Must God be condemned for you to be justified? —Timothy Keller

"Will you even put me in the wrong? Will you condemn me that you may be in the right?" —Job 40:8

"Look at verse 8. Do you see the place where God asks this question? Literally he says, “Must I be condemned that you be justified?” See that? That’s a question where he’s coming after Job, is he not? He’s saying, “How dare you vilify me and say, ‘Well, I’m living a good life, so I don’t know what the heck God is doing here’?”

God says, “In order to justify yourself, you’re condemning me.” He says, “Must I be condemned for you to be justified?” In the micro at that moment, the answer, of course, is “No.” Job needs to be quiet. Job needs to rest in the will of God. But in the macro, in the long run, the most amazing answer possible … The Bible says, the gospel says, Jesus Christ says, the answer to this question, “Must God be condemned for you to be justified?” is “Yes.”

Unless Jesus Christ came to the cross and was condemned, you can’t be justified. Do you see what happens? Jesus Christ, when he went to the cross and died for our sins … This means the infinite stormy justice of God is satisfied, but also the incredible love of God is satisfied at the same time. You now have a terrible but wonderful God, a God who’s so holy and yet so loving, so holy Jesus had to die, and so loving Jesus was willing and glad to die.

The cross makes God able, you might say, to be both holy and loving toward us … infinitely holy and infinitely loving at the same time. It’s because Jesus Christ bowed his head into the ultimate storm of divine justice and let it crush him. He was condemned in your place. Now, out of the storm of God’s holiness, all that comes for you, like Job, is a voice of love. That is your vindication. Who cares what the world thinks? God loves you. God knows you. That’s all Job needed.

What’s amazing here is Job actually says … Do you see? He says, “I heard of you with my ear, but now I see you with my eye.” Do you know what he’s saying? He is saying, “I had an abstract idea of the greatness of God, but now I’m having the experience of the might and wonder and size of God, so I don’t need an explanation.

Secondly, I kind of understood the grace of God in general, but now I actually see the infinite power of God, and somehow …” See, Job didn’t understand how. “Somehow, in spite of this infinite power and infinite holiness, you still love me. Therefore, I don’t need any other vindication.” When he says, “I repent,” literally the word means “I take back. I retract what I said. I take back my demand for an explanation. I take back my demand for vindication.”

He says, “As I see the size of God, I don’t need an explanation, and as I see the grace of God now, I don’t need a vindication. It’s enough that he loves me, and I know he knows what he’s doing, and I don’t have to.” He’s healed and is content, and it’ll heal you too."

—Timothy Keller, My servant Job

patience comes as a deliberate act of humility — Timothy Keller

"A lot of people say, “Oh, I wish I could,” as if … What do you mean, “I wish I could”? “I wish I had patience,” as if patience is like a germ you catch or you don’t. Actually, as far as I understand, the Bible says patience comes from a couple of deliberate actions. First of all, patience comes as a deliberate act of humility. It’s a deliberate act of humility. Patience is always an act of humility. For example, in James 4, we read this.

“Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. […] Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’ ” (James 4:13-15) It says you have your plans and you know how things ought to work, but you don’t know. You say, “This is going to happen. That’s going to happen.” But you don’t know. You ought to say, “Well, if it’s the Lord’s will.” (James 4:15)

What does that mean? When things go wrong, we think of our anger. We think of our despair. We think of our worry and our fear as feelings we can’t help. But this is saying those feelings arise out of an assumption of your own omniscience. There’s an assumed omniscience. When you’re really saying, “Oh, this is awful …” “What? Why?” “Because X, Y, Z is not happening. That will be a disaster if X, Y, Z doesn’t happen.”
Oh, you know, huh? You know X, Y, Z has to happen for life to mean … How do you know? It says you don’t know. You’re upset, but you don’t know. Please lay down the melancholy burden of assumed omniscience. It’s such a relief. Even the wisest people do not see all ends. When you are just freaking out because, “This has to happen,” that means you think you know. You’re not omniscient. The freaking out is coming from your certainty that you know. You don’t know. Be humble. It’s a deliberate act of humility. That’s one way to be patient."

—Timothy Keller (2013). The Timothy Keller Sermon Archive. New York City: Redeemer Presbyterian Church.

At the heart of every relationship is law — Timothy Keller

"At the heart of every relationship is law, and, at the same time, the purpose of law, really, in God is relationship. Let me give you an illustration to show you what I mean. It’s going to be a little funny. I hope it makes it obvious, though. Let’s just say a man and a woman are dating, and they’re getting serious. They’re thinking about each other, thinking about marriage, so one night they sit down and say, “Let’s really find out what our passions are and what’s really important to us.”

So she begins to pour her heart out, let’s say. She says, “Let me tell you three things that are very important to me. Some of them seem trivial, but, first of all, I can’t stand cigarette smoke. My nose, my eyes … I just can’t be in the same room. I’m just in a lot of trouble with it. I just can’t stand it. I can’t even be around it. You need to know that.”

He says, “Okay. Well, I’m going to smoke. I’m going to smoke three packs a day. I’m going to smoke all the time. I’m going to smoke in bed. I’m going to smoke when we eat. I’m going to smoke. I’m glad you told me about that, but I’m going to smoke.” She says, “Well let me tell you something else.” She says, “I feel very, very strongly … You make a lot of money and I make a lot of money, and together we’re going to make a lot of money, but here’s what I believe.

I feel very strongly that we should set our living expenses significantly below those which we could afford, and I would like to be deliberately and creatively and intentionally and significantly generous with our money. I would like to be very intentional in finding causes and charities and things we can be involved with and we can give our money to in significant proportions. It’s very important that we do that.” He listens, and he says, “Well, no. What I want to do is I would like to buy three or four homes and condos in luxurious places, and I will go into debt if necessary in order to afford that.”

She says, “Let me tell you one more thing. I would like to live in an interracial neighborhood. I believe in cross-cultural relationships. I think that’s very, very important.” He says, “Oh, no. For goodness’ sake. You can’t trust those people. I would have to lock all my doors. Oh no, no. We’re not going to do that at all.”

Then he says, “I’m so glad we had this little talk. This is wonderful. Now let’s get down to business. Honey, will you marry me?” She would go, “No.” Now, what is she doing? At the heart of every relationship is law. What is the law? Well, if you’re in love and you want to have a loving relationship, you can’t live any old way you want to. You have to get to know the passions and the convictions of the person you love, and the only way for you to possibly have that love relationship is to honor that. You can’t just live any old way. You can’t just trample on, in a sense, the laws of love, the passions of the heart.
In the Old Testament whenever there’s a relationship between a man and a woman in marriage, between God and a human being, between kings, between peoples, it’s always covenantal. They say, “We can have a relationship, but we won’t have a relationship unless there are some rules, unless there are some commonalities. We honor that, and if we honor it … blessing, love, embrace. If we do not … curse, which is always to be cut off. ‘Sorry, we can’t have a relationship.’ ”

There are people who love without any covenantal structure at all. We call them codependent people. That’s what we used to call them. Now we call them “people without boundaries.” I don’t know what you call them now. What it means is I enter into a relationship, and I don’t care whether you trample on everything. I don’t care if you smoke. I don’t care if you trample on my values. I don’t care what you do to me. I still love you. I’ll still be in a relationship. I’ll just let you walk all over me.

See, no covenantal structure, nothing you hold the other person to, no real blessing, by the way. There’s no real intimacy in that kind of relationship. And of course, no curse. You never cut them off. Now, here’s the difference. When you enter into a relationship with a man or a woman to get married and there has to be a cutting off because the other person will not honor, like in that funny illustration, that’s painful.

Here’s the problem. God is different than any other person. This tells us your relationship with God is not optional. I don’t have to marry you, I don’t have to be your friend, but I do have to have a relationship with God. I was built for that. That’s the reason it says in verse 12, “The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, ‘The man who does these things [the law] will live by them.’ ” What that means is unless you’re willing to hear the law of God and commit to that, unless you’re willing to obey that, you’re cursed. It’s like any other relationship.

God says, “I am holy.” God says, “Do not lie. Do not steal. Do not be selfish.” The Golden Rule. He tells you these things, and if you don’t do that, there has to be a curse. God is not codependent, like so many of us are. Here’s the problem. Without God we die. We die forever. We cannot live unless we fulfill the covenant. We cannot live if we’re cut off from him. We cannot live. We have to have him. But Paul says we don’t. We’re under a curse. That’s why something has to be done. That’s why we need the cross, but what actually happened?"

— Timothy Keller, Self-Substitution of God

The Bible is not basically about you—it’s about Jesus — Tim Keller

"Jesus is the true and better Adam who passed the test in the garden and whose obedience is imputed to us (1 Cor 15; Romans 5).

Jesus is the true and better Abel who, though innocently slain, has blood now that cries out, not for our condemnation, but for acquittal (Heb 12:24).

Jesus is the true and better Abraham who answered the call of God to leave all the comfortable and familiar and go out into the void not knowing wither he went to create a new people of God.

Jesus is the true and better Isaac who was not just offered up by his father on the mount but was truly sacrificed for us. And when God said to Abraham, “Now I know you love me because you did not withhold your son, your only son whom you love from me,” now we can look at God taking his son up the mountain and sacrificing him and say, “Now we know that you love us because you did not withhold your son, your only son, whom you love from us.”

Jesus is the true and better Jacob who wrestled and took the blow of justice we deserved, so we, like Jacob, only receive the wounds of grace to wake us up and discipline us.

Jesus is the true and better Joseph who, at the right hand of the king, forgives those who betrayed and sold him and uses his new power to save them.

Jesus is the true and better Moses who stands in the gap between the people and the Lord and who mediates a new covenant (Heb 3).

Jesus is the true and better Rock of Moses who, struck with the rod of God’s justice, now gives us water in the desert.

Jesus is the true and better Job, the truly innocent sufferer, who then intercedes for and saves his stupid friends.

Jesus is the true and better David whose victory becomes his people’s victory, though they never lifted a stone to accomplish it themselves.

Jesus is the true and better Esther who didn’t just risk leaving an earthly palace but lost the ultimate and heavenly one, who didn’t just risk his life, but gave his life to save his people.

Jesus is the true and better Jonah who was cast out into the storm so that we could be brought in.

Jesus is the real Rock of Moses, the real Passover Lamb, innocent, perfect, helpless, slain so the angel of death will pass over us. He’s the true temple, the true prophet, the true priest, the true king, the true sacrifice, the true lamb, the true light, the true bread.

The Bible’s really not about you—it’s about him."

— Tim Keller

http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justintaylor/2010/08/26/the-bible-is-not-basically-about-you/

The gospel — Timothy and Kathy Keller

“The gospel is this: We are more sinful & flawed in ourselves than we ever dared to believe, yet at the very same time we are more loved & accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared to hope. This is the only kind of relationship that will really transform us. Love without truth is sentimentality; it supports & affirms us but keeps us in denial about our flaws. Truth without love is harshness; it gives us information but in such a way that we cannot really hear it. God’s saving love in Christ, however, is marked by both radical truthfulness about who we are & yet also radical, unconditional commitment to us.”

— Timothy and Kathy Keller, The Meaning of Marriage: Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God

A Personal Necessity: someone who loves us radically, unconditionally, vulnerably – Tim Keller

“Some years ago a theologian named William Vanstone wrote a book, now out of print, that included an interesting chapter called “The Phenomenology of Love.” All human beings, he says – even people who from childhood were deprived of love – know the difference between false & true love, fake & authentic love.

Here’s the difference, Vanstone says. In false love your aim is to use the other person to fulfill your happiness. Your love is conditional: You give it only as long as the person is affirming you & meeting your needs. And it’s nonvulnerable: You hold back so that you can cut your losses if necessary. But in true love, your aim is to spend yourself & use yourself for the happiness of the other, because your greatest joy is that person’s joy. Therefore your affection is unconditional: You give it regardless of whether your loved one is meeting your needs. And it’s radically vulnerable: You spend everything, hold nothing back, give it all away. Then Vanstone says, surprisingly, that our real problem is that nobody is actually fully capable of giving true love. We want it desperately, but we can’t give it. He doesn’t say we can’t give any kind of real love at all, but he’s saying that nobody is fully capable of true love. All of our love is somewhat fake. How so? Because we need to be loved like we need air & water. We can’t live without love. That means there’s a certain mercenary quality to our relationships. We look for people whose love would really affirm us. We invest our love only where we know we’ll get a good return. Of course when we do that, our love is conditional and nonvulnerable, because we’re not loving the person simply for himself or herself; we’re loving the person partly for the love we’re getting.

Obviously there are healthy people and unhealthy people; some are more able to love than others. But at the core Vanstone is right: Nobody can give anyone else the kind or amount of love they’re starved for. In the end we’re all alike, groping for true love & incapable of fully giving it. What we need is someone to love us who doesn’t need us at all. Someone who loves us radically, unconditionally, vulnerably. Someone who loves us just for our sake. If we received that kind of love, that would so assure us of our value, it would so fill us up, that maybe we could start to give love like that too. Who can give love with no need? Jesus. Remember the dance of the Trinity – the Father, the Son, & the Spirit have been knowing & loving one another perfectly for all eternity. Within Himself, God has forever had all the love, all the fulfillment, & all the joy that He could possibly want. He has all the love within Himself that the whole human race lacks. And the only way we’re going to get any more is from Him…

Why did God create us & later redeem us at great cost even though He doesn’t need us? He did it because He loves us. His love is perfect love, radically vulnerable love. And when you begin to get it, when you begin to experience it, the fakery & manipulativeness of your own love starts to wash away, & you’ve got the patience & security to reach out & start giving a truer love to other people…”

– Timothy Keller, King's Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus

http://www.amazon.com/Kings-Cross-Story-World-Jesus/dp/0525952101