John Piper's Blog, page 282
January 11, 2016
Navigating Trials in the New America
The church in America is slowly awakening from the distortion of 350 years of dominance and prosperity. Until recently, being a Christian in America has been viewed as normal, good, patriotic, culturally acceptable, even beneficial. By and large, being a Christian has generally resulted in things going well for you. At least this has been true for what used to be called the WASPs — white Anglo-Saxon Protestants. But also for others in greater or lesser degrees.
Being dominant culturally and prosperous materially, Christians have come to feel at home — this is “our land” and “our culture” — and the assumption is that it will go well for us here. We enjoy being well thought of, and we expect things to go well. In such a framework, poverty, sickness, suffering, and death are the worst things that can happen, and there isn’t anything much worse.
We expect that this Christian land will be wealthy, and that we will be wealthy and healthy — or at least have a shot at it. Those of us in the white, middle-class mainstream expect life to be comfortable, upbeat, and success-oriented. And we’ve developed a form of Christianity to support those ingrained expectations. To be a Christian is to be accepted. To be a Christian is to be comfortable. To be a Christian is to be secure and to be accepted, maybe even admired. That form of Christianity has focused mainly on how we feel and whether our felt needs are getting met.
Rudely Awakened
For 350 years in America, the call to be a Christian has not been the call to be an alien. It has not been a call to be a sojourner or an exile or to be out of step with society. Rather, far too many of us have taken it as a call to be a respected citizen in the community.
And we get angry, really angry — watch it happen as we’re slowly awakening from this — if anyone treats our Christianity as though it’s not the norm. “You’re taking away my culture. You’re taking away my land.” We get mad because we’ve developed a Christianity with assumptions about dominance and prosperity, about being normal and fitting in. “This is our way here. If you don’t like it, go somewhere else.”
There is some truth in the assumed connection between being a Christian and being prosperous. If you live like a Christian, you very well may be more successful in life. Not getting drunk may help you keep your job. Not committing adultery may help you keep your marriage together. Not killing may keep you out of prison. Telling the truth may get you a good name. If you do what the Bible says, life sometimes goes better — so being a Christian obviously brings success, doesn’t it?
The problem is that this is totally out of proportion. We have come to take all of those relatively minor spinoffs of devotion to Jesus and elevated them above the massive, real pleasures of knowing him, loving him, and dying and being with him forever. So much is out of proportion in typical American Christianity! In particular, it’s out of step with the whole tenor of the New Testament. For example, it does not fit with the apostle Peter’s charge that we think it not strange when insults, oppositions, and trials come upon us because of our faith in Jesus.
Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. (1 Peter 4:12–14)
For many of us who are slowly awakening from the dream world of American cultural Christianity, this text fills us with a longing not to be domesticated, comfort-seeking, entertainment-addicted, prosperity-loving, security-craving, approval-desiring Christians. We don’t want to be that. It’s abominable to us to be that. We don’t want to waste our lives just fitting in.
O, how we want to be set free from this distortion! We want to be biblical. We want to have real spiritual, other-worldly power on our lives. We want to have stunningly, counter-cultural hope driving our engines.
So, as American Christians continue to awaken from the distortion, we want to help, and be helped — from the Bible and from Christians around the world, for whom insults, opposition, and all-out persecution are not alien but part of what it means everyday to be a follower of Jesus in a world that persecuted him.
Navigating the New America
In our new book, Think It Not Strange: Navigating Trials in the New America, a diverse team of contributors, representing five continents, links arms to help American Christians get ready for the insults, trials, opposition, and even persecution that may lie ahead.
After our short introductory chapters, Bethlehem College & Seminary professors Brian Tabb and Joe Rigney reintroduce us to the fierce resistance against the early church. Then in the heart of the book, four writers, from four different nations, feed our faith with stories of Christian resilience in the throes of persecution:
Dieudonné Tamfu, from Cameroon, walks with us the well-worn path of suffering from the post-apostolic fathers all the way down to the threat of Boko Haram in Africa today.
Steve Timmis, from the United Kingdom, gives us a glimpse not only into what may be looming in his post-Christian nation, but sobers us with stories from his ministry among the persecuted underground church in the 1980s Soviet Union.
World-traveler Tim Keesee opens windows for us into places like Pakistan, the Middle East, and North Africa where the doors are “closed” to gospel witness — and suffering for the Christian faith is the norm.
D. Glenn, who works among Syrian refugees fleeing the horrors of ISIS, invites us into the global “fellowship of the suffering.”
Finally, Tim Cain, a church planter among the poor, prepares us for the trials that will come from within, and missions leader Bob Blincoe puts our stateside opposition in perspective by renewing the call to complete the Commission in the hardest places on the planet.
Our prayer is that God would be pleased to use these short chapters to stir your faith and make you one of the happy Christians who will be undaunted in the coming days. We believe these are great days to be alive, for the sake of gospel advance and the fame of Jesus. May he steady your ship for the storms to come.
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Note: Six of these contributors will be giving ten-minute “small talks” at the upcoming Bethlehem Conference for Pastors + Church Leaders, January 25–27, in Minneapolis. Our theme is “Joy Set Before Us: Perseverance and Hope in the Day of Opposition.”
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January 10, 2016
Who Is There to Harm You?
It is astonishing to hear Peter say, “Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?” (1 Peter 3:13). What could he possibly mean?
No other book in the Bible addresses the issue of Christian, non-retaliating, unjust suffering more than 1 Peter. For example,
This is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. (2:19)
When you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. (2:20)
Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing. (3:9)
If you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. (3:14)
It is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil. (3:17)
Rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. (1 Peter 4:13)
If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed. (4:14)
If anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. (4:16)
Let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good. (4:19)
The same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. (5:9)
Peter is intent on preparing Christians to suffer well. He does not want them to be surprised when it comes: “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you” (4:12). It is not strange. It is part of the expected end-time judgment.
The end of all things is at hand. . . . It is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? (4:7, 17)
In other words, the fiery trial purifies Christians and punishes those who do not obey the gospel.
A Surprising Statement About Christian Suffering
Therefore, in the context of this book, it is astonishing to hear Peter say, “Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?” (1 Peter 3:13). This is a rhetorical question. No answer is given. He expects us to supply the answer. And the answer he expects is, “No one.” The question implies, “There is no one to harm you, if you are zealous for what is good.” That’s the way rhetorical questions work.
What does he mean? Bore in with me on the context.
Just before this surprising statement Peter quoted Psalm 34:12–16 (in 1 Peter 3:10–12). He gives this quotation as an argument for why we will inherit a blessing if we bless those who revile us. “To this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing. For . . .” (3:9–10).
The argument in support of our being blessed for blessing those who revile us is, first, because we will “see good days if we turn from evil and do good” (3:10–11); and, second, because “the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous. . . . But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil” (3:12).
Now here’s the surprising thing. That very argument for why we will inherit a blessing for blessing those who curse us is also the basis for what Peter says next: “Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?” (3:13).
So the very same argument is given for saying seemingly opposite things:
“You will be blessed for blessing those who revile you.”
and
“You will not be harmed by any one if you do what is good.”
The essence of that argument is that the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous. Peter’s insistence that no harm will come to the righteous is based on the fact that God’s eyes are on them. So his point is not that good deeds prevent others from abusing us. But that God’s people are doers of good deeds, and he is vigilant to watch over them.
So Peter infers, “If God’s eyes are on us, no one can harm us.” Has he somehow lost the conviction that pervades the whole book — that suffering for doing good is to be expected? No. For the next verse says, “But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed” (3:14). Why? Because “the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous” (3:12).
It seems to me, therefore, that what Peter is saying is: “When you are under my sovereign watch-care, those who cause you suffering do not bring you harm, but blessing.” Peter is differentiating between temporary harm and ultimate harm. Under God’s watchful, loving, sovereign care, those who are zealous for good deeds will only endure what leads to greater blessing. No ultimate harm.
This is confirmed as we keep reading. The next words go like this: “Have no fear of them, nor be troubled” (3:14). But he has just said, “Even if you should suffer.” So why should we not fear? It is going to hurt. That’s what “suffering” means. We should not fear because Peter believes that this hurt is not ultimate hurt. It is ultimate blessing. “If you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed” (3:14).
Safe and Fearless with Jesus
There’s more — at least three more clues that when Peter says, “Who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?” he means: No one can ultimately harm you.
If we look carefully, we realize that in 1 Peter 3:15, Peter is giving a loose quotation from Isaiah:
Do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. But the LORD of hosts, him you shall honor as holy. Let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. And he will become a sanctuary. (Isaiah 8:12–14)
Peter adapts this amazingly, and substitutes “the Lord Christ” for “the LORD of hosts.” Instead of saying, “Honor Yahweh as holy,” he says “Honor Christ the Lord as holy” (3:15). In both 1 Peter and Isaiah this is given as the alternative to fearing the enemy:
Isaiah: “Do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread.” (Isaiah 8:12)
Peter: “Have no fear of them, nor be troubled.” (1 Peter 3:14)
And Isaiah supplies the reason they don’t need to fear what others fear: “And he will become a sanctuary” (Isaiah 8:14). That is, no matter what happens, Yahweh (and now Christ the Lord) will surround you so that no ultimate harm will befall you.
I say not ultimate harm because Peter has already said in 3:14 that the ones we are not to fear are the very ones who in fact are harming us — “Even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them.” Why not fear those who are harming us? Because Christ the Lord is your sanctuary, where no ultimate harm can befall you.
Then Peter adds that instead of fearing man, you should “always [be] prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you” (3:15). Why “hope”? Why not “faith” or “love”? Because hope in the promised blessing is precisely the ground of our fearlessness. This is what makes our adversary wonder. And that hope includes the promise that no ultimate harm will come to you when you suffer for doing good. Our hope is not that people won’t persecute us and hurt us. He just said they would. Our hope is that this hurt is not ultimate hurt. It leads to blessing.
He Watches Over You
Finally, Peter ends the paragraph with these bold words: “For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil” (3:17).
Now we see why it makes all the difference in the world that “the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous” (3:12). He does not watch over them to spare them suffering. Rather in his sovereign watch-care, the all-good, all-wise God decides when his children will suffer for doing good — “if that should be God’s will” (3:17).
So the whole section ends on a note of God’s sovereignty over Christian suffering. The sovereignty does not mean he spares us harm, but that he spares us ultimate harm. This is what I take Peter to mean in 3:13 when he says the astonishing words, “Who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good?”
Which puts Peter’s words in the same stream as the apostle Paul’s who said, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31). Answer: No one. That is, no one can be against us with any ultimate harm. And, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect?” (Romans 8:33). Answer: No one. That is, no charge will stick in the end. No final harm will be done.
So Peter gives wisest of all counsels: “Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good” (1 Peter 4:19). Such suffering will not harm you. Not ultimately.
Related Resources
Slain in the Shadow of the Almighty: Sixty years ago, Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Peter Flemming, and Roger Youderian were speared to death in the Curaray River of Ecuador. (Article)
Why Sexual Metaphors of Jesus and His Bride Embarrass Us: Pastor John shares reasons why talking about sexual metaphors might cause embarrassment, but also why they are so beautiful. (Ask Pastor John)
Obey as People Who Are Free: How do servants of the King live and serve in a world with kings? In this lab, John Piper reveals the wonder of Christian freedom and the witness of being subject to human authorities. (Look at the Book)
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January 7, 2016
Slain in the Shadow of the Almighty
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the LORD, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” (Psalm 91:1–2)
On January 8, 1956 — sixty years ago today — Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Peter Flemming, and Roger Youderian were speared to death on a sandbar called “Palm Beach” in the Curaray River of Ecuador. They were trying to reach the Huaorani Indians for the first time in history with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Elisabeth Elliot memorialized the story in her book Shadow of the Almighty. That title comes from Psalm 91:1: “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.”
Not an Accident
This is where Jim Elliot was slain — in the shadow of the Almighty. Elisabeth had not forgotten the heartbreaking facts when she chose that title two years after her husband’s death. When he was killed, they had been married three years and had a ten-month-old daughter.
The title was not a slip — not any more than the death of the five missionaries was a slip. But the world saw it differently. Around the world, the death of these young men was called a tragic nightmare. Elisabeth believed the world was missing something. She wrote, “The world did not recognize the truth of the second clause in Jim Elliot’s credo: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”
She called her book Shadow of the Almighty because she was utterly convinced that the refuge of the people of God is not a refuge from suffering and death, but a refuge from final and ultimate defeat. “Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it” (Luke 9:24) — because the Lord is God Almighty.
God did not exercise his omnipotence to deliver Jesus from the cross. Nor will he exercise it to deliver you and me from tribulation. “If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:20). If we have the faith and single-mindedness and courage of those five missionaries, we might find ourselves saying with the apostle Paul,
“For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:36–39)
Security in His Strength
Has it ever hit home to you what it means to say, “My God, who loves me and gave himself for me, is almighty”? It means that if you take your place “in the shadow of the Almighty,” you will be protected by omnipotence. There is infinite and unending security in the almightiness of God — no matter what happens in this life.
The omnipotence of God means eternal, unshakable refuge in the everlasting glory of God, no matter what happens on this earth. And that confidence is the power of radical obedience to the call of God — even the call to die.
Is there anything more freeing, more thrilling, or more strengthening than the truth that God Almighty is your refuge — all day, every day, in all the ordinary and extraordinary experiences of life? Nothing but what he ordains for your good befalls you.
God Intervened
Research into the circumstances surrounding the martyrdom of the five missionaries has revealed the hand of God in unexpected ways. In the September 1996 issue of Christianity Today, Steve Saint, son of Nate Saint, who was martyred along with Elliott, McCully, Flemming, and Youderian, wrote an article about new discoveries made about the tribal intrigue behind the slayings. He wrote one of the most amazing sentences on the sovereignty of the Almighty that I have ever read — especially coming from the son of a slain missionary:
As [the killers] described their recollections, it occurred to me how incredibly unlikely it was that the Palm Beach killing took place at all; it is an anomaly that I cannot explain outside of divine intervention. (italics added)
In other words, there is only one explanation for why these five young men died and left a legacy that has inspired thousands. God intervened. This is the kind of sovereignty we mean when we say, “Nothing but what he ordains for your good befalls you.”
Which also means that no one, absolutely no one, can frustrate the designs of God to fulfill his missionary plans for the nations. In the darkest moments of our pain, God is hiding his weapons behind enemy lines. Everything that happens in history will serve this purpose as expressed in Psalm 86:9,
All the nations you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord, and shall glorify your name.
If we believed this, if we really let this truth of God’s omnipotence get hold of us — that we live perfectly secure in the shadow of the Almighty — what a difference it would make in our personal lives and in our families and churches. How humble and powerful we would become for the saving purposes of God.
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January 6, 2016
January 5, 2016
Seven Reasons Not to Play the Lottery
Americans now spend more than $70 billion dollars annually on lotteries. That’s more than the combined spending on books, video games, and movie and sporting-event tickets. Lotteries are legal in 43 states.
“That’s more than $230 for every man, woman, and child in those states — or $300 for each adult,” reports The Atlantic.
I agree with the report that this is a great shame on our nation. From time to time, the Powerball or Mega Millions lotteries rise to unusually high numbers and get fresh attention in the news (tonight’s and tomorrow’s drawings are announced as $140 million and $400 million).
Here are seven reasons, among others, I have often rehearsed to make the case that you should not gamble with your money in this way.
1. It is spiritually suicidal.
“Those who desire to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. . . They have pierced themselves with many a pang” (1 Timothy 6:7–10).
2. It is a kind of embezzlement.
Managers don’t gamble with their Master’s money. All you have belongs to God. All of it. Faithful trustees may not gamble with a trust fund. They have no right. The parable of the talents says Jesus will take account of how we handled his money. “They went and worked” (Matthew 25:16). That is how we seek to provide for ourselves (1 Corinthians 4:12; 1 Thessalonians 4:11; Ephesians 4:28)
3. It’s a fool’s errand.
The odds of winning are nearly 176 million-to-one. You take real money and buy with it a chance. That chance is so infinitesimally small that the dollar is virtually lost. 175,999,999 times. The smaller amounts paid out more often are like a fog to keep you from seeing what is happening.
4. The system is built on the necessity of most people losing.
Lotteries are simply another form of gambling (without any of the glamor and glitz of Las Vegas, of course). The “house” controls the action; the players will all eventually lose.
5. It preys on the poor.
According to the International Business Times, the lottery supports and encourages “yet another corrosive addiction that preys upon the greed and hopeless dreams of those trapped in poverty. . . . The Consumerist suggested that poor people in the U.S. — those earning $13,000 or less — spend an astounding 9 percent of their income on lottery tickets. . . making this ‘harmless’ game a ‘deeply regressive tax.’”
6. There is a better alternative.
A survey by Opinion Research Corporation for the Consumer Federation of America and the Financial Planning Association revealed that one-fifth (21 percent) of people surveyed thought the lottery was a practical way to accumulate wealth. We are teaching people to be fools.
If the $500 a year that on average all American households throw away on the lottery were invested in an index fund each year for 20 years, each family would have $24,000. Not maybe. Really. And the taxes on these earnings would not only support government services, but would be built on sound and sustainable habits of economic life.
7. For the sake of quick money, government is undermining the virtue without which it cannot survive.
A government that raises money by encouraging and exploiting the weaknesses of its citizens escapes that democratic mechanism of accountability. As important, state-sponsored gambling undercuts the civic virtue upon which democratic governance depends. (First Things, Sept., 1991, 12)
So, if you win, don’t give from your lottery winnings to our ministry. Christ does not build his church on the backs of the poor. Pray that Christ’s people will be so satisfied in him that they will be freed from the greed that makes us crave to get rich.
John Piper was assisted by Desiring God staff in gathering the statistics for this article.
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