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- [00:04]
Host
Welcome to Gospel and Life. How do we share what it means to truly know Jesus, not just as a historical figure or moral teacher, but as savior and king? This month, Tim Keller explores what the Bible shows us about being public with our faith and sharing the hope we have in Christ.
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Reader
The reading this morning is taken from the book of 1 Corinthians, chapter 15, verses 1 through 11. Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved if you hold firmly to the word I preach to you. Otherwise you have believed in vain. For what I received, I passed on to you as of first importance that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas and then to the 12. After that he appeared to more than 500 of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles and and last of all, he appeared to me also as to one abnormally born. For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me, whether then it is I or they. This is what we preach, and this is what you believed. Here ends the reading.
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Tim Keller
So we're looking at, for a number of weeks, we're looking at the subject of public faith. What does it mean to talk about your deepest beliefs, who you are with others in public who may not share your beliefs? And how do you do that in a way that's transparent, that's honest, at the same time is respectful, it promotes peace. This is something that everyone in a pluralistic society needs to learn how to do. And we've been looking at this each week. And today you come to maybe perhaps one of the more obvious things that you have to talk about, we need to talk about if we're going to discuss this subject. And that is what actually are the core beliefs of Christianity? You can't talk in public about Christianity unless at some point you get down to say, well, what is it? What are the core things that Christians believe? What do you believe in order to be a Christian? And if you're going to do that, there's no better spot in the whole Bible than here. Sure, there's other places in the Bible, but this has a special place because look at the passage that was just read to you. Paul says, now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you that you received. By this you were saved. And I had received it and I passed it on to you. And it's of first importance. And at the very end, he says, so whether it's I or they, meaning the others, that the other apostles, this is what we preached and this is what you believed. What he is giving you is not only a Gospel presentation. He says, here's the gospel I preached to you. I received it, you believed it, it saved you. But he's also speaking in the book of 1 Corinthians, and there's an amazing amount of consensus that 1 Corinthians was written just 20 years after the death of Jesus Christ, that it was perhaps the oldest of all the pieces of literature we have in the New Testament. And if that's the case, then when Paul talks about this is what I did before, he says, remember when I came before, I'm giving you a summary of the gospel that I received, that I gave you, that you believe that saved you. He's talking about something that happened just a handful of years after Jesus death. So if you want to get down to the foundations, what is Christianity all about? What does Christianity believe? What is the irreducible core that you must believe to be a Christian and to have spiritual life? Here it is, right here. And the reason why it's so important to keep in mind, if you're doing public talking about this in public is if you're a Christian, it is so important to major in the majors. There's lots and lots of things that Christians believe, and there's lots of things that different branches of Christianity believe. And some of them may be very true, very dear to your heart, but you really should not press and push and talk about beliefs that a lot of other Christians don't even share. You ought to major in the majors and hear the majors. And if you're skeptical of Christianity, it's also crucial to get straight what, what Christianity really is. Over the years, when people talk to me about how they're skeptical, they really don't believe. And I ask them, well, what do you think Christianity teaches? They tell me, and as gently as possible, I have to point out that that's not what Christianity teaches. You know, I usually say something like, you know, there's. I don't know a single church in the whole world that believes that. And of course I try to say it a nice tone. But since the more since I used this illustration in the beginning and I realized that's not very gentle, is it? No, I bet maybe I shouldn't put it that way. But the deal is, do you really understand the Christianity you think you're rejecting? David Martyn Lloyd Jones, great British preacher, had a question that he used to ask people that he considered a diagnostic question. It's a simple question. And he would say, do you consider yourself a Christian? And the person would say yes or no. He'd say, well, why? And if the person says, well, I do think I'm a Christian, I think I'm trying hard to live according to the teachings of the Bible. I'm trying very hard to live like Christ. I'm trying very hard to surrender and be like him. And Dr. Lloyd Jones says if somebody gives an answer like that, he knows that even though that's very, very typical, very typical, that that person doesn't really understand the gospel, doesn't understand the core teachings. This is the gospel. What is it? Well, let's just move right through it. There's actually four parts to this. The gospel is about Jesus. It's about sin and substitution. It's about history and resurrection, and it's about astonishing transforming grace just right through it. Okay, so first of all it's about Jesus because see for what I received, I passed on to you as a first importance. And as soon as he begins his summary of the gospel, he says that Christ and actually everything else in the whole paragraph is just a set of clauses or phrases that explain Christ. They all point back to Christ. The gospel is Christ. Actually, the gospel is Jesus Christ. Now how would that be? Well, the word gospel, though many people understand the word gospel means joyful news. That's what the Greek word technically means. It was actually used to announce a history changing event. It was a word that meant it was usually used to announce something like the coronation of a new king, the defeat of an invading army, something like that, some major news event. And if that's the core, if the core of Christian teaching is a gospel, then right away we're confronted with what makes Christianity different from all other religions. See, all other religions contain narratives about their founders. Of course, all other religions tell stories and have narratives about the lives of their founders. But their founders, all the other religions, their founders are teachers, not saviors. And because they're teachers, not saviors, their life story is not the Core of the core of those religions. The core of the core of those religions. Like the five Pillars of Islam or the Eightfold Path to Enlightenment of Buddhism, the core of the core of those religions is always a set of directions about what you must do. Always a set of. Since the founders are teachers, the core of the core of those religions is a set of directions about what you must do. But the core of the core of Christianity is a gospel. That's not a set of directions about what you must do. It's an account of what has been done. It's not actually advice. Christianity is not advice about what you must do. It's news. It's news about what he has done. And in fact, one of the most striking things about this whole passage is from verse three all the way to the end, this description of the gospel. There's nothing in here about what you must do. In fact, the gospel in here doesn't even contain that. You must repent and believe. Now, of course, you must repent and believe the gospel if it's to be operative in your life. And he says so up in verse two, he says, which you received and you took your stand on it. But see, technically, that's a response to the gospel. It's not actually part of the gospel. Why? Because the gospel is that nothing you can do, nothing you will do, nothing you have ever done can be the basis for your acceptance with God. It all happens through what Jesus Christ has done. There's nothing you have done, nothing you can do, nothing you will do, nothing you do can be the basis for your acceptance with God. It all comes through what Jesus Christ has done. So even repenting and believing isn't actually part of the gospel. Technically, it's a response to the gospel. And of course, the gospel brings massive changes to your life. It makes you an agent of reconciliation and justice and love in the world. It profoundly changes your character. It changes the very structure of your identity. It changes the very pathways of your heart. It changes the way your heart works. And yet those are results of the gospel. You never find the authors of the scripture. You never find the apostles or Paul ever loading that into the gospel as if that's part of it. No, in a sense, the gospel is Jesus Christ. It is Jesus. So first of all, it's about Christ. Secondly, though, it's about sin and substitution. Okay, so what's the first thing we're told about Jesus? It says that Christ died for our sins. Died for our sins. The very first thing. Sin and substitution. First of all, sin. The first thing that we're told about what Jesus came to do is. Is deal with sin. We are uninformed and we need wisdom. Yes. We are sufferers and we need help. We need support, we need relief. Yes. But what we're learning here is, first of all, we're sinners needing salvation. That is to say, sin is our most fundamental human problem. And I get that. Takes a little bit of explanation. You say, why is that? Well, first of all, sin means that if God created you and if there is a God who created you and who sustained you every single second and keeps you actually together from not. It's. You know, you may say it's gravity. Well, okay, where's that from? Or it's the way. It's the way, you know, the electrons stay in orbit around the nucleus. What's keeping that together? You are being held together every second by God. If there is a God who created you and sustains you and who does all that, then you owe him everything. Or you owe it not to him just to pray when you're in trouble or something like that. You owe it to live for Him. To live for him, totally. But sin is the teaching of the Bible that, of course, you know this. We don't live for him. We don't live for God. We don't live for our neighbor. We live for ourselves. We tend to live selfishly. We've ruined the world. That's sin. But see, to say he died for sin means that that's our fundamental problem. Everything else comes from that because we're alienated from our maker. And we need. The word alienation doesn't, you know, is not used very much. But I want you to see how important it is. And I think I can do that by just giving you a simple illustration. Sin means we're personally and legally alienated from our maker. There's a barrier there, and Jesus came to do something about it. And before he can do anything else, he has to do that. So imagine you have a friend. You've been friends for a good long time. Something changes. First, you notice your friend uses things that you give your friend without acknowledgment, without gratitude. Then it gets worse. You find your friend lying to you, breaking promises and then lying to you. And finally gets terrible. Your friend embezzles money from you because you're maybe in business together, or just steals from you and robs from you. And after all this comes out, your friend sits down and says, oh, can we stay friends? Because I really. I'll try to do Better. I'll try to live better. And I'm very sorry. And what are you going to say now? You'll use your own words, and you'll use your own words, but essentially you're going to say, hmm, we are in a state of alienation. It's both legal and personal. Because what you're gonna say is, look, I know you're sorry. I guess you're sorry. And of course, if we're ever gonna be friends again, if this state of alienation is gonna go away, you will have to be sorry. But it won't be enough just to do better. What are we gonna do about what you did to me you've robbed? There's a debt, there's a crime, Bad things have happened. There's an injustice that has to be dealt with if we are ever going to be friends again. See, personal and legal. And of course, with God, it would be writ infinitely larger because you have an infinite God, then you have an infinite debt, you have an infinite crime. And there's a barrier. And that's the reason why Jesus could not come as a teacher. Because teachers come and say, here's how you can be sorry and do a little better. That doesn't deal with the problem. It doesn't deal with the alienation, does it? Doesn't deal with the barrier. And Jesus came to deal with the barrier how? Substitution. This little word for is not very revealing to us because our English word for f O R covers such an enormous range of meanings. We. Very often you actually have to sit and think and reflect before you know in what way something is for something else. There's all sorts of categories. Fortunately, Greek had more prepositions that serve this. And the preposition used here is huper, which means on behalf of in the place of, as a substitute. This is saying that Jesus Christ died on behalf of us. He was a substitute. He died instead of us. He took what we deserve. In other words, Jesus Christ took our place, the place we deserve to be cast out on the cross. And if we believe in him, then we get the place that he deserved at the table, in the family love child of God. 2nd Corinthians 5:21. God made him sin. Who knew no sin, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Now, there's a lot of different metaphors that the Bible uses to try to describe what happened on the cross. There's the language of the marketplace. Sometimes it talks about that Jesus Christ on the cross paid a price. Why? Because sin is a debt. We just talked about that. And in the olden days, if you had a debt you couldn't pay, you went into slavery until you could pay it. And Jesus Christ, we're told in the Bible, is our ransom. He redeems us out of slavery, he pays the price, and so we're liberated. So you have the language of the marketplace, and sin is a debt. Another kind of language that's used to deal with the cross is the language of the battlefield. You know why? Because sin is not just a debt, it's not just a legal debt. It's a powerful evil force. It's in you and me. It makes us do things we hate. That's the reason why Paul, you know, in Romans 7, says, Very often I find I'm doing the very thing I hate. It absorbs us with ourselves and fills us with fears and fills us with all sorts of things. And we do things we don't like to do. So there's a force inside, of course, it's a force outside. People can wrong us. And Jesus Christ comes. And the Bible some places talks about Jesus going to the cross to defeat the powers of evil and sin and death. And it's a terrible struggle and he suffers horribly, but in the end, he fights and he wins for us. So there's the language of the marketplace, there's the language of the battlefield. There's also the language of the law court. The language of the law court says that sin is also a violation of a standard. And if there's a God, he, you want him to be against evil and injustice, don't you? You don't want God to be passive. You don't want God just to look on. You want him to do something about it. You want him to be judicially wrathful against evil and injustice. But then to see if we have any evil and sin in us, then that wrath, that judicial wrath, that condemnation lies on us. But Jesus Christ comes and takes the punishment that we deserve. Now, as different as that is, and there's others, there's others. But all those metaphors are wonderful because they show different aspects of the human problem and they show different wonderful aspects of the rich salvation we have. But do you notice there's a thread running through all of them, every single one of them. Substitution. Jesus fights, Jesus pays. Jesus bears what we couldn't bear. And that's the reason why John Stott, in one of the books, best passages in all of his writings, he was an Anglican minister, British Anglican minister. He says that the concept of substitution is crucial to understand both sin and Salvation. If you want to understand the gospel, you got to understand substitution. Because on the one hand, what is sin? It's you substituting yourself for God, putting yourself where only God deserves to be in charge of your own life you didn't make yourself. But see, when you say, I'm going to call the shots of my own life, what are you saying? I'm my own maker. I'm my own creator. When you act as if you're your own maker and your creator, your own creator, and you're not, it's kind of cosmic plagiarism, you know? And you, when you put yourself in that place and you're woefully under, by the way, you're woefully under. Qualified for the job of being Lord of your life. Woefully under. See, sin is. Is you substituting yourself for God. Well, salvation is God substituting himself for you, putting himself where you deserve to be. God going to the cross and taking his own punishment. Now, sin and substitution. Very first thing out of Paul's mouth when he's summarizing the thing that changed people's lives at the beginning of the beginning of the beginning of the Christian movement, at the core of the core of the core of all Christian beliefs. And yet, even though I love to run on and I want to go on, I need to stop for a little bit because this, as important as this is, as core as this is to Christianity, it flies right in the face of our culture. The idea that all people are sinners, that Jesus Christ had to go to the cross, take our punishment, assuage. Propitiate is the old word, the wrath of God. Satisfy the wrath of God. That just rankles and a hundred levels in our culture. But I would like to just briefly, therefore, deal with a couple of issues, kind of loose ends. One is, I would like to respond to the objection that this is a primitive, bloodthirsty idea, this idea of Jesus Christ going to the cross, substituting himself. And I'd also like to show you that this is the most democratic, egalitarian possible doctrine.
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Host
We always say the gospel changes everything, and we believe it really does. That's why here at Gospel and Life, August is Go and Share Month. Throughout August, we're inviting thousands of our listeners to take a small step in sharing the gospel with someone God has placed in your life. For those of you who make a gift to gospel and life, this month we'll send you two copies of Making Sense of God by Tim Keller. It's a powerful resource that explores how Christianity makes inclusion emotional, cultural and rational sense in today's world. It's our thanks for your gift and provides a way you can do a small act to share the gospel by reading the book with a friend, giving one to a co worker, or passing on both copies to people who are exploring the Christian faith. It's a simple way to start a gospel conversation or continue it. To request your two copies of Making Sense of God, simply go to gospelandlife.com give again. That's gospelandlife.com give us. Now here's Dr. Keller with the remainder of today's teaching.
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Tim Keller
So, first of all, one of the charges is this whole idea that Jesus Christ goes and he has to shed his blood in order to satisfy the punishment and wrath of God. Many people say that's just incredible. That's just like the ancient primitive, pagan, terrible religions. They were all bloody with all that sacrifice stuff. JI Packer, in his great book Knowing God, has a chapter in which he deals with this subject and he brings out a perfect example of what people mean when they think about primitive, pagan, bloodthirsty religion. He talks about the Iliad, Homer's Iliad. And in the Iliad, some of, you know, probably from sixth grade, you know, the Greek army has taken ship to go to Troy, remember, because Prince Paris has taken Helen away. And the general of the Greek army, which was Agamemnon, finds that they can't sail. Why? Because of contrary winds. Because the gods for some reason are angry at them. So Agamemnon sends for his daughter and ceremonially slaughters her as a sacrifice, mollifies the hostile gods. The old word was propitiation. He propitiates the wrath of the gods and then they can sail to Troy. That was the part, by the way, if you Learned this in 6th grade, they probably left that part out. They left it out for me. When I actually started reading, I said, why didn't they tell me the best stuff? You know? Well, people say, there we go. Oh my word. Here's a father who sacrifices his daughter, his child to mollify the gods, to propitiate their wrath. This is terrible. And Christianity is just like that. It's primitive and bloodthirst, just like that. And J.I. packer says, no, no, not only is it not like that, it's utterly different. Why? And here's what he says. He says, in paganism, man propitiates his gods and religion becomes a form of commercialism and indeed of bribery. In Christianity, however, God propitiates his own wrath through his own sacrificial action of love. See as God comes in Jesus Christ and goes, and he takes his own punishment. It's utterly different. It's the reverse of ancient primitive, bloodthirsty religion. Don't say that. Now secondly, I'd like to say something on the contrary about this doctrine of substitution and sin is. It's radically egalitarian and democratic. And if you think, you say, boy, that's kind of weird. I want you to look at the little word in here, right in the beginning of the Gospel presentation where Paul says Christ died for our sins. You know what's so interesting about that? There's a world of meaning in that. Paul did not say for your sins. Paul was a Hebrew of the Hebrews. Paul tells us about what an incredibly fastidious godly religious person he was. He just, he pored over the Bible and he tried to find anything the Bible says that we should do. And he did everything he possibly could in order to comply with every single aspect of God's law and did everything he could. And yet here he is saying what? That Jesus Christ substituted himself and died for our sins. Meaning I deserve to die too. My record deserves death. Now if that seems absolutely inexplicable to you, you need to read the book of Romans, chapters 1, 2 and 3, where he. And in a very top level summary of that, he spends one chapter talking about the pagans, yes, the Gentiles, the people who didn't believe the Bible and they don't follow the biblical rules of chastity and purity and integrity and so on. But then he turns to people who believe the Bible and, and he shows that though externally they're obeying the Bible, inside, their motivation is not for love of God, but for love of self. Inside there's self righteousness, there's pride. And he gets to chapter three and he says, therefore all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And he says no one is righteous. No, not one. No one is really even seeking for God. It's an amazing statement because here's what Paul is saying. Paul is saying, the people that all of my life I was taught to despise, the Gentiles, the people that I wouldn't even want to eat with because they're unclean. See, they don't follow the Bible. They don't follow the people that I've always despised. Now I'm spending my whole life with. I'm spending my whole life with them. Why? Because we're not really any different. He says, I'm really no better than a criminal that slits people's throats and takes their money. In the end, though, of course we're lost in different ways. In the end, though we violate the law of God in different ways, in the end we all fail to love God with all our heart, soul, strength and mind, our neighbor as ourselves in different ways. And therefore we're all equally sinners, we're all equally lost, and we're all equally in need of God's grace. That is the most radically egalitarian, humanizing doctrine there is. Look at Paul. What turned him from a self righteous racist into a person who embraces all people as his equal? I'll tell you what, it was the gospel. It humanized him. Because, see, every other religion and philosophy says, this is what you must do to get saved. This is what you must do to find God. This is what you must do to save the world. This is what you must do in order to be a good person or a moral person, in which case there's always a bunch of people over here not doing what you think should be done. And therefore you have to say, oh, look, they're not doing this. But see, Paul says it doesn't matter. Liberal, conservative, moral, immoral, you know, avant garde, respectable, this race, that race, it doesn't matter. We're all sinners. We're all in need of grace. How radically humanizing that is, how radically egalitarian that is. You know why? Because we're all the problem with this world. You can't. Look, I think every other philosophy I know, every other political platform I know, every other religion I know, basically says, we know what we should be doing. And these people over here are the problem with the world. And of course Paul says, no, no, no, no, we're all the problem. You know Agatha Christie's novel Murder on the Orient Express? It's, you know, her, her, Detective Poirot, is stuck on a train, stuck in a snow drift, and a man is murdered. And he's trying to figure out who was the murderer. And he's on the train with 12 other passengers. So which of the 12 has done the murder? So he's trying to figure it out, and this is the hardest one he's ever seen because all the clues are pointing in different ways. And he realizes he's missing something. He's missing something. What is the key insight that will make sense of everything? What is the key insight will make sense of everything? Well, the surprise answer. And I'm going to tell you. And if anybody complains about spoilers, I want you to know that this book has been out for 80 years, and if you haven't read it or seen it, I don't want to hear it. You know what the key insight is? Everybody done it. All 12 people murdered the man together. And suddenly everything makes sense. The they're all the villains, they're all the murderers. They're all in it, okay? This is the clue the Gospel gives you, without which your life won't make sense, society won't make sense, and history won't make sense. We're all in it. We're all in it. No one is righteous. No, not one. Most democratic egalitarian doctrine. Okay? Now, thirdly, the third part of this gospel presentation is the longest, but it doesn't mean it necessarily is more important than the others. In some ways, it's probably long. It's about the resurrection of Jesus. It's probably longer because it's setting up the fact that the rest of the chapter is going to be a lengthy, wonderful, remarkable treatment of the doctrine of the resurrection because it was an issue in the Corinthian Church. But the point is, he is now saying the third part is of the Gospel is history and the resurrection. He says that Christ died for sins according to the Scriptures. He was buried. He was raised on the third day. According to the Scriptures, he appeared to Cephas, that's Peter, then the 12 apostles. After that, he appeared to more than 500 of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. And last of all, he appeared to me and saying, almost as if he had to come back and make a special trip, like I was born at the wrong time, but he even appeared to me. Now, what's he talking about, the resurrection. Why does the resurrection of Jesus Christ play an important role in the Gospel? It plays an important role because it's crucial to both. It's crucial in that the resurrection of Jesus assures and secures our past and our future salvation. First of all, it usures and secures our past salvation. How do you know that Jesus death on the cross actually paid for sins? How do you know it actually defeated sin? How do you know that the punishment was taken? How do you know it's all paid so that if you believe in him, your sins, nothing, there is no more condemnation for thee? How do you know? Well, see, if somebody was in debt in those days, they were either in slavery or maybe they'd be in prison. And the only way you knew that the debt had been paid. And the way you could be sure you knew the debt had been paid was when they were released, when they were sprung, see, then you knew that the debt had been paid. And of course, the wages of sin is death. And when Jesus Christ was sprung from death and he burst the bands of death, that's proof that it was paid. That's proof that it was paid. If you're shopping in a store and you have a bag with some things you've already purchased, there's nothing more, you know, unfortunate and kind of unpleasant than to have some plain clothesman come up and say, have you really bought those things? Let me look inside your. And, you know, you're irritated and you're feeling very bad, but what do you do? What you do is you reach in and you pull out what the receipt, and you say, trouble me not. You say, begone. Why? This is proof that your accusation has no merit. Do you know how to do that with the resurrection? If you're a Christian, have you learned to do that yet? Have you? When your conscience goes after you, you failed. You've done something really, really bad, and it's killing you. And you say, are you a Christian? Have you believed in Jesus Christ? Your conscience is killing. Do you know how to get out the resurrection and say to your conscience, trouble me not. Be gone. This is my receipt. This proves that it was paid in full. This proves, you know, this stamps paid in full across history in such a way that nobody is ever going to miss it. Do you know how to do that? So, on the one hand, the Resurrection assures and secures you your past salvation, but then, secondly, it assures and secures the future salvation. Because our future salvation is not just being forgiven and going and living in heaven as a soul. Our future is a resurrected body and a new heavens and a new earth and a place without suffering and death. Do you know what that's going to be like? J.R.R. tolkien, in an essay called On Fairy Stories, tries to help us understand why we so love fairy tales or science fiction or what we call fantasy tales. We read them all the time. We watch them. We turn them into Blockbuster Pictures year after year after year. And in there you have magic and you have, you know, fantasy. And he's trying to understand why in the world, especially in our modern age, when we're very secular, we're very scientific, and we know these stories are fiction, why we still pour into the. The movie theater, we read the books, and we find ourselves moved. And he says, here's why. Because these stories show us some things. They depict things that we long for that we can't stop longing for. And here's what some of them are. He says. He says, we long for the ability to step outside of time. The idea of being able to step outside of time fascinates us. Secondly, we long for escape from death. Thirdly, we long for love without parting. Love that doesn't end, doesn't stop, it doesn't end with death, love without parting. Fourthly, we long. We're fascinated by the idea of having communication with non human beings. And then lastly, he says, we actually, of course, long for a final defeat of evil. And so whenever we see these kinds of stories, they just fascinate us. We can never get enough of them because it scratches where we itch. We have this incredible longing for these things. But do you know that if the resurrection of Jesus Christ really happened, and if you believe in him, all those things are actually literally gonna come true? They're literally gonna come true. And look, if you are skeptical of Christianity, okay, you're skeptical of Christianity, but why wouldn't you want that to be true? If you don't want that to be true, you're not being honest with yourself. And Christianity promises it more than promises. It essentially it demonstrates it. It essentially proves it with the resurrection. And that's the reason why he does all this. Why is he going on? He was seen by Cephas. He was seen by the 12. He was seen by 500 people who are still, most of whom are still alive. Richard Bauckham, in his great book Jesus and the Eyewitnesses, points out that these are footnotes. See, if you're writing a serious academic work today, especially historical work, you have to have footnotes. Why? Because your footnote basically says, here's how you can find out that what I'm saying is right. So, for example, if you say in such and such and such and such, this happened, well, what you do is you footnote the historical register in this particular library where the original letter is, or something like that. He says footnotes are ways for you to say to the reader, what I'm saying is true, and the footnote is a source from which you can find out that what I'm telling you is true. But see, in those days, if you're writing not legend, but history, how did you do a footnote? You said, here are the witnesses who are alive who saw it. You can go check. These are footnotes. These are sources. And Paul was saying, there's hundreds of people who saw Jesus with Their own eyes. Go talk to them. Most of them are still alive. It was only 20 years later. @ this point. Do you see what that means? Paul is saying the resurrection was not a symbol. It's not a nice story. It's not a legend that's come down to us through the ages. People saw him, there's evidence. And if that's the case, then the stuff that you most long for in life, the kind of world you most long for, is available. It's there. Believe the gospel. Look at the very, very end. This ending is technically a testimony and is wonderful because, see, the gospel ultimately is personal. It's not just a set of bullet points. And he says, for I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than them all, yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Look at three things as we just said. First of all, this is the gospel is about grace. Notice three times he uses the word. The gospel is about grace, grace, grace. The reason why Lloyd Jones could use that diagnostic question and say to people, are you a Christian? And if they said, well, I'm trying, trying very hard. The reason he knew that they didn't understand the core of Christianity was because they didn't understand grace. They're basically saying, well, if I work hard enough, then maybe God will bless me. Oh, my word. Do you? John Bunyan, who wrote Pilgrim's Progress in his autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, tells a story of how he probably got converted. He'd been reading the Bible, and it just made him feel more and more guilty. But he said one day he just thought of something. And he says in here, he says, one day, as I was passing through a field, suddenly I thought of a sentence. A sentence, your righteousness is in heaven. And he explains how then, with the eyes of faith, putting together things he'd read in the Bible, he says, with the eyes of faith, I saw Christ sitting at God's right hand. And suddenly I realized, there's my righteousness. God could not say, where is your righteousness today? For it was always right in front of him. My good frame of heart could not make my righteousness better, nor a bad frame of heart make my righteousness worse. For my righteousness was Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever. And now my chains fell off. Indeed, I felt delivered from slavery to guilt and fears. And I saw that all those weaknesses, character qualities in my heart were like the pennies that a rich man carries in his pocket when his gold is safe in a trunk at home. Grace. Get grace. Till the grace penny drops, you haven't got the gospel. Secondly, however, grace does not mean. Okay, well, you just accepted. That's all there is to it. Doesn't change you. Of course it changes you. Because he says what? His grace to me was not without effect. Boy. And that is the understatement of the year. Because what he says is, I hated Christianity. And what he doesn't say is, I was a brilliant man. See, Paul is one of the most influential people in the history of the world. He was brilliant and he hated Christianity, and yet grace changed him. Well, how can grace change you? Well, because grace is undeserved. Once you realize that God's grace is undeserved, it humbles you. But then when you also realize that his grace is unconditional because it's undeserved, it takes you down. I'm no different than anybody else. But because it's unconditional, it brings you back up. I'm always accepted. I'm always loved. Peace, boldness. But because it was costly, it's absolutely free to you. God's grace, but it's infinitely costly to him because of what he had to go through on the cross, turns you into a sacrificial lover of other people. It was not without effect. It was not without effect. And lastly, it just fills you with wonder. Do you see? He's almost just kind of amazed at himself. He's just looking and he's saying, but by the grace of God, I am what I am. When you say something, when Kathy pointed out to me that this week in the Tuesday Science Times of the New York of the New York Times, it talks about the fact that we're probably on the verge of finding a cure for Hep C, which is a disease, by the way, that kills more people than aids. It just gives you a miserable life while it's killing you. And it looks like possibly the. They went to pains to say it's not for certain, but it looks like there's not just a vaccine, but a pill. Just a pill, not even a vaccine that you take. And it can take it out of your body in a couple months. And of course, everybody who's hearing about it, they're just excited. They're astounded, they're amazed. They're telling each other they're rushing. Of course you're going to be like that. Of course you're going to be like. Think of the joy of knowing that the death sentence that was over you is taken away. Aren't you going to tell everybody about it? Aren't you going to be amazed? Well, listen, the gospel would be way more than that. We're talking about not just extending your life a few years. We're talking about love without parting, escape from death, communication with non human beings. We're talking about everything you've ever wanted. How could you not be filled with joy? How could you not want to tell people? Let us pray. Our Father, we thank you that for the Gospel. We thank you for the glad, joyful tidings of the Gospel. And we ask that the undeservedness, the unconditional nature of it, the costliness of it, would change us the way it changed Paul. Humbling us, empowering us, melting us, tenderizing us, humanizing us. Oh Father, forgive us for not walking in a manner worthy of the Gospel, which means we're just not thinking, just not thinking until the power of it just begins to change us. And we ask that you would also teach us how to winsomely tell people that we found the cure. We pray this in Jesus name, Amen.
- [44:24]
Host
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 and share it with others. As you may know, August is Go and Share Month. At Gospel and Life, we believe God uses small acts to do great things. If you've already taken a step, maybe you've shared a resource or started praying for someone, we'd love to know. You can encourage others by marking your location on our Go and Share map. Just go to gospelandlife.com share and let us know you've participated. 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.
- [45:14]
Tim Keller
SA.