Desiring God, Revised Edition: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist

This book is a mixture of scriptural truth and human reasoning. In Many ways Mr. Piper will state scriptural truth and then add his words and thoughts that tend to lower the truth. He admits that a person might not like the use of the term Christian Hedonism. He even states that God Himself does not require us to use the term Christian Hedonism. Since this is central to Mr. Pipers understanding of the Gospel, one might ask, “why is this term not found in the bible?”The theology of the book is like a man claiming that he has hit the bullseye of the essence of Christianity, but when others take a close look they do not see the arrow in the center but clearly off center. The view of God and His glory, of the nature of sin, of divine purpose, etc. are all made to fit into the overarching view of Christian Hedonism. For example, a definition of sin is stated as; “All sin comes from not putting supreme value on the glory of God – this is the very essence of sin”. Now it is true that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. However, the apostle John defines sin as lawlessness. That is a lack of subjection to God’s will and in fact doing our own will in independence of God. Since God is goodness itself, not just doing good, as He is also not just loving but love itself, any departure from God is a departure from good and therefore is evil. All of mankind, because of the fall and the sin nature produced by it, are chargeable with lawlessness toward God. A person could be an upstanding citizen, a philanthropist, a good family man, etc. and be dead in trespasses and sins.The change in the statement of the catechism from “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever” to “by enjoying Him forever” is a significant change. There is no greater example to us in scripture of God being glorified than when Christ glorified God in the sufferings of the cross. To say that Christ was enjoying God when he was forsaken of God would be monstrous. He did not enjoy the cross. The very moment He glorified God the most, in receiving to Himself the just judgment of God due to us sinners, He stated, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me”. Nor did God spare His own Son when he delivered Him up for us all. This work of the cross was the only means of our salvation and recovery to God. Jesus Christ as Son of God must suffer, or we must be lost forever. Repentance and submission to God brings us into this blessed salvation.This brings me to the matter of worship. In the introduction the author states, “I came to see that it is unbiblical and arrogant to try to worship for any other reason than the pleasure to be had in Him. His experience while in seminary of finding difficulty in the worship of God, shows, perhaps a weakness in his own understanding of the Gospel. The common unregenerate state of man is a lack of genuine thankfulness to his creator (see Romans 1:21) and a rejection of God’s means of salvation by the cross. (1 Cor. 1:18ff; 2:14) When one apprehends God’s love in the gospel of His son, the Spirit of God fills his soul with the consciousness of God’s love and gratitude flows out spontaneously. It is not that we must apprehend the “Christian hedonist” position and then we will worship God rightly, but we must apprehend God’s love for His sinful creature and we will be filled with God and worship flows spontaneously. God has glorified Himself in the death and resurrection of His beloved Son and we are brought into the love and glory of God in Christ. Mr. Piper tends to weaken the full light of the Gospel and true worship by his interest in promoting Christian hedonism. See Eph. 3:14-21 and note that as soon as Paul speaks of being filled to all the fullness of God, he breaks forth in worship to God. Surely this is the correct view of worship. It would behoove us all to seek to be in the good of the gospel of the grace of God and then worship will flow without effort. Mr. Pipers view is that we must get into the good of so-called Christian hedonism to worship properly.In conclusion, it would be better to search the scriptures daily to get our souls into the good and gain of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. The purpose of God is to conform us to the image of His son. We cannot say that this will always be enjoyable but our faith and trust in God even in times of darkness and difficulty will be to His glory. The time of full enjoyment and bliss in our God is yet to come. In reading Mr. Pipers book, one should be careful to continue in the actual word of God, the bible, and not just submit to his view of Christian hedonism uncritically. There is more in heaven and earth than is dreamed of in our human philosophies, to paraphrase Hamlet.

What excites your soul? What stirs happiness and joy in you? On what does your mind think when everything is still and your daydreams linger?This may not seem an immediately important question, and surely not a Christian one, but that assumption would wrong. There is no deeper or more necessary question for us to ask of ourselves than, "What do I treasure?" Our answer will shape our lives.This is exactly what John Piper is getting at in Desiring God. To him, "The chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying Him forever." (p. 18) If we don't treasure Christ, we cannot enjoy Him and won't glorify Him. Too many Christians have sought to glorify God by refusing joy and happiness in this life in exchange for hope of joy and happiness in the afterlife. But Piper argues, like C.S. Lewis in The Weight of Glory that Christianity is not about asceticism (the denial of pleasure), but hedonism (the pursuit of pleasure). To Piper, the Christian life is one of Christian Hedonism: our greatest joy comes in his highest glory. This is what we are created for, what we long for, and what we naturally hope for. Our lives are meant to sing His praise because as Piper says, "we must come to see that God is love precisely because He relentlessly pursues the praises of His name in the hearts of His people." (p. 48) Listen to the words that John shares from C.S. Lewis' Reflections on the Psalms,"But the most obvious fact about praise - whether of God or any thing - strangely escaped me. I thought of it in terms of compliment, approval, or the giving of honor. I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows into praise unless (sometimes even if) shyness or the fear of boring others is deliberately brought in to check it. The world rings with praise - lovers praising their mistresses, readers their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game - praise of weather, wines, dishes, actors, motors, horses, colleges, countries, historical personages, children, flowers, mountains, rare stamps, rare beetles, even sometimes politicians or scholars. I had not noticed how the humblest, and at the same time most balanced and capacious, minds praised most, while the cranks, misfits and malcontents praised least.I had not noticed either that just as men spontaneously praise whatever they value, so they spontaneously urge us to join them in praising it: `Isn't she lovely? Wasn't it glorious? Don't you think that magnificent?' The Psalmists in telling everyone to praise God are doing what all men do when they speak of what they care about. My whole, more general, difficulty about the praise of God depended on my absurdly denying to us, as regards the supremely Valuable, what we delight to do, what indeed we can't help doing, about everything else we value.I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. It is not out of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they are; the delight is incomplete till it is expressed."What more could God give us to enjoy than Himself? "If He withholds Himself from our contemplation and companionship, no matter what else He gives us, He is not loving." (p. 48) And in receiving Him our heart leaps for joy (we call this worship). "In the end the heart longs not for any of God's good gifts, but for God Himself." (p.87) This desiring of God in affectionate adoration is true Biblical worship (Psalm 16:11; Psalm 27:4; Psalm 37:4; Psalm 42:1-2, 5-6; Psalm 63:1; Psalm 73:25-26; Psalm 130:5). Without Him, there is nothing that will stir our hearts, and without our hearts there can be no worship. "The engagement of the heart in worship is the coming alive of the feelings and emotions and affections of the heart. Where feelings for God are dead, worship is dead." (p. 86) Desiring God then is the worshipful act of loving God.John Piper has given us a theological masterpiece in Desiring God. I remember reading this in college (vaguely), but I honestly didn't remember much of what I read. It seems that reading for an assignment and reading for joy are two very different things (and in a sense, that's kind of what this book is about).This book is a treasure chest of Gospel promise and eternal joy that your heart and soul will deeply appreciate. Consider this statement that John makes concerning money, "Why does God bless us with abundance? So we can have enough to live on, and then use the rest for all manner of good works that alleviate spiritual and physical misery. Enough for us; abundance for others." (p. 203) After reading this, I for one am thankful that God has blessed John as He has because the comfort and security and joy and pleasure that has been enough for John in learning to desire God has surely been an abundance for me.

Piper presents some interesting thoughts here, all of which everyone can see are from the Scriptures. I don't agree with many of his statements, and the whole work is not very literary, but it's nevertheless a helpful daily devotional read.

Deeply spiritual book which outlines the truth on which intimacy with God is based. Enjoying God yet bringing Him glory and honour through that enjoyment what is more desirable than this? Wonderful life changing truth.

Well worth the reading and fully recommend. Would be suitable for a mature Christian for further study and contemplation, read and enjoy.

Excellent content, but pages are are very light and bend very easily

great