Category Archives: Jesus

The Affection of Christ Alone

08 Saturday Apr 2017

Posted by in Beauty, Christian Life, Grace, Jesus, Obedience, Sanctification, Sin, The Gospel

≈ Comments Off on The Affection of Christ Alone

Tags

Luther says that if we obey God’s law without a belief that we are already accepted and loved in Christ, then in all our good deeds we are really looking to something more than Jesus to be the real source of our meaning and happiness. We may be trusting in our good parenting or moral uprightness or spiritual performance or acts of service to be our real and functional “saviors.” If we aren’t already sure God loves us in Christ, we will be looking to something else for our foundational significance and self-worth. This is why Luther says we are committing idolatry if we don’t trust in Christ alone for our approval.

The first commandment is foundational to all the other commandments. We will not break commandments two through ten unless we are in some way breaking the first one by serving something or someone other than God. Every sin is rooted in the inordinate lust for something which comes because we are trusting in that thing rather than in Christ for our righteousness or salvation. We sin because we are looking to something else to give us what only Jesus can give us. Beneath any particular sin is the general sin of rejecting Christ’s salvation and attempting our own self-salvation.

Thomas Chalmers wrote this:

The best way of casting out an impure affection is to admit a pure one . . . It is only when, as in the gospel, acceptance is bestowed as a present, without money and without price, that the security which man feels in God is placed beyond the reach of disturbance. Only then can he repose in him as one friend reposes in another . . . The only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one.

– Tim Keller

Preach Christ, Not Moralism

04 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Jesus

≈ Comments Off on Preach Christ, Not Moralism

Tags

In nearly every text of Scripture a moral principle can be found, shown through the character of God or Christ, displayed in the good or bad examples of characters in the text, or provided as explicit commands, promises, and warnings. This moral principle is important and must be distilled clearly. But then a crisis is created in the hearers as they understand that this moral principle creates insurmountable problems. I describe in my sermons how this practical and moral obligation is impossible to meet. The hearers are led to a seemingly dead end, but then a hidden door opens and light comes in. Our sermons must show how the person and work of Jesus Christ bears on the subject. First we show how our inability to live as we ought stems from our forgetting or rejecting the work of Christ. Then we show that only by repenting and rejoicing in Christ can we then live, as we know we ought.

– Tim Keller

The Greatest Gift

20 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in Generosity, Incarnation, Jesus

≈ Comments Off on The Greatest Gift

Tags

,

Of all the customs surrounding Christmas, it occurs to me the most singular, the most distinctive, is the custom of giving one another gifts. You realize how unique that is. There are other special occasions, birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, Father’s Days, Mother’s Days, and so on, in which somebody is given gifts. You bring your gifts to somebody, but the real question is … How many holidays do we have in which all of us give gifts to all of us? The answer is only one, and it’s right that we do it at Christmas because it highlights, it makes real, the central event, in some ways, the central truth of Christmas.

Jesus Christ came at Christmas, but he didn’t just come. He was given. ‘For unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given …’ Jesus didn’t just come. He was a gift. That’s the central event of Christmas, and all the gift giving, in a sense, makes that real. Jesus was given. ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son …’ Jesus did not just come. He was a gift.

There’s one place in which Paul is so overwhelmed by the thought of it that he breaks into praise, and he says, ‘Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift,’ an unspeakable gift, an inexpressible gift. It’s beyond description. It’s beyond comprehension. Whenever Paul thinks about it, even for a while, his imagination and his heart explode.

– Tim Keller

Words found in Tim Keller’s December 23, 1990 sermon, “His Name Shall Be Called”

 

The Message of Christmas

19 Saturday Dec 2015

Posted by in Incarnation, Jesus, Joy

≈ Comments Off on The Message of Christmas

Tags

,

The message of Christmas is the world, human life, is a dark place, and the more you look for the solutions and the more you think about it, the darker it gets. I have a tremendous amount of respect for Russell and a tremendous amount of respect for Huxley and all those guys who would press you and say, ‘The world is a dark place. Let’s not get out from under it. Don’t you feel it?’

The message of Christmas is … Unless God has sent his Son into the world, unless God has revealed himself through the Son who he sent into the world, there is no light for the world. Huxley would say the same thing. Russell would say the same thing. That’s the message of Christmas. Right here. Don’t you see? Don’t you understand why people do run off to the mystics, they do run off to the politicians, they do run off to the therapists, they do run off to all these people trying to get meaning in life? But there is no light any other place. That’s the message of Christmas. You know what that means?

It means, first of all, if you do not know God personally, if you have no confidence that Christmas really happened, if you just think it’s a nice idea, but you don’t really know that it really happened, you don’t know that God really sent his Son into the world to live and to die on earth for us, if you don’t know that, don’t you understand there’s really no way you should take Christmas and use it the way we do to make chirpy, groundless little statements about how if we just hold hands everything will be all right? If we just get together in a circle and love each other everything will be all right. You can’t do that.

Here’s why: Christmas won’t let you do that. Christianity is not sentimental at all. Every other kind of non-Christian philosophy tries to console you like this: They say, ‘Buck up. Things aren’t that bad. In every cloud there is a silver lining.’ Christianity is far more realistic than any non-Christian philosopher or any non-Christian is really prepared to be. Christianity would never say, ‘Oh, things aren’t so bad.’ Christianity says, ‘Things are just as bad as the worst and most pessimistic analyst says they are. Nevertheless …’

You see? Nevertheless … Christians will not be chirpy. There’s no sentimentality. There’s no nostalgia about the message of Christmas. Not at all. It says, ‘The world is dark.’ Human life is a dark place. That’s where the comfort is, if God has actually done what Christmas has always said he had done. Apart from that, every smart person knows there is no hope. There is no light. Don’t you see? Unless Christmas is true there is no light at all and there’s no comfort, so stop being chirpy. That’s what Christmas says.

When it says stop being chirpy, what you can do is you can put it something like this: If there’s a God, if he sent Jesus Christ into the world to die for us, if he was born as a baby and he died for us, and he rose triumphant over the grave, and he is Pastor of the heavens, and now he is seated at the right hand of God the Father, and he’s ruling all things until he puts everything under his feet, and someday we’re going to rule and reign with him … If that’s true, there’s light and there’s comfort. If that’s not true, there’s no comfort, there’s no light.

– Tim Keller 

Words found in December 16, 1990 Sermon, “Light Has Dawned”

The Gift of Jesus

19 Saturday Dec 2015

Posted by in Grace, Jesus

≈ Comments Off on The Gift of Jesus

Tags

,

The central event of Christmas is that Jesus Christ was not just born. Jesus is the one great personage who wasn’t simply born. The teaching of the Bible, of course, is that he had an existence before he was born, and therefore, Jesus was not just born; he was given to us. He’s the gift Christmas is about. You see what Paul says. ‘He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?’

This is the one gift that, if you have it, you have all the other gifts. That’s what Paul is saying. This is the one gift that, if you reject it, you lose all other gifts. That’s what Paul is saying. This is a theme of the Bible. There are some other Christmas passages that talk about this. For example, Isaiah 9. It’s one of the texts on which the Messiah is based.

For unto us a Child is born
Unto us a Son is given

It’s a gift. John 3:16: ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son …’ Here we have Paul saying God ‘… did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all …’ Therefore, as Paul says elsewhere, Jesus Christ is the inexpressible gift. Inexpressible he says. ‘Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!’

– Tim Keller

Words found in the 1993 Sermon, “Jesus Our Gift” by Timothy Keller.

 

The Heart of the Christian Story

15 Tuesday Sep 2015

Posted by in Jesus, Sanctification, Suffering

≈ Comments Off on The Heart of the Christian Story

Tags

,

We have been arguing that every culture gives its members a story about what life is all about, and the story of late modern culture – that life is about individual freedom and happiness – has no place for suffering. But the Christian story, as we will see, is utterly different. Suffering is actually at the heart of the Christian story. Suffering is the result of our turn away from God, and therefore it was the way through which God himself in Jesus Christ came and rescued us for himself. And now it is how we suffer that comprises one of the main ways we become great and Christ-like, holy and happy, and a crucial way we show the world the love and glory of our Savior.

– Tim Keller

Answered Questions

05 Saturday Sep 2015

Posted by in Apologetics, Jesus

≈ Comments Off on Answered Questions

Tags

,

If you want to be sure you are developing sound, thoughtful answers to the fundamental questions, you need at the very least to become acquainted with the teachings of Christianity. The best way to do that is to see how Jesus explained himself and his purposes to people he met – and how their lives were changed by his answers to their questions.

– Tim Keller

Access Through Christ

17 Monday Aug 2015

Posted by in Jesus

≈ Comments Off on Access Through Christ

Tags

‘For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.’ Every word in there is loaded. It reminds me, a hymn writer once talked about a verse like that.

A box where sweets compacted lie.

That’s what it is. Every word is sweet. Look at the first one: for. It’s a sweet word. Why? Look at what comes before it, all of Paul’s discussion of how Jesus Christ died on the cross to reconcile people to God and to reconcile people to one another, but what is the point of it? What is it for? It all boils down to verse 18. ‘For through him we both have access …’ Access is the bottom line of the Christian life. Access.

You may be religious. You may have experienced forgiveness. You may have experienced changes in your life. You may have overcome habits. You may have experienced a certain amount of peace, but listen. All those things are great, but that’s not the bottom line of the Christian life. Those things are symptoms. Those things are sparks, in a sense. They’re results. The bottom line of the Christian life is access. It’s all for this: Through him, we have access, getting in. Getting in.

The bottom line of the Christian life is… Are you in, near God? Are you out on the periphery, or are you in close? Do you experience access to him? Do you enjoy him? Do you know him? Or flip it around. Is he in the center of your life, or is he out on the periphery? Does he enjoy access to you? Do you enjoy access to him, and does he have absolute access to you? Are you in his center, or is he in your center? Access, that’s what the Christian life is about. That’s why we have to look at it. Notice all three members of the Trinity, the triune God, are involved in bringing us this great gift.

For what? ‘For through him …’ Who’s that? Christ. ‘…we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.’ Three prepositions: through Christ, to the Father, by the Spirit. Three little words. Prepositions of all things, not a noun, not a verb, not even an adverb. Three prepositions on which you can build your whole life. Not only that (and it has been done), on which you can build a whole civilization. Three prepositions. Let’s look at each one of them. This gift of access is to the Father through the Son by the Spirit.

– Tim Keller

 Words found in Tim Keller’s 1989 Sermon, “Christ Our House”

Boldness and Humility

14 Friday Aug 2015

Posted by in Grace, Humilty, Jesus, Love

≈ Comments Off on Boldness and Humility

Tags

When Jesus invites Peter to follow him, he’s not just saying, ‘Would you like to sign up for a few courses with me?’ He wants him to live with him. He wants him to be his family. Therefore, when the salvation of Jesus Christ comes into your life, you see yourself as more wicked and sinful than you ever dared believe, and yet you sense you’re more valued and loved and affirmed than you ever dared hope at the same time.

That is a mark, infinitely greater self-worth, infinitely greater realism about your flaws at once, which is the selfquake, which is the unique self-image, which is the transformation of identity that happens to anyone into whose life this salvation comes. I say it every so often, but it has been a while so I’ll say it again. If you were saved by works, if you go to heaven through your performance, then you might be bold but not humble when you’re living up or you’ll be humble but not bold and confident when you’re failing, but you can never be bold and humble at once.

If you are more wicked than you ever dared believe and you’re more loved and affirmed than you ever dared hope at the same time because your relationship with God through Jesus Christ is based completely and sheerly on his grace, on his call, then it means you can’t be into either superiority or inferiority at all, because at the same moment you have infinite self-worth from his affirmation and you have infinite realism about your sin.

You can’t get an inferiority or superiority. There is a boldness and a humility about you at once. It is absolutely different.

– Tim Keller 

Words found in Tim Keller’s 2003 Sermon, “The Message of Jesus”

With Us in the Fire

29 Wednesday Jul 2015

Posted by in Jesus, Suffering

≈ Comments Off on With Us in the Fire

Tags

,

If you believe in Jesus and you rest in Him, then suffering will relate to your character like fire relates to gold. Do you want to know who you are – your strengths and weaknesses? Do you want to be a compassionate person who skillfully helps people who are hurting? Do you want to have such a profound trust in God that you are fortified against the disappointments of life? Do you want simply to be wise about how life goes?

Those are four crucial things to have – but none of them are readily achievable without suffering. There is no way to know who you really are until you are tested. There is no way to really empathize and sympathize with other suffering people unless you have suffered yourself. There is no way to really learn how to trust in God until you are drowning.

But God is with us in the fire. He knows what it’s like to live through the miseries of this world – He understands. He is near, available to be known and depended upon within the hardship. He walks with us, but the real question is – will we walk with Him? If we have created a false God-of-my-program, then when life falls apart we will simply assume He has abandoned us and we won’t seek Him.

– Tim Keller