on the one hand you have the kind but permissive types, and on the other hand you have the tough but the harsh types. The only hope of humankind is if we can produce Lancelots, if we can pull together both the kind of the two sides of human nature, if we can have people who are as at home on the battlefield, actually, if necessary, as in the art gallery. Where can we get that sort of power to be like that? We get it from Jesus. Because Jesus was the one with the children on the lap, that Jesus was the one who everybody wanted to come and talk to. And Jesus was the one that could clear out the temple with a look. Remember what he did to those money changers. He didn't hit him. It was just his. The power of his. His ferocity. Now listen, friends, the only way we can become a people like that, a people that combine the aggression and the compassion, a people that combine both the fierceness and the sweetness, is if we come to Jesus Christ and we come to him and become his children by receiving him as Savior, it says in, in John 1:12, as many as received him, they became, had power to become his sons, you see, in his image. And because the gospel does that to you, I'll say it, I said it before, I'll say it again. The gospel on the one hand humbles you because it tells you you're far worse than you ever dared believe. But on the other hand, it strengthens you because it tells you you're far more loved and valuable than you ever dared hope. Because Jesus died for you, you are freely forgiven and received by God. So you're humbled and you're bold at the same time. It's only the gospel that can create knights, you see? It's only the gospel that can create Lancelots. It's only the gospel that can create people, a people of aggressive compassion. Do you understand that, Christians, if you're in your right mind, you look out at the people around you today and you look around instead of saying, do I want to be here? Do I like these people? Instead you'll say, I am rich because of who I am in Jesus Christ. I'm rich beyond the dreams of the greatest earthly billionaire. So these people out here owe me nothing. I owe them everything because of what God's done for me. And you'll begin to treat people as valuable. It'll affect you personally. It'll affect the way you are in the subway. It'll affect your politics. It'll affect everything. The Lord. The Lord's law is exceedingly broad, and yet it's sweeter than honey to our mouth. Listen, friends, where are you this morning? Hopefully, I hope that many of you are people who have received Christ as savior and you. And you're having the image of God renewed in you, and yet you're not very compassionate people. I just think that you need to get a grip on who the people are around you and who you are. If you see the value of the people around you and you recognize what Jesus has done for you, you will be enabled to a lifestyle of aggressive compassion. But there's probably, I would hope, some people here who may begin to realize that Christianity is more than being a good person. Friends, the good works that this passage calls you to, the good works that the Bible calls you to, you are incapable of unless the image of God is restored in you because you've met Jesus Christ as your savior. Why are we messing around with sex and drugs and money when infinite joy is a available? Come to him, know the king, and then you'll be able to treat others as kings because his royal life will be in your own veins. Let's bow in prayer.

A (34:47)

Thanks for joining us here on the Gospel in Life podcast. We hope that today's teaching encouraged you to go deeper into God's word. You can help others discover this podcast by rating and reviewing it. And to find more gospel centered content by Tim Keller, visit gospelandlife.com Today's sermon was recorded in 1989. 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.

B (35:21)

Sam.