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Welcome to Gospel in Life. Many

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today have elevated skepticism to such

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an extent that belief in God

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can seem almost unimaginable. But

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many of the human longings that characterize

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the ancient world are still the same

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today. We all still desire

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meaning, happiness, and a strong identity.

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Today, Tim Keller is speaking on how

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the Christian faith can address the problems

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and satisfy the longings of the modern

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heart. The

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man who does not walk in the counsel

0:58

of the wicked, or stand in the way

1:01

of sinners, or sit in the

1:03

seat of mockers, but as the

1:05

light is in the law of the Lord, and on

1:08

his law he meditates day

1:10

and night, is like a

1:12

tree planted by water,

1:15

streams of water, which yield

1:17

his fruit in season, and whose leaf

1:19

does not wither. Whatever he

1:21

does, he prospers,

1:25

not throw the wicked. They are like

1:27

shash, but the wind blows away. Therefore

1:29

the wicked will not stand in the

1:31

judgment, nor sinners in the assembly

1:33

of the righteous. For the Lord

1:35

watches over the way of the righteous, but

1:39

the way of the wicked will

1:42

perish. This

1:44

is God's word. 1975.

2:03

We passed through in this country one of the eras

2:06

in which there was the most economic

2:08

growth. There was a fast

2:13

rise in lifestyle, in

2:16

the standard of living. There was

2:18

an enormous optimism at the time of

2:20

those things that we will probably

2:22

never see again. And during those 20

2:24

years, the

2:26

teenage suicide rate in this country went

2:29

up 300%. And

2:32

all the social commentators agreed that that was very

2:34

significant and none of them could agree on what

2:36

it was significant of. But

2:40

I think probably the best answer of all came

2:43

out of the mouth of

2:46

one of the kids themselves.

2:49

There was a young man in the

2:51

mid 80s in Houston, a young teenage

2:53

boy who hung himself on a tree

2:56

and left a note on the

2:59

tree and said, this

3:01

is the only thing around here that

3:03

has any roots. Now

3:08

to have roots goes

3:10

two ways. There's two sides to having roots.

3:15

On the one hand, roots is a very positive

3:17

sounding concept. To have

3:19

roots means you are substantial.

3:21

It means you're rooted in. It means

3:24

you endure. It means you last. Roots

3:28

enable you to be able to handle storms

3:31

to help you stand your ground. And

3:34

so in all those ways, roots gives you

3:36

stability and certainty and

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build up, it builds mass. You know, that's what

3:41

roots are there to do and they protect. But

3:43

on the other hand, roots limit

3:47

your freedom. Roots come

3:49

fine even as,

3:52

and actually because, they protect

3:55

and nurture and nourish and stabilize

3:57

you. To

3:59

the two sides. In the

4:01

mid-80s, Tom Wolfe, the novelist who lived, I

4:03

think, on this street, somebody told me once,

4:05

but anywhere pretty near, Tom Wolfe

4:07

spoke at Harvard Class Day. And

4:10

in that speech, it was a memorable

4:12

speech, I think, he said that throughout

4:14

history, through all ages,

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all human beings have always sought two

4:18

kinds of freedom, but today

4:20

we're after a third kind as well. And

4:23

so the two kinds of freedom that we've

4:25

always searched after are freedom from tyranny and

4:29

freedom from want. And

4:31

under freedom from tyranny is included things

4:33

like freedom of expression, freedom of religion,

4:35

freedom of political determination, and

4:38

under freedom from want is included things

4:40

like freedom of economic opportunity and so

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on. But Tom Wolfe went on

4:44

and said, today we are seeking

4:46

and even expecting a third kind of freedom that

4:49

is unprecedented. And

4:52

he said this was freedom from

4:54

religion, not freedom

4:56

of religion, we've always wanted that. He

4:59

says, today we expect freedom from religion, and he's

5:01

defined it this way, freedom from

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the internal monitor that your parents stick in

5:05

there, that the clergy stick in there, freedom

5:10

to write your

5:12

own morality, freedom to determine your

5:15

own destiny, freedom to decide

5:17

the nature of spiritual reality

5:19

for yourself. He

5:22

says, that's never ever been

5:24

thought before, it's the final

5:26

freedom. Now what's the result of

5:28

the final freedom? The result of the final

5:31

freedom is rootlessness.

5:35

You see, our ancestors, when they said I have roots,

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here's what they meant. When they

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said I had roots, that means this is my

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country, this is my family, this is my

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faith, and so many of the things

5:46

I do, I do because I've got obligations, because

5:48

I've got commitment. I mean, I want to

5:50

do it and my feelings go this way and my impulses this way,

5:52

sometimes it doesn't look like it's in my

5:55

best interest, but I have roots. See,

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I've got some things here, some commitment. We

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have cut all those elements. We have cut

6:02

all those things. We have said

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now we're free But

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our ancestors had both less freedom and

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less despair than us Because

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you see a plant without roots

6:15

is at

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best a tumbleweed Is

6:20

a tumbleweed more free than oak tree? Yeah, it's

6:22

free to be blown about forever and

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there is what the Bible calls

6:28

a rootlessness and a weightlessness about

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our society right now a superficiality

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and Everybody

6:37

in this room every one of us the

6:39

one degree or another are affected by it and we have

6:41

to fight against it What

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I'd like to do this morning is to talk about what

6:46

the Bible says regarding

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this condition It's

6:51

not the kind of thing that many of you walk

6:53

in here thinking you not need to know about I'm

6:55

hoping that as we actually do the biblical analysis you'll

6:57

begin to see some of your problems today Many

7:00

of your problems today. Maybe the main problem you face

7:02

today Is

7:05

that you've been taken over or affected

7:07

deeply? By this

7:09

weightlessness and ruthlessness that we experience in

7:11

our culture and society Even

7:14

though it's a modern condition even though it's

7:16

running rampant today, even though Tom Wolfe says

7:18

in the sense it's unprecedented The

7:21

fact is that the root of the

7:23

rootlessness the roots of this condition were diagnosed

7:26

long ago in this home And

7:28

the prescription is laid out here. Let's take a look at them.

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First of all, the Bible talks about chat

7:35

and says That

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there is a life on the surface

7:41

there's a life of superficiality and ruthlessness Which

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can affect people it's called a

7:47

life of chat. It says the wicked Or

7:50

like chaff which the wind drives away. Now, let me

7:52

talk to you about what that means. What is the

7:54

life of chaff? chaff

7:58

Is referring to an agricultural thing,

8:01

when you would harvest back

8:03

in those days, you would throw the grain that

8:06

you gathered up into the wind. Now

8:08

the grain consisted of two parts. On the one hand

8:10

you had the internal kernel, you

8:13

had the life itself, the organic part

8:15

of the grain, and

8:17

it had more substance to it. And because it was

8:19

heavier it would fall down. The shaft

8:21

was the cusp around the kernel.

8:25

It was the sleeve.

8:28

It was lighter, it was

8:30

useless, and the wind would

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blow it away. When

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the Bible talks about a life of chaff, what

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is it talking about? It's talking about this. Chaff

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represents a life which

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is totally consisting in externals,

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in show and facade. A

8:49

life without an

8:51

anchor, a life without any enduring

8:54

internal reality behind the facade.

8:56

A life

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of chaff means to be constantly

9:01

blown about by the

9:03

winds of public opinion and

9:05

trends, by the winds of your own

9:07

impulses and feelings of the moment, blown

9:10

about by the winds of suffering and trial because

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you've got no roots. You've

9:15

got nothing to keep yourself from being

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continually blown about. Now I

9:20

know I'm talking metaphorically but I'm going to bring this right

9:22

down to earth and let's start right now. When the Bible

9:24

talks about this, what is it describing? Recently

9:27

a very, very, very popular movie

9:30

was Indecent Proposal. Robert

9:33

Redford finds Woody Harrelson

9:35

and Demi more happily and faithfully married

9:37

to each other. And he mischievously

9:40

says, I'll give you, he says to

9:42

them, I'll give you a million

9:45

dollars if

9:47

I can sleep with her. This is

9:49

an enormously popular movie. People

9:53

came out not just because it was a sexy theme.

9:55

I believe people came out. I spent

9:58

a hundred million dollars watching it. because

10:00

they were wrestling themselves with the

10:02

central crucial question of the age.

10:05

It's the thing that Tom Wolfe

10:07

was getting at when he said,

10:09

this is an unprecedented issue. Our

10:12

ancestors would have realized that

10:14

the proposal was just wrong, it was

10:17

a temptation. But we sit

10:19

in there and modern men and women listen

10:21

to that proposal and they watch that movie

10:23

and this is what they're asking. Is

10:26

there anything that under any

10:29

circumstances is always wrong?

10:34

A million dollars. Hey, think

10:36

of what we can do with that, honey. Just

10:39

imagine. Is there anything

10:41

that's always wrong, or let's put it this way.

10:44

Is there any rooted convictions in

10:46

you that regardless

10:49

of the wind blowing, regardless

10:51

of the advantages or disadvantages,

10:53

regardless of the feelings, regardless

10:56

of conditions, are there any

10:58

rooted commitments that will

11:00

never change? Let me put it another way.

11:04

Is there anything in you that's always

11:06

there? That's

11:09

just there, always there. Is

11:11

there anything about you that's

11:13

non-negotiable, no

11:16

matter what people threaten you with, no

11:18

matter what people entice you with, no

11:21

matter how your feelings are, that's

11:24

a given, that's a root, that's

11:26

a commitment. In

11:29

other words, is there anything behind

11:32

your roles, behind

11:34

the image, is there anything

11:36

deep inside you that's always

11:38

there? That's

11:41

the question. The

11:43

Bible says, if there are no non-negotiables in

11:45

your life, if

11:48

there are no commitments, things that you always

11:50

true to, that you always believe, that you

11:52

always hold on to, you always do, regardless

11:54

of either the enticements on the one hand

11:56

or the threats on the other hand. If

12:01

there's nothing in the center,

12:03

then you're chaff. That's what a chaff

12:05

is. It's

12:08

centerless. The kernel dawn. It's

12:11

a husk. It's a shell. You're a form without power.

12:14

That's the life of chaff. It's

12:18

really quite amazing picture. I

12:22

know plenty of people to

12:24

one degree or another who are

12:26

like that, especially in New York. Now, before

12:29

we move on, that's the life of chaff.

12:32

What causes a life of chaff? What

12:34

causes it? The Bible says the

12:36

answer is ungodliness. Now,

12:39

you know, the word ungodliness, unfortunately, does

12:41

not appear in the translation that we

12:43

printed. In

12:47

the very beginning it says, blessed is the man who

12:49

does not walk in the counsel of the wicked. Now,

12:52

I think that's a poor translation. In

12:54

the older translations it says, blessed is

12:56

he who walketh not in the counsel

12:58

of the ungodly. Now, the word wicked,

13:00

of course, ungodly people, I'm

13:02

sorry. Of course, wicked people are always

13:04

ungodly, but ungodly people aren't always wicked.

13:07

Wicked means violent, vile.

13:10

To be ungodly, though, is this. It

13:13

means the roots of your soul

13:15

are not in God at all.

13:19

Now, of course, an ungodly person might be somebody who

13:21

doesn't believe in God or doesn't know

13:23

if there is a God or is just indifferent

13:25

to God. But

13:28

an ungodly person could also be someone who believes

13:30

in God, but the roots

13:32

of your soul do not actually go into God

13:34

and make him your life source. See, roots in

13:36

a tree, roots of a plant, go down into

13:38

the water, go down into the mineral, go down

13:40

into the life source. You

13:43

can believe in God in general, but

13:46

if God is not your life source, if he's not,

13:49

the way in which you decide things,

13:51

the plumb line for your decision, if

13:54

he's not the joy of

13:57

your life, if he's not your life

13:59

source, That's

14:02

a life without God and that's what the

14:04

ungodly life is. And the Bible says ungodliness

14:08

creates a life of chaff. Not

14:11

just whether you believe in Him or don't believe in

14:13

Him, but whether you're a rooster in Him. Well,

14:16

now how does ungodliness create a life of

14:18

chaff? Let's take a look at it. First

14:20

of all, ungodliness, which means to leave

14:22

God out of a picture. Remember,

14:25

ungodliness does not simply mean you don't believe in

14:27

Him. It means to leave Him out of a

14:29

picture in your thinking. Leave Him out of

14:31

a picture in your decision. Leave Him out of

14:33

a picture emotionally. When you

14:35

dismiss God, first of all, it creates this

14:38

life of chaff because it creates

14:41

intellectual instability. Blessed

14:44

is he who walketh not in the counsel

14:47

of the ungodly. Stay away, says the

14:50

psalmist, of the counsel of the ungodly.

14:53

And the word ungodly, the

14:55

actual Hebrew word that's used here,

14:57

means fitful, sleepless, and restless. Look,

15:00

there's an intellectual instability when you leave God

15:03

out. Those of you who

15:05

today are Christians, it's great to

15:07

know that for the last 3,000 years, people

15:10

have essentially, there's been people who've taken the

15:12

Bible and based their lives on it and

15:14

it's true. And

15:18

a thousand years from now, the world is still here.

15:20

There'll be people doing the same thing, lots and lots

15:22

of them. And if they can read

15:24

your diaries, your quiet

15:26

time notebooks, they would understand

15:29

them. Just

15:31

like we can read the great journals and

15:33

the prayers of the men and women of

15:35

God of a thousand years ago, 2,000 years

15:37

ago, and say, this is my brother, this

15:39

is my sister. There's a stability there, intellectually.

15:42

There's changes, of course. New ages, new

15:44

cultures, new regions, new places in which

15:47

we make changes, we adapt, we understand,

15:49

we ask the Bible new questions, we

15:51

see new things in it, but there's

15:53

a stability there. However,

15:57

don't walk in the Council of the ungodly. totally

16:00

different. Any intellectual system that

16:02

leaves God out is a

16:05

revolving door. Last week

16:07

in the New York Times book review, interestingly

16:10

enough, 60 years ago, Freud

16:12

and psychoanalysis was considered the

16:14

wave of the future. Ah, if

16:17

you had trouble with it, if you didn't believe

16:19

in it, you were primitive, you were unenlightened, you

16:21

didn't realize this is how we were going to

16:23

solve our problem. And the New

16:25

York Times book review was reviewing another

16:27

book that is just simply assessing the fact

16:31

that Freud is largely mocked today. 60

16:33

years ago, and now he's mocked,

16:36

he's made fun of, he's vilified. Peter

16:38

Drucker recently wrote a book, Post-Capitalist Society, and in

16:40

the beginning of the book he says, we all

16:43

know capitalism is changing, we all

16:45

know it's not going to be what it was. What will

16:47

the Post-Capitalist Society be, he said?

16:49

He says, for the last 60

16:51

years, everybody who was intelligent thought

16:53

they knew the answer. The

16:56

Post-Capitalist Society would be a Socialistic Society.

16:58

And he says, now in the last

17:00

10 years, that's all changed. Because everyone

17:03

knows now that whatever comes after capitalism

17:05

is something that will come after capitalism,

17:07

it won't be socialism. What's

17:10

the point? Friends, what

17:13

right now is put to you in

17:16

the journals, in the newspapers, in the media,

17:19

as being the assured result

17:22

of reflection and research. But

17:24

way over the future, 50 years from now, a large

17:28

part of it will be on the

17:30

dustbin. It will be on the scrap

17:32

pile. Why? Because the counsel of the

17:34

ungodly is restless. It's worthless. It constantly

17:36

changes. And if you believe it, it

17:38

will turn you into chat. That's what

17:41

it's saying here. Blessed is the one

17:43

who walketh not in the counsel of

17:45

the ungodly. Ungodliness

17:47

creates that rootlessness because it creates

17:50

intellectual instability, constantly changing.

17:52

Let me go a little further. Secondly,

17:56

ungodliness creates social and

17:58

personal instability. We'll

18:02

get into it later. Friedrich

18:05

Nietzsche, somebody you've got

18:07

to read in order to understand our world today. A

18:10

hundred years ago he realized that the Belutin

18:13

God was losing its compelling power in western

18:15

society and it bothered him. He

18:17

wasn't happy about it. He

18:20

said, literally, he said in

18:22

one of the most insightful things he

18:24

ever said, he says when God dies

18:26

in western society all things will seem

18:28

weightless. Weightless.

18:32

Hollow, he said. Wait,

18:36

my generation in the 60s saw this, the

18:39

thing that Nietzsche thought was coming, we saw

18:41

it. And we sang songs with

18:43

tambourines about it. We

18:45

didn't say, oh my gosh, do you realize what this

18:47

means? You see, recently I've been

18:49

listening to some of this music in the 60s

18:52

and it was great to listen to the mamas

18:54

and the papas blissfully crooning, you've

18:56

got to go where you want to go. Do

18:59

what you want to do with

19:01

whoever you want to do

19:03

it with. Remember? You've got to

19:05

go where you want to go, do what you want to

19:07

do with whoever you want to do it with. Ah,

19:10

that's what Tom Wolf was talking about. That's what Nietzsche

19:13

was talking about. No higher obligation

19:16

from God. No ten commandments

19:18

that we have to follow. No absolute truth

19:20

over us. Nothing to

19:23

guide us but our one us. You've

19:26

got to go where you want to go, do what you want to

19:28

do with whoever you want to do it with. And

19:30

we thought it would be great. This

19:34

lead, just like Friedrich Nietzsche said,

19:37

to a hollowness both sociologically and

19:39

psychologically. Do you want to see

19:41

how? Listen, one of the problems today

19:44

is that we find, because

19:46

people believe that, that more and more

19:48

people are mugging us. More

19:52

and more people are not telling us the

19:54

truth in their advertising. More and more people are

19:57

not Keeping their promises to us.

20:00

Make a covenant commitment with us and then

20:02

I get out of it and we start

20:04

to say this isn't right. This is the

20:06

right. Oh yes, you know what they're doing.

20:08

They're going where they want to go, doing

20:10

what they want to do to whoever they

20:12

want to throw it to. And.

20:18

August You know, all the

20:20

research shows that Americans are

20:22

beginning to perceive. That.

20:24

We can't trust anybody that everybody is

20:27

motivated by self interest and no matter

20:29

what they say on the outside, there

20:31

is not a reality behind it. Americans

20:35

are unbelievably cynical overs what they were twenty

20:37

years ago about what the politicians tell them

20:39

about the clergy. Tell them. I found that

20:41

out as soon as I got the New

20:43

York. But

20:47

what? The politicians? What? the court? what

20:49

does after so you doctors we don't

20:51

trust you The powerball say so about

20:53

what the business tells you about what

20:55

the advertiser Sawyer We think they're all

20:57

after themselves. We think that are. They

20:59

put up a good concept behind it.

21:01

There's no reality through the hollowness. In

21:05

our culture is growing and growing

21:07

Emerald Harvest. And we start

21:09

to say, well, I'm being ripped off. One on I rip off.

21:13

This is what the tax form says

21:15

you may this year, but beneath that

21:18

behind it, there's no reality to that,

21:20

is what the advertiser says. That

21:25

he said, he thought his dad. Everything

21:28

becomes weightless. But not only that,

21:30

Nasa sociological intensely. Voice.

21:34

Why does not allow suffering in the world?

21:37

How can one really to be right? Any

21:40

others run to. Science basically disproves.

21:42

Christianity. In his

21:44

addresses these questions and more in his book

21:46

The Reason for That. Drawing.

21:49

And Literature Philosophy real as conversations

21:51

and potent weakening. this book will

21:53

challenge you. to gain a deeper

21:55

understanding of the christian faith splitter

21:57

you're a believer speaking reassurance you're

22:00

reading it with a friend who is searching for answers.

22:03

When you give to Gospel in Life during

22:05

the month of May, we'll send you two

22:07

copies of the reason for God, one for

22:09

you and one to give to a friend

22:11

who is exploring Christianity. It's our

22:13

hope that through reading the book with a

22:15

friend, you can have conversations about the

22:17

claims of the Christian faith. The books

22:19

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22:21

this ministry. To receive your two copies

22:24

of the reason for

22:26

God, simply make a

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gift at gospelonlife.com/give. That's

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gospelonlife.com/give. We also encourage

22:32

you to check out our short podcast

22:35

series, Questioning Christianity, for people exploring the

22:37

claims of the Christian faith. To

22:40

listen to this short series

22:42

or share it with a

22:44

friend, visit gospelonlife.com/questioning. That's gospelonlife.com

22:46

slash questioning. Your gift helps the message

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the world. So thank you for partnering

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with us because the gospel

22:55

truly changes everything. What

22:59

happens to us psychologically, and I've already hinted at

23:01

it, if everything is negotiable,

23:03

if you say, well, I don't believe in committing

23:06

adultery, but $2 million, $100 million,

23:10

think of what that would do for my kid. Think

23:12

of what I could do with that money. Here is

23:15

the rich, sleazy Robert Redford. He's just going to spend

23:17

all that money on himself. If I get $100 million

23:19

from him just because I let him sleep with my

23:21

wife, think of the great things I could do for

23:23

my hometown. Think of the factories I

23:26

could build. So you think of all the people

23:28

I could affect to work. This couldn't be

23:30

wrong. And if

23:32

there's nothing inside you that

23:36

is always, always right and always, always wrong,

23:38

if there's not something inside you that you're

23:40

always committed to, there's no you in there.

23:44

You're just a series of faces. You're just

23:46

a series of facades. You're a series

23:49

of masks going where

23:51

you want to go, doing what you want to

23:53

do with whoever you want to do it

23:55

with. And you don't know who you are. And people don't

23:57

know who they are. Everything

24:00

is hollow, everything is weightless.

24:03

Why? Because ungodliness leads

24:05

to it. The

24:08

wicked are like chaff. The ungodly are like

24:11

chaff that the wind driveth away. All

24:14

right, now that's the problem.

24:17

So what's the solution? How

24:19

do we get a life of substance? Everybody

24:22

in this room to some degree or another is hurting

24:26

because of this tremendous modern

24:29

pressure to be

24:32

hollow and weightless. Those of us

24:34

who are Christians have found that out. We

24:37

tried very hard and

24:40

yet were so concerned about show. It would be very easy

24:42

for a large church to be concerned about show. This morning

24:44

I got up at 5 a.m. and my wife doesn't know

24:46

this yet, in a sweat, because

24:48

I was going to preach to you about hollowness. And

24:52

yet God was saying and convicting me and saying, you know,

24:54

if you worry as much as you do about how things

24:56

look, about whether the greeters will be making people feel good,

24:58

about whether the air conditioning is going to be on or

25:00

off, if you're that worried about

25:02

the outside, if you're

25:05

that worried about show, if you come into this church,

25:08

you come on in and unless the music is great and unless you really

25:10

get a high, you're not coming back. You just

25:13

move all around from church to church. All depends

25:15

on what meets your needs today. The

25:17

idea of being committed to something and sticking with

25:19

it, don't you see what's going on? There's

25:21

a hollowness about us. It's

25:24

creeping in on us. It's pushing in on us.

25:28

We want to have our needs met. We

25:30

want to go with the flow. But we're

25:32

actually being blown about from

25:35

church to church, from

25:37

morality to morality, from marriage

25:39

to marriage, from gender

25:41

to gender. Everything

25:43

changes because there's

25:45

no reality behind what's gone.

25:47

Now how do we get that life of

25:49

substance? It's fairly simple. What's

25:51

the difference between a tree and a chaff? The

25:55

chaff is connected to nothing.

25:57

The tree is connected to something besides

25:59

that. See here that? The

26:02

chaff is connected to nothing. The tree

26:04

is connected to something beyond itself, beside

26:07

itself. It has roots that go out beyond

26:09

itself. That's the

26:11

reason why the chaff is

26:14

representative of a life in

26:16

which the only thing that guides you is

26:18

what's inside you. Your impulses, your feelings, and

26:24

therefore there's no you. Nothing

26:26

in there but your one is. Nothing outside of you

26:29

that can discipline you. And the

26:31

tree goes outside. Well, what does

26:33

it go to? The first thing we see

26:35

from this metaphor is the tree

26:37

goes into the law of the Lord. If

26:41

you look, it's not that hard to see. It's

26:43

the inverse too. It says, the light is in

26:45

the law of the Lord. On this law and

26:48

meditate day and night. And verse 3 it says,

26:50

he is like a tree planted by streams of

26:52

water. So it's very, very clear the parallelism is

26:55

the tree putting its roots down into

26:57

water, parallel to man delighting

26:59

in the law of the Lord. And

27:02

so the very, very first and most

27:04

important thing to understand is for

27:07

you to get a life of substance, for

27:10

you to avoid the hollowing out, the

27:13

chaffiness of modern life, you

27:16

have got to get yourself connected and

27:19

committed to God's truth. Not just any

27:23

of us. You know, Hitler was a man of principle. It was

27:26

the wrong principle. And so he destroyed himself

27:29

and he destroyed the world and destroyed all

27:31

kinds of people because

27:33

he showed the principle that wasn't accord with

27:35

God's reality and God's truth. The way in

27:37

which you develop a life of substance is

27:39

you have to connect with God's truth. And

27:42

here's why. Let me show you this.

27:44

The Bible says that God alone has

27:47

glory. The early part of our service

27:49

was all about God alone

27:51

has glory. Now the word Hebrew

27:54

word for glory means

27:56

wait. And the Bible

27:58

says, because God has no beginning and

28:00

no ending. God alone lasts. God

28:03

alone has substance. God alone is there.

28:06

God alone is solid. God

28:11

alone matters, is

28:14

matter. And

28:17

everything else is ephemeral. Everything

28:21

else is fleeting. Everything else is fading.

28:24

Everything else is transitory except

28:27

to the degree that it is connected to

28:30

Him. When

28:33

you give God glory, and

28:35

only to the degree that you give God glory do

28:37

you get any of that weight or that matter or

28:40

that reality of that substance yourself. When

28:44

the law of God, let me be very

28:47

practical about this, when the law of God

28:49

is revealed to us in the Bible, this

28:51

is not busy work. The law of God

28:53

is actually revealing the very fabric of God's

28:55

heart and the fabric of the reality that

28:58

He has made in His own image. It

29:01

reveals the glory of God. So to

29:04

the degree that you are obeying the law of God,

29:06

to that degree you're real. You've

29:09

woven yourself into the fabric of things.

29:12

But to the degree that you disobey God, the

29:14

more you disobey the law of God, the more

29:16

unreal you become, the more of a

29:18

fantasy life you have to live, the

29:20

more ephemeral and fleeting and ghost-like you

29:23

get. Let me just

29:26

show you. Let me be extremely practical. Every

29:28

time you lie, why do you lie? You

29:31

know why you lie. You lie to

29:34

keep up a front. When

29:37

you tell an

29:39

unreality, which is what a lie is, in

29:42

order to make sure that you look okay, so you

29:44

keep your job, so you make some money, so the

29:47

person will go out with you. Whenever

29:50

you decide, I'm going to lie, in order to

29:52

look good, what you're doing is you

29:55

are voting for the front, the

29:57

chaff, the huff. you're

30:00

denying the inside, the carnal, the reality. And

30:02

every time you tell a lie

30:05

to keep up a front, you're hollowing

30:07

out. Don't you see what you're doing? You're

30:11

becoming a shell. Only goes,

30:14

every time you break to one of the same commandments, don't

30:16

lie. I was gonna give you another one. Every

30:19

time you have sex with

30:21

somebody you're not married to. Every time you have sex

30:23

because it feels good, because you're

30:25

following a feeling, following a desire for

30:27

satisfaction, instead of making marriage,

30:29

what God says it should be, which is

30:31

an expression of permanent marital

30:34

commitment. You're

30:38

hollowing out. People

30:40

say, well, I like, I wanna live

30:42

with him, I wanna live with her, but I don't wanna be married.

30:44

You know what that means? I don't wanna

30:46

be vulnerable. I am committed to nothing except my

30:49

right to be happy

30:52

without commitment. I'm committed

30:54

to nothing except I should have the right to

30:56

do what makes me happy without having to honor

30:58

commitment. There's nothing there. You

31:02

don't wanna be vulnerable. In other words, I'm committed to

31:04

nothing, but the fact that I shouldn't have to

31:06

commit myself, you're

31:09

hollowing out. All right, every

31:11

time you decide you know better than God, did

31:14

you notice this week, one

31:17

of the last of the campus radicals turned herself

31:19

in, somebody my age, Catherine

31:21

Ann Powers, she was part of

31:23

a bank robbery in

31:26

Boston years ago in which a

31:30

police officer, a father of nine was killed. She

31:33

turned herself back in and said, and it was

31:35

amazing, she said, back then I thought that

31:38

the only way to work for the poor and work

31:40

for the oppressed, she actually

31:42

said the reason she tried to rob the bank

31:44

was she wanted to take from the rich and

31:46

give to the poor. Now

31:50

there was this thing in the Bible that's been there

31:52

for years and things thou shalt not feel. And

31:56

there was a substance, there was a reality

31:58

behind that. You can. can't divide

32:00

to do an end run around one of the

32:02

commandments of God, around the law of the Lord.

32:04

You can't do that. When

32:06

you break the commandments of God, the commandments

32:08

of God break you. Not because

32:11

they're mean or cranky, because

32:13

they are reality. You're trying

32:15

to drive through a wall and there's no

32:17

door there. The

32:22

paper said that when the

32:24

officer was killed, Officer Schroeder, when he was killed

32:26

in this bank robbery, during the

32:28

height of all the campus radicalism, his oldest

32:30

son was in college. And

32:33

right after his father was killed, imagine

32:35

this, he saw flyers appearing on his

32:37

college campus excited

32:39

about the fact and saying, Pig

32:41

is dead. Talking about

32:43

his father. Those of us who remember

32:46

talking like that are

32:49

absolutely embarrassed, are absolutely humiliated, that

32:51

we ever thought or talked like

32:54

that. But you

32:56

know what we're feeling? The

32:59

weightlessness of our lives, that because we

33:01

think we're smarter than the law of

33:03

God, we've been carried along like that,

33:05

blown around like that. And we still

33:08

are weightless and we still are rootless

33:10

today. If the only way

33:12

we make our minds up about what is right and

33:14

wrong is about how it feels right now or what

33:16

the latest public opinion is, don't you

33:18

see? God

33:22

alone is real. To the degree you obey

33:24

God, you become real. To the degree you

33:26

disobey God, you become chapped. You become unreal.

33:29

You're hollowing out. Now

33:34

finally, it's not enough just simply to take

33:36

out a rule book and say, okay, the

33:38

Bible's a rule book. I'm

33:40

going to take it out and I'm going to

33:42

start living according to the Ten Commandments. I'm going to

33:44

start living according to the Sermon on the Mount. And

33:46

then I will start to become more

33:49

substantial. I'll start to become a personal principal. I'll

33:51

start to become a person of

33:53

conviction. I'll start to know who

33:55

I am. I'll start to develop

33:57

roots. That's

34:00

not the whole picture because the image

34:02

here is that when

34:05

the tree puts its roots down

34:07

into the truth, the

34:09

truth is actually turning this into a living

34:11

organism. The picture is that

34:17

the picture that the Bible is trying to get across to you

34:19

is an abstract principle won't do. You've

34:22

got to not just obey the Bible.

34:25

You've got to be born again by the Word

34:27

of God. 1 Peter

34:29

1, we

34:31

are born again not

34:33

by perishable seed but by imperishable,

34:36

the living Word of God. The

34:38

Word of God, the truth of

34:40

the Word of God has to not just

34:43

be taken in an abstract way, just obey

34:45

it in a kind of abstract way. It's

34:47

actually got to be taken in in such

34:49

a way that you're born again through it.

34:52

That's what it's saying. In

34:54

Bonfire of the Vanities, there's

34:56

this great little, I remember this great little place

34:58

where Larry Kramer, that's the guy's name in the

35:00

Bonfire of the Vanities, he's a lawyer. He's a young

35:03

man, graduated from Columbia Law School. And when he was

35:05

in Columbia Law School, he had a principle, he

35:07

had an ideal. He says, I'm going to make my

35:09

life count. So he goes to work for the city

35:11

as a public defender. And

35:16

one day he's walked going down Park Avenue and he sees one

35:18

of his classmates, somebody graduated

35:20

with him, coming

35:22

out of a Park Avenue apartment, carrying a $500 attaché

35:27

case, getting into a car with a driver and

35:29

going off to work. And he's

35:31

making $30,000 and he makes no money and he gets no

35:33

glory and he gets a lot of stuff

35:36

every day. And suddenly

35:38

that abstract principle completely

35:41

erodes and withers. He

35:43

suddenly says, I'm going to get mine. I'm making

35:45

no money. My life is pointless. I'm going to

35:47

go get some money. I'm going to sell out.

35:49

I'm going to do it. And

35:52

Tom Wolf, actually the author of Bonfire

35:54

at a Vanity, actually said that goes to show

35:57

that abstract principle is a false. enough

36:00

to overcome the feelings of

36:02

the heart. That's right. The

36:04

Bible says it's not enough just to say

36:06

honesty is the best policy. No, you

36:09

have got to take the truth of God

36:11

in in such a way that you become

36:13

a new person with it. You know how that works? You

36:16

have to grab the truth of the Bible

36:18

by the right hand.

36:20

You know, they always talk

36:22

about getting, you know, getting

36:25

hold of the wrong end of the stick. You have to grab it by

36:27

the right end of the stick, and the right end of the stick is

36:29

what Jesus Christ did for you. A tree,

36:34

a godly man is like a tree. A tree

36:36

doesn't plant itself. A

36:38

tree has to be planted. You don't make

36:40

yourself a Christian. You become a Christian

36:42

when you accept what Jesus has done for you.

36:45

What did he do for you? He left

36:48

heaven, and he was born as a

36:50

child. But not just that, he lived

36:53

the perfect life, a perfect human life

36:55

of compassion and perfect justice and perfect

36:57

compassion and perfect obedience. But not just

36:59

that, he died on a

37:02

terrible hill to take

37:05

your punishment. Why did he do all that? To

37:08

stand in your place, to live

37:10

a life you should have lived, and to pay the debt

37:12

you should have paid. And when you

37:14

realize that you will never ever ever be right

37:16

with God, simply by in an abstract way taking

37:18

his principles out and trying to cram them in,

37:21

but when you realize he's done all this for you,

37:24

Jesus has, and you rest and receive

37:26

him as your Savior. The

37:28

truth comes in, and you

37:33

become a living organism. The

37:36

psalmist doesn't say, ah the godly is like a

37:38

great pine tree, but the wicked is sort

37:40

of like a little dogwood tree. It's not what it says.

37:42

It says one is like a

37:44

tree, one is like a chest. The difference

37:47

between the godly and the ungodly is not

37:49

that the godly is a nicer person, a

37:51

better person, it's a difference of nature. The

37:53

godly has been planted, the godly has been given

37:55

a new nature. Think

38:00

about this. Some of

38:02

you so desperately want no

38:05

one to know how afraid you

38:07

are that you don't matter, that

38:09

nobody notices you, that you seem

38:11

inconsequential. Many

38:14

of you are so unhappy because you're

38:16

not romantically involved. Some of you

38:18

are unhappy because your career is not going in

38:20

the right direction and you feel so inconsequential. Nobody

38:24

notices, like you don't matter. You

38:26

don't want people to realize how upset that

38:28

makes you. But you see,

38:31

don't go to counselors for that. It's

38:33

not so abnormal. The Bible says

38:36

you hunger for glory. You

38:40

were built for his glory. Here's the only way to get

38:42

it. The paradox of the

38:44

gospel, when you finally go to

38:46

God and say, Lord, your

38:48

will matters more than my will. Lord,

38:51

you are going to live

38:53

for your glory, not my glory. Lord,

38:56

you matter more than I matter.

39:00

Your will and your word is more important than

39:02

my feelings and my needs. And the irony is,

39:05

when you say you matter more than me, you

39:09

begin to matter to the only one who

39:11

matters. You

39:14

are loved by the only one whose

39:16

love is eternal, is solid and is

39:18

lasting. God says to you, heavens

39:22

and earth may pass away, but my love for you will

39:24

never pass away. Glory. God

39:27

is saying to you, the heavens, the earth,

39:29

the mountains, they're nothing compared to you.

39:32

They're ephemeral. They're fleeting. They're

39:34

ghosts. They're a myth compared to my love

39:36

for you. That's glory. Not

39:39

the acclaim. So many of you come to New

39:41

York to try to make it in a particular profession. That's not

39:43

the glory that will do it. Some of you

39:46

have come here to find somebody so you get married. That's not

39:48

the glory that will do it. This

39:51

and this alone. Heaven and earth

39:53

will pass away, but my love for you will

39:55

never pass away. Do

39:57

you want a life of chat? Do you want to be blown about by the

39:59

wind? to be blown away or do

40:02

you want to be a tree? Christian

40:07

friends, do you

40:09

have a reality inside that matches the facade?

40:11

Are you really what you show

40:14

other people that you are? Are you

40:16

glorying in him? Are you making him the

40:18

most important thing in every part of your

40:20

life? Are you?

40:24

That's what it means to glory in him. The

40:26

more you glory in him, the more you put

40:28

him first in your job. The more you put

40:30

him first in your romantic life, the more you

40:32

put him first in your sex life, the more

40:34

you put him first in your possessions, the more

40:36

you put him first in your thought life and

40:38

your intellectual life. The more you get him glory,

40:40

the more you make him matter

40:42

more than anything else, the more

40:44

you grow yourself

40:46

in reality and fluidity. Are

40:51

you more like a tree? Is your life more

40:53

like that or more like a chaff? Choose

40:56

this day whom you will serve. Let's

40:59

pray. Now, Father,

41:01

we ask that you grant as

41:03

we spend some time thinking about

41:07

these important images which get to these

41:09

great realities we ask that you would

41:11

show us, what it means to live

41:13

life as conviction, lives of rootedness, lives

41:15

of solidity and substance. We

41:18

pray that all of us will not

41:20

be finding ourselves hollow and

41:23

weightless but

41:25

solid joys and lasting pleasures, none

41:27

but science children now. We thank

41:29

you for that true hope. I'm taking it now. We

41:31

ask that you achieve your life. Amen. Thanks

41:41

for listening to Tim Keller and the Gospel

41:43

and Life Podcast. If you found

41:45

today's teaching helpful and something you'd like more

41:47

people to hear, we invite you to consider

41:49

becoming a Gospel and Life monthly partner. Your

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partnership helps more people discover the hope

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and joy of Christ's

41:57

love. Just visit gospelonlife.com-partners.

42:00

learn more. This month's

42:02

sermons were recorded in 1993. The

42:04

sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel of Life

42:06

podcast were preached from 1989 to 2017

42:10

while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Rodeoar

42:13

Presbyterian Church.