In spring of last 12 months, a lot of us saw a photograph of the late Timothy Keller sitting on a park bench. The photo was used on the quilt of Collin Hansen’s biography of Keller, and it circulated across the web in May when he passed away—on social media, blogs, and even Keller’s personal website.
What most of us didn’t see, nonetheless, was the banana peel lying on the bench only a pair feet from Keller. The peel has been cropped from most versions of the photo, and understandably so. Who desires to see an unpleasant brown little bit of organic waste in an creator’s photograph?
I confess that if I were a world-famous pastor and best-selling creator having my picture taken by knowledgeable photographer, I’d most definitely have moved the banana peel before someone took my picture. Who wouldn’t? But Keller didn’t appear to care.
I think this points to a deeper character trait of Keller’s, which many observed during his lifetime of ministry: an indifference to fame and to curating a picture—something a lot of us struggle with within the social media era. This can be a part of why, I think, he finished his race so well.
Finishing well in life and ministry has been historically difficult for believers, especially for those in positions of leadership. Think of Gideon or Solomon within the Old Testament, Demas within the New Testament, or, in fact, the various church leaders today who’ve infamously did not persevere.
The esteem that leaders receive from the Christian community can allow for hidden flaws to grow like rust on the hull of a ship, unnoticed and unaddressed at first. But as these leaders reach greater influence, greater weight is placed on these flaws—which might reach dangerous levels of corrosion—and might often be enough to sink the entire ship of their character and legacy. Yet Keller’s neither corroded nor sank.
As Keller wrote in his best-selling booklet on self-forgetfulness, “Friends, wouldn’t you should be a one that doesn’t need honor—neither is afraid of it? Someone who doesn’t lust for recognition—nor, then again, is frightened to death of it?” As someone who seemed neither to lust for recognition nor to be frightened by it, this description looked as if it would fit Keller well.
Arianne Ramaker, who took the unique image in Paris while photographing Keller for an article, wrote in our piece of email, “Because the theme of the article was ‘being a Christian in the town’ and since I like documentary photography, I didn’t change anything in regards to the environment. … To me, such a banana peel makes it real and unpolished, as life is.” She added, “I’m … totally surprised that my photo has been used a lot.” I believe Keller probably felt the identical surprise in regards to the success of his own ministry.
In our day of fracturing alliances and shifting loyalties—particularly with respect to how Christians should best engage culture—it’s no surprise that a Christian leader like Keller, who often spoke about cultural engagement, had critics who wished he was stronger on one issue or one other. Yet people rarely condemn his character, which stays generally acknowledged as inimitable.
“You won’t find leaders near Keller who idolize him,” Collin Hansen writes in his biography. “But they do admire him for his charactzer.”
When Jesus noticed how religious and political leaders in his own time often “selected the places of honor,” he told a parable. “When you’re invited by someone to a marriage feast,” he said, “don’t sit down in a spot of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited. … But if you find yourself invited, go and sit in the bottom place.” He added, “For everyone who exalts himself will probably be humbled, and he who humbles himself will probably be exalted” (Luke 14:7–11, ESV).
Francis Schaeffer comments on this parable in his famous sermon “No Little People, No Little Places.” He writes,
Jesus commands Christians to hunt consciously the bottom room. All of us—pastors, teachers, skilled religious employees and non-professional included—are tempted to say, “I’ll take the larger place, because it’ll give me more influence for Jesus Christ.” Both individual Christians and Christian organizations fall prey to the temptation of rationalizing this fashion as we construct larger and larger empires.
The rationale that larger is all the time higher, Schaeffer argued, was taking Jesus’ words backward. “We should consciously take the bottom place,” he said, “unless the Lord himself extrudes us right into a greater one.” This idea of “extruding” comes from manufacturing: “Picture an enormous press jamming soft metal at high pressure through a die in order that the metal comes out in a certain shape,” Schaeffer said. “This is the way in which of the Christian: He should select the lesser place until God extrudes him right into a position of more responsibility and authority.”
This was Keller’s way. Although he stood well over two feet taller than Frodo Baggins, the beloved character in J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy—books he never stopped reading—Keller remained just as unlikely and unassuming of a personality on a very important quest. No one who starts his first pastorate with a rural church of just 90 people in Hopewell, Virginia, may very well be expected to change into a household name amongst confessing evangelicals only a number of a long time later.
Even when Keller moved to Manhattan in 1989 to start out Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Collin Hansen notes, “he deliberately avoided publicizing the church, especially to other Christians.” Why? Because “he wanted to fulfill skeptics of faith within the Upper East Side greater than he desired to sell books in Nashville.”
I’ve never been to Nashville, but in the identical way I’d have moved the banana peel, I confess my heart too often feels more excited to sell books in Nashville than to like the people God has placed around me. These temptations with ministry ego return a while. Unchecked, I’m more of a Boromir than a Baggins.
Image: Photography by Arianne Ramaker / Courtesy of Redeemer City to City
Tim Keller sitting next to a banana peel.
When I interviewed for my current ministry role, I remember standing within the basement, chatting with the pastoral search team. It could be an understatement to say the kitchen looked more dated than I’d have preferred. Ditto for the entire constructing. And the neighborhood hadn’t aged well either. For context, I used to be leaving a big church with a brand-new constructing in a growing a part of the town. That church kitchen had a large stainless-steel industrial dishwasher. I didn’t know the best way to use it, but it surely sure looked cool.
To use Schaeffer’s word, once I got here to our church, I felt the Lord extruding me—but downward, not upward.
Over ten years have passed since then, and I’m still here. I’m not famous, and I doubt I’ve sold many books in Nashville because I haven’t sold many books anywhere. But I can testify in 100 ways to the kindness of God. In the words of Jesus, our church has experienced good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, in our lap (Luke 6:38). The temptation to hunt great things still lingers, but I proceed to learn that the way in which of life is present in dying to our sin.
In Keller’s last video message to his church before passing away, he spoke to this, reflecting on Jeremiah 45, a lesser-known passage a few scribe named Baruch who, evidently, began to think too highly of himself. “Do you seek great things for yourself?” God asks rhetorically. “Seek them not” (v. 5).
Keller used quoted his passage as he told his church, “Ministers fairly often come to New York to make a reputation for themselves.” After living 34 years in the town, I’m sure this was not a hypothetical scenario for him. He continued, “Ministers, don’t make your ministry success your identity. … Hallowed be Thy name. Forget yourself, forget your fame.”
This advice got here from someone who had a stellar fame—as a pastor, theologian, evangelist, and creator. And I’m thankful that God extruded Keller to a spot of prominence. I’m thankful for the church-planting empire that the Lord built through him and for the various resources he’s published that proceed to assist people like me and churches like mine today. But had Keller not finished well the race marked out for him (Heb. 12:1), none of that may have mattered.
Which is why I’m most thankful for the reminder left by Keller’s legacy—one which so many church leaders need today—that humility and self-forgetfulness are godly virtues that make sure the impact of our ministry far outlasts our lives.
Benjamin Vrbicek is the lead pastor at Community Evangelical Free Church in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the managing editor for Gospel-Centered Discipleship, and the creator of several books.
