The Girl Nobody Wanted

Welcome to the Gospel and Life Podcast. We're excited to share a special episode with you today. It's one of Tim Keller's most shared sermons, The Girl Nobody Wanted. In the book of Genesis, Leah's life is shaped by disappointment and unmet longing, yet her story mirrors our own search for meaning. Why are we always so sure that the next thing, whether it be success, love, or recognition, will finally make us feel whole, only to find that the satisfaction never lasts. Today Dr. Keller shows how the Gospel rescues us from the weight of unfulfilled expectations, ultimately inviting us to find our true identity in Christ and his redeeming work on the cross. We just finished a series in the Old Testament of sermons and messages on how, from the Old Testament, how we can search for God, how we do spiritual searching. And we're about to start a series of messages out of the teaching of Jesus himself on how to do spiritual finding. We're going to look at all the places where Jesus talks about finding. But I'm going to do something that I hardly ever do today. And what I'm going to do almost always, virtually always, maybe only twice in my life, I'm not going to preach on the text that's been announced. Because there's been a particular passage, a particular text, that A has just been doing a real number on my heart. It's a very, very, it's a fascinating place that clarifies what the Gospel message is. Secondly, it doesn't fit from what I can tell into any series that I can conceive of in the indefinite future. And thirdly, it's appropriate because we just witnessed a wedding. I'm going to read you a passage out of the Old Testament, Genesis 29. And one of the things that we learn right away, we're struck with immediately, is that the Bible is the most unsentimental, the most unsentimental of all books when it comes to the subject of marriage and family. It is utterly realistic about this, that it is always hard and often devastating to not be married, and it is always hard and sometimes devastating to be married. And you know, in order to keep this biblical understanding, this biblical balance, it's very difficult because there's almost no support for it, institutionally, structurally. Inside this church, for example, or outside Christian circles in the secular world at large, there's a tremendous amount of fear and a tremendous amount of cynicism about marriage, with good reason, because of one of the things I just said that the Bible talks about. On the other hand, inside Christian circles, there is a tendency to say, ah, marriage, that's what life's about. Marriage, family, kids, white picket fence, and both, the Bible says both of those attitudes are utterly wrong, both of them. Because Jesus Christ, the Bible does not show us Jesus Christ pointing a marriage saying, this is what you need, but rather the Bible shows us marriage both in its strengths and even in its tremendous difficulties pointing to Jesus Christ is the thing we need. Now that's never been more obvious when I read you this account. I'm going to read Genesis 29, verses 15 to 35. Now after Jacob had been with Laban for a month, Laban said to him, just because you are a relative of mine, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be. Now Laban had two daughters. The name of the older was Leah. The name of the younger was Rachel. Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel was lovely, informed, and beautiful. Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, I'll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter, Rachel. Laban said, it's better that I should give her to you than some other man. Stay here with me. So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her. Then Jacob said to Laban, give me my wife, my time is completed, I want to lie with her. So Laban brought together all the people of the place and gave a feast. And when evening came, he took his daughter Leah and gave her to Jacob and Jacob lay with her and Laban gave his servant girl, Zilpa, to his daughter Leah as her maid servant. But when morning came, behold, it was Leah. So Jacob said to Laban, what is this? You have done to me. I served you for Rachel. Deny, why have you deceived me? And Laban replied, it is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one. Finish this daughter's bridal week and then we'll give you the younger one also in return for another seven years of work. And Jacob did so. He finished the week with Leah and then Laban gave him his daughter, Rachel, to be his wife. Laban gave his servant girl, Billhaw, to his daughter, Rachel as her maid servant. And Jacob lay with Rachel also and he loved Rachel more than Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years. Now when the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he opened her womb, though Rachel was barren. And Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Ruben for she said, it is because the Lord has seen my misery, surely my husband will love me now. She conceived again and when she gave birth to a son she said, because the Lord heard that I am not loved, he gave me this one too. So she named him Simeon. And again she conceived and when she gave birth to a son she said, now at last my husband will become attached to me because I have born him three sons. So he was named Levi. And she conceived yet again and when she gave birth to a son she said, this time I will praise the Lord. So she named him Judah and then she stopped having children. This is God's word. Now you need to know two things as background of the story and then we'll look at two features of the story and then we'll see some remarkably rich stuff in here for all of us. First of all there's two things you have to know as background of this story. You have to know that Jacob came from a family chosen by grace and a family filled with suffering. Jacob had a grandfather named Abraham and one day God comes to Abraham and he says, Abraham look at the world. Do you see the misery? Do you see the cruelty? Do you see the injustice? Do you see the disease? Do you see the tragedy? Do you see death itself? I'm going to do something about it. I'm going to heal it, I'm going to redeem it all and I'm going to do it through your family. One of your descendants will be the Messiah. So he says to Abraham and therefore this is what has to happen. You need to know that in every generation of your family there will be children but one of the children will be the seed. One child will be the Messianic seed, the bearer of the Messianic strain and that child should be head of the family and that child must walk before me and that child must pass the true faith along to all of the family because of all those children one of them will be the true seed and on and on until some day one seed will be the seed and one prophet will be the prophet and one priest will be the priest and one king will be the king of kings and Lord of lords. And that was why this is a very special family Jacob was part of but also in spite of that and this is a lesson all by itself this is a family filled with suffering because Abraham had one son Isaac but when Isaac's wife Rebecca was pregnant and she had two twin sons in her womb God sent a prophecy to Isaac and said the elder will serve the younger and that means God was saying to Isaac the second one out is the seed. Not the first one not the elder but the younger that's the seed that's the one I've chosen but out they come Jacob and Esau and what Isaac does is ignores what God says he puts his heart on Esau and he favors Esau clearly favors loves him more than Jacob and as a result devastation is wreaked on both the boys as they grow up their characters are ravaged by this because not only does Esau grow up to be rueful and proud and with no self control at all because of the way in which Isaac dotes on him and clearly makes him the favorite Jacob turns into a liar Jacob turns into a deceiver Jacob turns into a manipulator and many of you know the story what happens is when they come to they come of age Jacob one day deceives his father his father's old and he's blind and Jacob dresses up as Esau goes in and gets Isaac to give Jacob the blessing to give Jacob the birthright to give Jacob the head of the clan but when Esau realizes what he has done how is to see Esau vows to kill him and so Jacob has got to run and he flees far far away over across the fertile the desert the other side of the fertile crescent where his wife I pardon me his mother's relatives take him in his uncle layman takes him in but now you see Jacob's life's over Jacob isn't sure if it's God that screwed up if he's the one who screwed up if his father his family screwed up but he'll never fulfill his destiny now he's got no faith it's all ruined he's got no money he's got no place he's not in his homeland anymore it's all over the story that's the background you need to know two things about the the background before you get the story but now the story has two parts to it laban's plot and Leah's lot that's the two parts of the story first of all laban laban's plot laban is the uncle and laban has you know brings Jacob in sort of as a charity case and Jacob's working for him for a month as a shepherd and laban suddenly realizes something he looks and he says this guy's a great shepherd this guy's got management capabilities and he realizes that if Jacob becomes a a a foreman for him he could tremendously expand his operation and he could make a tremendous amount of money as long as he doesn't have to pay Jacob too much and so he comes to Jacob and he says I'd like to give you a contract you know what do you want in order to work for me and Jacob says Rachel now Jacob really screwed up here because when you're talking to a disheister when you're talking to a con artist you never let them know your area of weakness as soon as laban sees this as soon as he realized this guy will do anything for Rachel laban's got him why because in laban Jacob has met his match because Jacob's a liar Jacob's a con artist and so is laban but laban's been out at 25 more years and as a result you see he's much more experienced at this and so laban says I got a way that I can deal with two problems at once I will use this now will exploit this man's weakness to deal with two problems at once so what are the two problems well the first problem of course is how do I make lots and lots and lots of money how do I get out of this guy a tremendous amount of valuable skill with very little to pay for it so I can become a wealthy man but a second problem is Leah this man had two daughters and the verse of course you might remember I tried to read it slowly but I probably didn't it says now laban had two daughters the older was you Leah and the name of the younger was Rachel Leah had weak eyes but Rachel was lovely in form and beautiful now if you go to various translations you'll find that every single one of the translations will say will describe Leah's eyes differently some will say she had tender eyes some will say she had delicate eyes some will say she had broken eyes you know because that's what the word really means is is a breakable fragile thing and nobody really quite knows exactly what the word means but it's not that hard when you look at the context you see does it say when it uses the word weak does it mean that that Leah's vision was weak well if it says Leah's vision was weak it should say Leah had weak vision but Rachel could see a long long way but that's not what it says it's not talking about how they looked it's talking about how they looked it's not talking about how they looked with their eyes it's what it's talking about what they look like what it's really saying is this these were two girls these were not women yet almost for sure and you have two girls here and one of them had either cross eyes or protruding eyes or some kind of eye disorder but whatever it was she was ugly and Rachel was gorgeous one was ugly duckling who had never become a swan and one was absolutely gorgeous and these two girls that had to grow up together with each other and layman had a problem now listen here's where the Bible is brutally frank and if you say off thank goodness we're beyond all this oh are we are we layman says I'll never marry this poor woman off I'll never marry him this daughter off I have way to get rich and get rid of the daughter that would be around my neck for the rest of my life that's the kind of man he was and so what does he do well it's pretty interesting Jacob says I'll work for Rachel for seven years what does layman say verse 19 it's better that I give you to you it's better than I give her to you than to some other man so stay here with me he didn't say yes in other words he said something that led Jacob to believe he was saying yes but he would always be able to come back later and say Jacob read the fine print he says it's better for you that better for me that she should go to you than some stranger but he didn't say yes so Jacob goes for seven years and then finally Jacob says now I've done my seven years send me my wife but it was fine and of course at the time of the as you might have noticed this a wedding feast was a week long and I was we'll get into this in a minute Jacob of course was just more happy than he's than most people at wedding feasts because now I have Rachel now finally something's going right in my life finally something will console me for all the problems I've always had and so everybody begins to get drunk and right in the middle of the very first night in comes the wife in comes the bride all veiled and they embrace and they are married and they go into the tent and they lie together and they go to bed together and the Hebrew literally says and it's a great it's a great narrative ploy the Hebrew literally says but when morning came behold it was Leah Jacob goes and says well have you done this to me and Laban says wait it's the custom I mean you know you can't marry the younger daughter off before the older it's not illegal here this is the custom this is the way we do things you have to have the older daughter has to be married before the younger and lovesick Jacob says well what do I do and he says I'll tell you what you can marry Rachel too but you have to work another seven years for her and Jacob says yes and now because of all this of all this manipulation and these deceiving men Leah is thrown into hell Leah who probably could have hardened her heart had she stayed single for a long time she could have dealt with the fact that she was unwanted he dealt with the fact that in a world like this she was not marketable you saw we're beyond all that are we beyond all that is our society that different and she might have been able to harden her heart but because of these men she is now put into a situation where she is married to a man who not only doesn't love her and many many people have that but the person that she does love is also a wife right there it's her sister and she's put into hell and the last verses of this passage are the most plaintive I know of hardly anywhere in the bottom of any place because every time she names a child when she begins to have children she says now now maybe my husband will love me now maybe I'll have some meaning in life and every time she actually uses the she names Ruben Ruben because it's Ruben means I'm seen and some means I'm heard and Levi means I'm attached and every time a child comes along she says now maybe finally I'll be visible now maybe finally I'll be heard now maybe finally he'll cleave to me see and every time surely now my husband will love me now and it never happens but in the last verse this is what we read in the very last verse we read and finally she conceived again and when she gave birth to a son she said this time I will praise the Lord so she named him Judah and she stopped having children and that's the gospel what let me get let's draw out the lessons and let's do the way the gospel does okay six lessons three bad news three good news that's how the gospel goes lots of bad news at the beginning but then the good news is so much gooder than the bad news was bad now let's take the first three there's three things here let's do the bad news there's a lot of bad news in this story number one ready you never do sin sin does you you never commit sin sin commits you look carefully people think that when you do a sin when you break God's law when you lie when you use somebody when you trample on somebody when you sin you feel like that's just an event that's just an action no it's not the Bible says that when you sin you don't just do an event and you pass on you create and you release a devastating power that careens around your life indefinitely look at what's going on here I mean there's so many examples of this in here and I wish I I don't have time I'm not going to trace them all out look what Isaac does to Jacob look at how he favors Esau look at how he look at what he does to Jacob and now look what's going on reverb Jacob is doing the same thing to Leah that his father did to him and not only that because of what Isaac did to Jacob Jacob does it back to Isaac you see and eventually of course as you go if you keep on going down the fact that he does this to Leah means that Leah's children hate Rachel's children when they finally show up Joseph and because Leah's children hate Rachel's children because of the way in which Jacob sinned and deceived they eventually sell Joseph into slavery and then they deceive Jacob and say he's dead and Jacob goes through utter hell hell begets hell lie begets lie sin begets sin you never sin you don't do it it does you you never sin and pass away sin is like a boulder not onto the stone sin is like dropping a boulder into water shock waves they go out forever friends listen you never get away with it you never get away with it anything that's a violation of God's will for how people should live here and how people should live together you never get away with it you don't do sin sin does you that's the first bit of bad news second bit of bad news and that is all life here is marked by cosmic disappointment cosmic disappointment now I listen I want to say something quickly having read this thing and thought about this thing and thought about this passage I want you to know that I love Leah and I am protective of her in this story but for a minute I got to tell you that she represents something very bad one of the most fascinating things in the narrative is the way it turns on you because here is Jacob saying finally finally I'm gonna have happiness in this life finally finally I've got Rachel but behold in the morning it was Leah and there is a very interesting little commentary written by one of my favorite writers Derek Kidner and he puts it this way this this Derek Kidner says but in the morning behold it was Leah this is a miniature of our disillusionment experienced from Eden onwards Jonah is one of the most widely known stories in the Bible but it's so much more than a simple account of a prophet who runs from God and gets swallowed by a great fish in his book rediscovering Jonah Tim Keller uncovers the deeper message of this familiar story revealing how Jonah's resistance to God exposes our own reluctance to trust and obey him and how Jonah's experience ultimately points us to Jesus and his saving work on the cross during the month of May we'll send you a copy of rediscovering Jonah is our thanks for your gift to help gospel in life share the transforming love of Christ with more people so request your copy today at gospel in life.com slash give that's gospel in life.com slash give now here's Dr. Keller with the rest of today's teaching you know what he's saying he's saying this is a miniature of a fact that you everybody in this room needs to know you critically need to know it and that is this no matter what your hopes for a project no matter what your hopes for marriage no matter what your hopes for love no matter what your hopes for a career no matter what you have hopes in in the morning it will always be Leah no matter what you think is Rachel it will always be Leah now nobody ever put it nobody ever put it any better than Lewis CS Lewis in his chapter on hope he says most people if they really learn to look into their own hearts and that's what I'm urging you to do right now most people if they really learn to look into their own hearts would know that they do want and want acutely something they cannot be had in this world there are all sorts of things in this world offer to give it to you but they never keep their promise the longings which arise in us when we first fall in love or first think of some foreign country or first take up some subject that excites us our longings which no marriage no travel no learning can ever really satisfy I am not speaking of what would ordinarily be called successful marriages or holidays pardon me I'm not speaking of what would ordinarily be called unsuccessful marriages or failures of holidays and so on I'm speaking of the very best possible ones there is always something we have grasped that there's always something in that first moment of longing but fades away in the reality the spouse may be a good spouse the senior has been excellent it turned out to be a good job but it's evaded us in the morning it's always Leah now the reason you have to understand that is because I tell you it's painful to overhear people's lives you notice what I said I didn't say overhear people's words because people don't say these things out loud but you can be you hear there in their life you hear it I overhear it when I see people's choices I overhear it when I see people's attitudes when I see what they're doing and that is this you overhear people saying essentially oh I'm gonna have such a career I'm gonna get myself a hunk I'm gonna get myself a babe and I'm gonna live in this place and I'm gonna live in this place and I'm gonna live in this place and I am gonna have a life in the morning it's always Leah this is the miniature of the disillusionment which is our lot from Eden onwards and your life eventually I tell you eventually it is definitely going to come through eventually you're gonna see it and when you do there's only four possibility possible ways of responding to that there's only four ways to go and you're gonna have to choose one of them and totally shape the rest of your life you'll either say you'll either blame the things you have and say I've got to get better ones better woman better man better job or secondly you'll blame yourself and just hate yourself or thirdly you'll blame life and you'll harden yourself so you'll never hope for anything at all or fourthly you can blame your theory of reality and you can say if there's nothing in this world that ever is Rachel then Rachel must be beyond this world if there's nothing in this world that ever satisfied me then that means I am made for something beyond this world now there's only four possible answers four possible responses which one is it gonna be one makes you a fool one makes you a self-hater one makes you an utterly hard cynic and one makes you a Christian now thirdly and it's very linked first of all the first bit of bad news is sin you never do sin sin does you secondly all life is marked by cosmic disappointment in the morning it's always Leah always thirdly but as bad as life is you make it much worse through idolatry and especially the idolatry of a family now I know this to me may sound very strange but what we have here is a form of idolatry where you put your hope in something to give you a sense of being loved being valuable giving your life meaning and this is not these are not idols of the liberal world these are idols of the conservative world because Jacob says if I get this gorgeous wife on my arm if I'm married then I finally will have happiness and it didn't work and poor Leah she turns and says if I have a child if I have children if I have sons if I have this wonderful family then I'll be worth something then I'll be loved and it never works don't you know that when you build your life on white picket fence when you build your life on either before or after it happens on being married and having a perfect family and all of your children growing to be so happy the Bible comes against that huh well doesn't the Bible come against immorality and adultery and and orgies and living together and you know well yeah some other place that's not the text we have here we got a text coming against conservative idols here we have a text coming against traditional values we have a text that's saying if you build your life on a spouse at the very best you'll be emotionally dependent or you'll be controlling you'll be judgmental and if anything goes wrong with that spouse if that spouse has any problems you will go to pieces and you'll be of no help to that spouse or anybody else if you build your life on your children at the very least you'll try to live your life out through your children till they either hate you or they don't have any identity of their own and at worst you'll end up abusing them because they have got to be good they have got to be right they've got to love you or you don't have a life and again and again you see Leah saying ah a son now does she just fit right in with traditional values especially at the time you're nobody unless you have children you're a woman so you must have children and and she does and it doesn't work if she'd had a nicer husband she might have been able to live in the delusion for a longer time but fortunately for her she didn't and she came to see that idols always make the disappointment of this world far far far worse now that's the bad news but what's the good news the good news is gooder than the bad news was bad three things first of all the good news is that God works with a very weak people now somebody here surely this is New York somebody out there is saying this is the stuff I hate in the Bible why did you bring something out like this here you've got Jacob and look how he's oppressing these women look at how he's acting polygamy bigamy look at women being you know moved around and abused and and sold and and look at this is what I hate about the Bible now dear friends we could spend a little bit of time on that in the whole Bible there every place the Bible condemns bigamy polygamy every part of God's law and if you think this text showing us the absolute misery and hell that comes when women are treated like this if you think this text in any way condones that this text is a screed against that it's a but that's not your problem the reason when people read these kinds of stories they get so bummed out and they get confused as this you have got a spiritual paradigm I want to shatter right now when you read the Bible and you see all this stupidity and all this stab in the back and all this foolishness on the part of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and David and everybody you say what's going on here you know why you're so upset because you think the Bible should be a book of virtues you think the Bible should be a series of inspirational stories with role models you think the Bible should be a series of stories of heroes and that proves that you don't understand the gospel the Bible is not about role models it's not about emulating these great people the Bible gives you again and again men and women who God continues to work with even though they resist his grace they don't deserve his grace they don't seek his grace and then they don't even appreciate it after they've been saved by his grace and a story after story after story now why would God give us stories like that why would God continue to work with this guy unless you're incredibly proud you don't realize what incredibly good news this is how can you be offended at this unless you have a tremendously unrealistically high view of yourself my dear friends listen you think if you think the Bible should be a book of virtues inspirational stories of role miles we should be emulating that means you think that the Bible should be like all the other scriptures and all the other religions but they're not because every other religion says God is the top of a ladder he's put a ladder down between you and heaven you know heaven and earth and he's standing at the top of the ladder and he's saying perform do good live right emulate the heroes if you try real hard you can come up the ladder to heaven but Jesus Christ said you will see angels ascending and descending on the Son of man because Jesus Christ said you'll never come up the ladder you'll never emulate look at all these guys look at all they have revelation from God they have miracles in their lives they have all kinds of incredible things happen to them and they screw up again and again and again are by God the Christian God is not a God who stands at the top of the ladder but who sent his son down to be the ladder he's not a God who says perform but he says God my son Jesus Christ will come down and live a life you should have lived and died the death you should have died and that's the reason why this Bible stories are a series not of stories of role models emulate but weak people like you and me whom a weak God had to come down and become weak and die on the cross to save us God works with weak people that's the first good news second good news God works through weak people Laban really hurt Leah didn't he Laban really hurt Jacob didn't he and yet I'm going to be very fast let's me 30 seconds because I'm going to move on to the last point if you understand how God used Laban in their lives you'll see that it was only because of Laban and all of this shyness and all of his meanness that Jacob finally began to get humbled you know the reason a lot of commentators say oh my goodness why is it that Jacob didn't put up more of a fuss when he realized what Laban was doing he could have insisted he could have said no way seven more years for Rachel why didn't he because he realized what was happening to him was exactly what he'd been doing he saw himself in Laban and he hated it he finally began to come around he finally began to get some perspective he finally began to realize who he really was and what he'd really done see God works in your life through weak people right now there's a Laban in your life instead of just screaming why in the world Lord have you put this Laban in my life you have to realize that God works not just with weak people but he works in your life through weak people but lastly God is attracted he's attracted to the weakest see he doesn't just work with and work through but he works in the weakest and the most broken of all this is what is so astounding Leah now one thing you can't realize as you watch her cry out to God and talk about how I want my husband to love me maybe now is that she uses a vocabulary that commentators over the years have been struck by there's two words that are used for God in the Old Testament in your English translation the one word is the word translated God and it's translated God I said God okay and it's and it's the Hebrew word Elohim it's a generic name for God it just means God and everybody used the word all religions all people everybody used the word God it meant the great one but when God came down to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob he gave him a new name he gave him a personal name was the name Yahweh and in the old this word Yahweh was a word that a name he only gave to people to whom he was also giving the story of salvation he only said Yahweh to people who said to whom he said I want you to believe my promise that through a descendant I will save the world and every place the word Yahweh shows up in the English Old Testament you don't see the word God translate what do you see the Lord and Leah floundering around like a madwoman doing anything she can to deal with the hell she's in anything she can to start to feel like how do I get my how do I get out of this I always knew I was homely I always knew that I was you know in the world's eyes I was nothing and now every day it just pushed into my face how am I going to survive this and she says a child a child but every time she has a child she cries out and she faces her husband now my husband will save me now my husband will love me and she looks at the child but she also says every time the Lord she begins to call the name Yahweh now wait a minute what happened we didn't hear about what Leah must have heard the promise the promise of the seed the promise of salvation and she began not just to believe in a general God at the top of the ladder to whom she must submit which is what everybody else in the world believed but she began to grab hold of at first only partially of the idea of the Lord Yahweh the God who will save by grace and what's so fascinating is look carefully and you will see if you go back and read this passage that she's turning to her husband to her husband until the very end and at the very very end something changes something radically changes every time she says now my husband will love me now my husband will love me now my husband will love me and then it says she conceived again and then she gave birth to a son and she said this time I will praise the Lord now what did she do finally no talk about her husband what had happened through this suffering she stopped turning to her husband she stopped looking to her children she stopped looking to anything else and she said I'm going to praise the Lord and at that moment she got her life back at that moment Laban Jacob all the people who had abused her and abused her as long as she had stayed in the idolatry she would have been a slave but at that point she stood up and she got her life back and more than that look who was the child when she finally stopped turning from her husband when she stopped turning from her husband and she stopped looking to her husband for those things that only God can give and when she finally turned to God she said this time I will praise the Lord and the child was what it was Judah who's Judah get this God comes to Leah and says you'll be the mother of Jesus because Judah was Judah was the seed but more than that Leah became the seed Leah the outsider Leah the ugly Leah the rejected because she grabbed hold with faith she got her life back from all the people that had ruined it for her she got it back and God comes down and makes her into the seed she goes ahead of her husband she understands the gospel better than her husband and at the very end she stands up and God says now through your suffering because you have come to understand the gospel of grace you are the seed and your son Judah's the seed and you become the mother of Jesus now how could this be how could this possibly be why would God choose Leah to do that and the answer is right here when the Lord saw that Leah was not loved he came to her and now we know the Old Testament shows us what the New Testament really really tells us God loves those who others don't love God is attracted because of his gracious nature and he wants the ones that no one else wants but more than that when he sees a wife who's not loved he shows that there's a heavenly bridegroom he shows that there's a heavenly husband Jesus Christ the Bible tells us is the bridegroom he's not just a king and we're the servants he's not just a shepherd and we're the sheep he's the bridegroom and we're the bride and what happened is Jesus Christ came to earth and died he lost his true beauty the beauty of a noble soul the beauty of holiness he lost his true beauty live the life we should have lived died the death we should have died so that when we believe in him what we become his bride I'll tell you what it is so that though we may look like Leah to Jesus Christ we look like Rachel that's the gospel we might look like Leah in ourselves but to Jesus Christ we look gorgeous and that is exactly what God does here we see here in the Old Testament a foretaste and a hint of the fact that God is the heavenly bridegroom he sees the wife who's unwanted that's the reason why God chooses the foolish to shame the wise God chooses the weak to shame the strong God chooses the things that are despised even the things that are not to bring to nothing the things that are so that we might understand God's grace conclusion if you're a person here who's still searching for God you need to understand this God is not the top of the ladder he sent his son to be the ladder secondly if you're a person who is very upset whenever you get near a wedding because you're so angry that you're not married or if you're still just incredibly desperate to be married you've missed the point in the morning it's never what you thought you cannot look to anything but Jesus Jesus is the only in heaven we have a father that will deal with all of our imperfect fathers here in heaven we have a brother that will deal with all our imperfect families in heaven we have a spouse that will deal with all our imperfect spouses and until we make him the one until we say this time I will praise the Lord we'll never be able to deal with all the imperfection around us never if there's anybody in this in this building right now that feels like somebody else has ruined my life look at Leah what a picture Leah gets her life back she doesn't have to be bitter she doesn't have to hate she doesn't have to deceive back she doesn't she says this time I will praise the Lord I won't look to anything else to give me what only Jesus Christ can be for me I will not add anything to Jesus Christ as a requirement for being happy do that and you'll get your life back is there anybody here who feels ugly the only eyes that count are radiant with you the only eyes that count are ravished by you that's the only comfort that can't be quenched let's pray our father we pray that you'd help us to get that balance that is so difficult forgive us for the uh the liberal idols and the conservative idols forgive us for all the ways in which we try to blame ourselves or our our society or other people for what's wrong in our hearts we pray that you would help us hear the good news that we can like Leah praise you and have your grace come into our life and be used for great things we thank you that you made her into a great heart we thank you that you brought her to greatness through her suffering because she came to understand the difference between salvation by grace and by works we pray that you'd help everybody in this room to understand the same in Jesus name we ask it amen thanks for joining us here on the gospel and life podcast if you were encouraged by today's teaching you can help others discover this podcast by rating and reviewing it and to find more great gospel-centered content by tim keller anytime visit gospelandlife.com today's sermon was recorded in 1998 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