Top 502 Quotes & Sayings by John Piper - Page 7

Life and death! They seem like complete opposites-at great enmity with each other. But for Paul-and for all who share his faith-there is a unity, because the same great passion is fulfilled in both-namely, that Christ be magnified in this body-our bodies-whether by life or by death.

All heroes are shadows of Christ

The vast majority of abortions are performed between the seventh and tenth week when the baby is already sucking his thumb, recoiling from pricking, responding to sound. All his organs are present, the brain is functioning, the heart is pumping, the liver is making blood cells, the kidneys are cleaning fluids, and there is a fingerprint. His genetic code is uniquely and unquestionably human. And, if we are willing, he can be seen by ultrasound.

There is a war going on. All talk of a Christian's right to live luxuriously "as a child of the King" in this atmosphere sounds hollow - especially since the King himself is stripped for battle.

The apex of glorifying God is enjoying Him with the heart. But this is empty emotionalism where that joy is not awakened and sustained by true views of God for who He really is

If truth does not lead to falling in love, it fails.

The whole world lives for pleasure. The only difference is theirs is fleeting, while ours is forever in Jesus.

Jesus' teaching in general [implies] that happy and fulfilling sexual relations in marriage depend on each partner aiming to give satisfaction to the other. If it is the joy of each to make the other happy, a hundred problems will be solved before they happen.

Ignatius, when he heard the clock strike, would say, "Now I have another hour to answer for." (Eph. 5:16)

Taken as a whole, the story of Ruth is one of those signs. It was written to give us encouragement and hope that all the perplexing turns in our lives are going somewhere good. They do not lead off a cliff. In all the setbacks of our lives as believers, God is plotting for our joy.

Adoption is the visible Gospel.

God is not a killjoy; he just opposes what kills joy.

The greatest threat to your ministry, dear brothers, is that you lose your joy in God.

A God-centered theology has to be a missionary theology

Our concern with truth is simply an echo of our concern with God .

The great barrier to worship among God's people is not that we are always seeking our own satisfaction, but that our seeking is so weak and half-hearted that we settle for little sips at broken cisterns when the fountain of life is just over the next hill.

The right creative act makes its own laws, and always will do.

God is not an employer looking for employees. He is an Eagle looking for people who will take refuge under his wings.

Only the #? gospel can do two seemingly contradictory things: destroy pride and increase courage.

It is a myth that man in his natural state is genuinely seeking God. Men do seek God. But they do not seek him for who he is. They seek him in a pinch as one who might preserve them from death or enhance their worldly enjoyments. Apart from conversion, no one comes to the light of God.

The further you go in the revealed thoughts of God, the clearer you see that God's aim in creating the world was to display the value of his own glory.

Giving in a regular, disciplined, generous way-up to and beyond the tithe-is simply good sense in view of the promises of God.

We need a Savior. Christmas is an indictment before it becomes a delight.

Mission exists because worship doesn't.

If you remove enjoyment of God from faith in God, it ceases to be faith.

The thought of building a life around minimal morality or minimal significance—a life defined by the question, “What is permissible?”—felt almost disgusting to me. I didn’t want a minimal life. I didn’t want to live on the outskirts of reality. I wanted to understand the main thing about life and pursue it.

We are not as Christ-centered and cross-cherishing as we should be, because we do not ponder the truth that everything good, and everything bad that God turns for the good, was purchased by the sufferings of Christ.

When GOD is our deepest pleasure we display Him as our highest treasure.

The gospel of God and the love of God are expressed finally and fully in God's gift of himself for our everlasting pleasure. "In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

Preaching is the pastor's main work, and preaching is heart work, not just mental work.

The purpose of the Lord's Supper is to receive from Christ the nourishment and strength and hope and joy that come from feasting our souls on all that He purchased for us on the cross, especially His own fellowship.

Ways to be actively involved in the solution: 1. Consider adoption. 2. Be a regular giver of your money to Crisis Pregnancy Centers. 3. Volunteer in a Crisis Pregnancy Center. 4. Be involved in spreading truth with good literature. 5. Make your presence know at the abortion clinics in town (by) writing or phoning or visiting and talking, if you can, with those who work there. 6. Dream a new kind of ministry. 7. Pray!

I will not waste my life! I will finish my course and finish it well. I will display the Gospel of the grace of God in all I do. I will run my race to the end.” - Paul

Worship is basically adoration, and we adore only what delights us. There is no such thing as sad adoration or unhappy praise.

Fight for us, O God, that we not drift numb and blind and foolish into vain and empty excitements. Life is too short, too precious, too painful to waste on worldly bubbles that burst. Heaven is too great, hell is too horrible, eternity is too long that we should putter around on the porch of eternity.

There will be no passion to draw others into our worship where there is no passion for worship.

Strong affections for God, rooted in and shaped by the truth of Scripture - this is the bone and marrow of Biblical worship.

Wise people know that all their money belongs to God.

God's global aim in creation and redemption is not only the glory of his name, but also the gladness of the peoples.

So saving grace, converting grace, for Augustine, is God's giving us a sovereign joy in God that triumphs over all other joys and therefore sways the will. The will is free to move toward whatever it delights in most fully, but it is not within the power of our will to determine what that sovereign joy will be.

We will not let you choose between being a lover of God and his sovereignty and being a lover of lost people.

We are far too easily pleased.

All the different ways God has chosen to display his glory in creation and redemption seem to reach their culmination in the praises of his redeemed people. God governs the world with glory precisely that he might be admired, marvelled at, exalted and praised. The climax of his happiness is the delight he takes in the echoes of his excellence in the praises of the saints.

God loves to show mercy . . . His anger must be released by a stiff safety lock, but His mercy has a hair trigger.

God is not worn out running the galaxy. He’s not taxed at all guiding every dust particle all the time.

Exultation that does not flow from education, affections that do not flow from knowing, savoring that does not flow from seeing, feeling that does not flow from thinking - are hollow and rootless - noisy gongs and clanging cymbals. And God is not glorified by artificial and empty passions. True delight is rooted in true doctrine. God-centered exultation is rooted in God-centered education.

We will wait. We will wait till all is made righteous (glorious) according to the word of God.

Go, send, or disobey.

God created us with sexual passion so that there would be language to describe what it means to cleave to him in love and what it means to turn away from him to others.

We have a name for those who try to praise when they have no pleasure in the object. We call them hypocrites.

My joy grows with every soul that seeks the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Remember, you have one life. That’s all. You were made for God. Don’t waste it.

Obedience does not consist in paying God back and thus turning grace into a trade. Obedience comes from trusting in God for more grace - future grace - and thus magnifying the infinite resources of God's love and power.

The chief end of missions is the supremacy of God in the joy of all peoples.

Worship is ultimate, not missions. Because God is ultimate, not man.

Even on days when every cinder in our soul feels cold, if we crawl to the Word of God and cry out for ears to hear, the cold ashes will be lifted and the tiny spark of life will be fanned. For 'the law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul.'

Intensity is all that matters in painting.

The missionary question is not, 'Where are there unbelievers?' and then send a missionary there. There are unbelievers everywhere! The missionary question is, 'Where are there people's who don't have any Christians in them or don't have a church strong enough to do the neighbor evangelism that we can do if we just want to do it?' That's the missionary question.

The great danger of riches is that our affections will be carried away from God to His gifts.

Sin is what you do when your heart is not satisfied with God. No one sins out of duty. We sin because it holds out some promise of happiness.

We make a god out of whatever we find most joy in. So find your joy in God and be done with all idolatry.