At the risk of emphasizing one man's work as it relates to the work of God, I must say that John Piper's work has definitely had a noticeable impact on my life as of late. This is one of the reasons why I have chosen to come back after a long hiatus of not journaling my thoughts.
I'm sure you must've heard his famous quote, "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him" (Piper, 2003) or something to that effect. As I've shared with many, God's mandate for me this 2006-07 year is to be able to find complete joy in Him. Albeit it has been a journey, but one man's thoughts (thanks jon) has prompted me to start to record my thoughts again.
It seems that this pursuit of joy in itself is a weird exercise, and something that is so foreign to the Christianity that many of us have been brought up with; but yet it is such a foundational and central theme of the gospel. It's a wonder how I could have missed it for so long.
I guess the first lesson that I have been learning is simply to understand what joy is, which naturally leads to the seeking out this aspect of God. Practically, this translates in making an effort to spend time with the Lord, and attending prayer meetings I can. I find that... life is very much placed into a sensible perspective when I enter the above frame of mind. It scares me often that I could be a Christian and yet retain cynacism and criticism of my own faith. True, upright justice is warranted at times, but there I don't believe that God requires all of his bearers of justice to constantly be crushed under the weight of the Church's unrighteous deeds sapping them of their joy.
So, it begins. This pursuit of joy. Footstop. Nothing comes after...it is simply the pursuit of God that consumes me. As Piper put it recently "there are no 'so thats' in joy", joy is simply joy. For example, husbands don't love their wives so that they will cook well, in the same way we pursue joy for joy. We pursue God for God. It is one in the same. Seems so simple, yet it can be so profound.
1 comment:
hi Sam :) great blog! hahaha i have to agree with mel - what IS with the pink?
JP huh mel?? sounds like one of our marketing profs...
you write so formally (and well at it) friend, it kind of scares me that you're an engineer.
but i understand what you mean, about how sometimes we just hold onto those "christian values" that are not necessarily "God values". thanks for the reminder bud.
Post a Comment