Tim Keller Did Not Avoid Difficult Topics for the Sake of Being ‘Winsome,’ Says Kathy Keller

“While the Sunday sermon was intentionally focused on the gospel of Jesus and his redemptive work as the best way to understand whatever Bible passage was being preached on, hot-button issues were not ignored,” said Kathy. “They were fully, adequately and biblically addressed numerous times with regular church attendees and skeptics alike at venues and events outside of worship.”

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This posture was true of Keller even in his personal life, said Kathy. “His brother Billy was a gay man who died of AIDS when [Billy] was 40 years old. And [Billy’s] partner Joachim, we would always have dinner with him when we went through Baltimore on our way to the beach every summer.” 

“And Joachim had no trouble with Tim being a Presbyterian minister, but then he realized he wasn’t a United Presbyterian minister,” said Kathy. “He was the other kind, so [Joachim’s] battle plan every time we had dinner was to come with this whole list of mic drop questions that he would lob at Tim, like, ‘I’m going to get you, mister. You’re not going to be able to answer this.’” 

“And it was something that Tim had heard 500 times and was able to answer gently and persuasively etc.,” Kathy said. “It just frustrated Joachim so badly because…he wanted so badly to just put Tim in a place that he couldn’t wiggle out of.”

“And Tim wasn’t trying to wiggle out of anything,” she said. “He just knew that the truth is the truth. And when you say it, that’s all there is to it.”