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by Dr. Timothy J. Keller

These are the unofficial, but meticolously enscribed sermon manuscripts for Timothy Keller's “Vision of Redeemer” 12-part sermon series which was preached in the fall of 2005, plus one additional sermon from Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Posted with permission.

in ePub,  mobi and pdf formats. 

These 13 sermons provide a worldview unique to the Gospel, to the preaching of Drs. Lloyd-Jones and Keller, and unique to their respective churches. We sense that these sermons encapsulate the true nature of the Gospel (in the first 3 sermons…and first three Readings of this book) – particularly the core idea of Paul in all his letters dealing with our standing before God, and summarized succinctly in Titus 3:4-6. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, [5] He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, [6] whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior.

The 4th Reading (Where is Your Faith? – by Dr. Lloyd-Jones) should remove once for all any falsely held assumption that a life of faith will be a one of great comfort and few, if any, trials.

One of the primary reasons for the division in the church over free grace and free will is the failure of one side to distinguish between law and gospel. Most synergists erroneously reason (outside of Scripture) that if something is commanded in Scripture then man must, therefore, have the moral ability to do it. Instead, after the fall, the Bible uses the holy commands as an instrument of God to strip man of all hope in himself and behold his own moral bankruptcy (Rom 3:19, 20).

"The commandments are not given inappropriately or pointlessly; but in order that through them the proud, blind man may learn the plague of his impotence, should he try to do as he is commanded." Martin Luther, Bondage of the Will, pg. 160

"By the law is the knowledge of sin' [Rom 3:20], so the word of grace comes only to those who are distressed by a sense of sin and tempted to despair." Martin Luther, Bondage of the Will, pg. 168

All the commands of our Lord were given to us to obey. We cannot twist Scripture to somehow ignore the weight of the responsibility this puts on each one of us. Grace does not somehow give us a trump card to ignore the commands. No, we appeal to grace, not in order to cancel out, avoid or do away with God's commands. On the contrary, we appeal to the grace of God in Christ in order that we might have the strength and power to do them. For apart from grace we can do nothing (John 15:5, 3:27, 6:63; 1 Cor. 4:7, 15:10; 2 Tim 2:25) If God commands us to love him with all our heart how do we do this? By grace. If God calls us to love our neighbor, how to we do this? By grace. If God summons us to believe the gospel, how do we do this? By grace. This is the message found on every page of the bible.