Here's yet another reason why I love John Piper. Yesterday morning I clicked onto the blog "Desiring God" for my daily dose of John Piper. On this day, Piper summarizes one of his sermons from a few years back about what true piety should produce in us, that is "a passion for social justice and practical mercy." Preaching from Isaiah 58, he lists five needs that Isaiah and Jesus are passionately concerned about. (1) the need for freedom from bondage and oppression (2) the need for food (3) the need for housing (4) the need for clothing (5) the need for respect. The longer version of this sermon is even better, where he makes assertions such as "Piety that does not produce a passion for God-exalting social justice and practical mercy is worthless." and "I want to remind us as a church that we have been saved for the sake of God-exalting good works. We have been saved not merely to avoid evil, but to do good. Therefore the people of Christ should not be known primarily for what we don’t do, but what we do do."
Two months ago, I blogged here about a distorted piety being a fallacy that prevents today's evangelical churches from embracing its God-given responsibility to the poor. Since so many of these churches are children of the enlightenment (modernity) with their pie-in-the-sky dispensationalism, their church-growth/marketing pragmatism, their soul-saving dualism, their idol of consumerism, and of course their misplaced pietism, I've sort of wrote off the church in America (although my obedience to Christ and my calling has kept me within the church). Because Piper is such a towering, influential figure among fundamental and conservative evangelical pastors, maybe pietism in the evangelical church will begin to be restored to its proper place, which is producing a passion for social justice and practical mercy.
11 comments:
two reactions:
a) if piper and his theology believe people will really burn in hell forever, why should anyone waste time on social justice when people are dying daily all around him?
b) if piper believes certain people - and only those people - will be saved regardless of what happens on earth, what need is there for mercy? if he can't feel mercy towards the non-elect who are doomed to hell, how could he ever feel mercy to anyone?
if you couldn't tell, i'm not a piper fan (nor a mohler fan, nor a macarthur fan, etc...).
mike rucker
fairburn, ga, usa
mikerucker.wordpress.com
Mike,
I am struggling to figure out why these two questions should be a problem. Before the fundamentalist/liberal controversy of the latter 19th and early 20th centuries, the protestant church (whether Lutheran, Anglican, Congregational, Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist, etc…) believed in a literal hell, but passionately embraced both evangelism and social justice/practical mercy just as John Piper does. The doctrines of grace should motivate Christians to respond to God’s grace with loving obedience of both sharing the good news of Jesus and doing good works of social justice and practical mercy. Its been the influence of modernity that has compartmentalized evangelism/discipleship from social action, not Reformed theology. Piper rightly exegetes Isaiah 58 in that pietist activities such as Bible study, prayer, and praise worship was never supposed to be separated from social responsibility.
On your second question, could it be that you have a misrepresentation of Piper’s view of election? Has he ever said that he doesn’t care for the non-elect? Most sensible Christians who hold to the doctrines of grace, and in particular-election, view election not as a privilege to hoard among themselves, but as a responsibility to make God’s name known throughout the earth in word and deed.
I have found that some people who don’t like Piper’s Calvinism (I am not pointing the finger at you) it seems become quite disappointed that Piper actually has something to say about missions/evangelism (Let the Nations be Glad) because they want to stereotype him as a hyper-Calvinist who revels in his own election. Likewise, other people who don’t like Piper’s Calvinism are disappointed that Piper embraces social justice and deeds of mercy because they want to demonize him for his Calvinist view of salvation (especially substitutionary atonement) which is supposed to not have any relevancy to the social problems of the 21st century.
Unfortunately, we Christians love to build straw-men and reductionist arguments when in disagreement with each other…..Sorry about me being long-winded.
i agree to a large extent with you - about believing should lead to doing - but not your conclusions.
i believe that people like piper (picking pecks of pickled peppers) are their own worst enemies in terms of illogical conclusions (or logical ilconclusions). on (a), if he - or any Christian - truly believes people around him are dying and going to hell every day, there is NOTHING he/they should be doing except frantically trying to 'save' people. yet he isn't/they aren't. so, my conclusion is he doesn't/they don't.
like most people in church who say they believe in hell, but go about their lives here content to seek 'the abundant life' Jesus offers while friend and neighbor are already feeling a little warmth in their souls.
we had a youth leader at our church - he needed volunteer workers for VBS - and he came onstage with a bunch of kids, all sad looking, feeling abandoned. during his humorous speech, he said, "do you want these kids to GO TO HELL?!?!"
and the kids yelled, "do you want us to GO TO HELL????".
the audience laughed. it was funny.
to me, anyway, because i reached the conclusion the whole hell thing is a cruel joke.
all the rest of the audience? how could they laugh at that?
i'll tell you how: they (you) don't believe it either.
piper, though, really does. and yet he's content to preach to his choir every sunday, write books, go out to dinner after church, probably take in a twins game occasionally, go to the movies, and sleep in once in awhile.
all the while knowing that someone that very hour is dying in a nursing home, or retirement home, or perhaps even on his own block GOING STRAIGHT TO AN ETERNITY IN FLAMES.
and he's ok with it. or at least he's convinced he's 'doing enough' to be able to sit in heaven with a clear conscience.
perhaps you are, too. i mean, after all, you're spending time blogging, for God's sake (pun intended).
none of this is 'straw men'. what IS made of straw are these guilt-inducing, people-controlling ideas that have been perpetuated too d-mn long.
what's also straw is the calvinists' ever-quick response of, 'well, YOU must not understand what calvinism is all about,' ignoring the hard questions about the obvious conclusions to which the theology leads.
sorry for the tone, but the subject of hell always makes me mad as ... mad as ...
well, i guess you can figure that one out.
m.r.
Interesting analysis about your view of those who believe in hell. By the way, growing up with a fundamentalist background, I experienced my share of manipulations of hell. In fact, as a child I vividly remember a S.S teacher giving details (some that corresponded with the narrative, and some that were clearly made up) which literally scared the hell out of me, causing me to make a false decision to follow Jesus. When I was older, I came to a time and place where I embraced what it meant to be a Christian, not only repentance and belief in Christ, but also living as Jesus did.
Despite having been manipulated as a child with a “chic-tract” like story of hell, I still affirm it because it is part of the Grand narrative of scripture and because it has been affirmed throughout church history for at least eighteen hundred years. Although two-hundred years of the enlightenment has caused certain groups and individuals to capitulate scripture to either reason or science, which might explain why you choose not to believe in it.
As for your view that a Christian such as John Piper or any one else who believes in a literal hell should focus all their time and effort trying to save people from that judgment, is a misnomer. While hell/judgment is one of the aspects of the Grand story, it is not the story. Furthermore, I do not believe that the scriptures teach that life is all about evangelism, discipleship, or for that matter Rick Warren’s five purposes. As a missionary to inner-city Grand Rapids, evangelism is part of my calling, but I am also involved in discipleship, leadership training, providing employment assistance, conducting crisis interventions, training volunteers, and providing vision and oversight for a non-profit ministry. I also have a wonderful wife and four children who are ten years of age and under. For me to live out my calling as a husband, father, neighbor, teacher, missionary, and etc…takes a robust Christian worldview that embraces the creation mandates as well as the redemptive mandate.
Now I have only met Piper once so I can only go by what people tell me. From what I hear, through living in his inner-city Minneapolis neighborhood, he often looks for opportunities to share his faith within the context of loving his neighbors. I don’t know what more you are looking for from him. In his little world in inner-city Minneapolis, he’s demonstrating and communicating the love of Christ (along with the activities that you mentioned)!!! It seems as if you have characterized him in the worst way possible as someone who couldn’t really care about non-believers because he believes in election and a literal hell because you have come to some logical conclusion that it’s not possible to do both. Sigh….I guess we fundamentalist/evangelicals are not the only ones entrapped by the snares of modernity. So are those from the liberal persuasion where reason trumps revelation.
When I was older, I came to a time and place where I embraced what it meant to be a Christian.
as did i. and in so doing, i had to come to the conclusion that rescuing people from burning in hell forever was either the be-all-end-all of my existence here or it was nothing.
...it is part of the Grand narrative of scripture and because it has been affirmed throughout church history for at least eighteen hundred years.
the church affirmed the world was flat for 1500 years. the development of hell through scripture is confusing at best, faulty at worst. how could the church have become so dogmatic on a doctrine that has horrendous implications yet even God himself refused from the very start to lay it out clearly.
Although two-hundred years of the enlightenment has caused certain groups and individuals to capitulate scripture to either reason or science...
this is a common way people use to discount other who have thought through things and arrived at a conclusion different from their own. i did not 'capitulate' to anything: i used the knowledge and reason God gave me.
...a robust Christian worldview that embraces the creation mandates as well as the redemptive mandate.
not a single thing you mention in your here's-what-i'm-involved-in listing means a hill of beans if your neighbor next door could die in a car wreck today and burn forever. were you able to sit in heaven and see him burning and screaming each day - forever - you'd eternally weep and nash your teeth that you spent time in any way other than frantically trying to save people. did you see schindler's list? the guy at the end stood among hundreds of people he'd rescued, and yet he was breaking down because 'i could have saved one more.' if you're a christian, and you believe in this kind of hell, any reaction other than one like his is impossible.
or, should be impossible. sadly, people perpetuate the God-impugning, people-controlling view of hell without ever - EVER - legitimately facing the implications of what they preach.
Piper ... through living in his inner-city Minneapolis neighborhood...
that's not the point i'm making. i have no doubt he has a good heart (in places). it just simply cannot square with thinking people around him are going to hell, that he has a role in helping them NOT go there, and choosing to do other things. his Christianity should be acted out just like you describe. his teachings and the implications of his beliefs are the problem that he - and others - will not face.
...where reason trumps revelation.
and when that revelation has been debated and differed on for 2000 years - what then? have you used REASON to try to figure things out? and if your interpretation is wrong - what then? was 'revelation' really 'revealed'? or should you have REASONed better?
this is another attempt to discount someone else's beliefs and conclusions.
and it's the faulty fear that is the hardest one to cast off.
i doubt we ever will.
m.r.
Spudley: You misrepresent Piper:
1. He does believe people are going to hell
2. He does not believe that he has anything to do with it. He believes that god sovereignly chooses.
3. His motivation for sharing Christ is not so that people won't go to hell (though is is a nice off-shoot) but rather that God be worshiped. God's glory, not man's lostness is the center of Pipers theology.
4. As such the thing that Piper must be doing according to his beliefs is worshiping in every way possible, including sharing Jesus.
I know you will not like this more..but this is a more accurate view of what Piper believes.
while your handle, mr-poop-is-emergent-too, gave me a chuckle, i was quite shocked to see that the initials - PIET - is just one letter short of 'piety'...
add a 'y'all' and you're all set.
i'll resist drawing the obvious conclusions...
i'm torn between being amused and being horrified by your statement that people won't go to hell ... is a nice off-shoot.
in a nutshell, thank you for proving my point, though i can argue my side myself, thank you very much.
to believe that, 'well, we fed this guy a sandwich' is in some way ok while the guy across the street spends eternity in flames simply shows the imbalance that exists in your faith and reason.
and if you really can believe that 'God sovereignly chooses' who he burns forever and ever - remind me not to let my kids near you or whomever is preaching you that God-impugning belief.
your inability to understand how warped your thinking is - whether it's biblical or not in your view - is even more horrifying than your previous statements.
your problem is the same one mine was for years and years: a refusal to step - or maybe a fear of stepping - outside the box your theology and churching have you in and look back objectively at what you're saying.
and i know nothing i say will convince you to do that, so carry on heaping coals on everyones' heads...
m.r.
Friend, I simply pointed out accurately Pipers view.
If in your mind God's sovereignty impugns him it is the Bible not I that you have an issue with...
BTW: A honest belief that God deserves all the worship or everyone is the best motivation I can think of to share Jesus with anyone.
Take me for instance...I can be annoying, you might not like me, this could possibly inspire you to want to tell me to "go to hell"...and not share Jesus with me.
If however you believe that God is the most precious thing in all the universe, you would over look me...I am not the point and you would want Jesus to receive the worship he deserves.
Finally back off the arrogance just a little, So you used to believe things and now you don't...great, this my friend does not make you smarter than anyone...people wiser than you or I have taken opposing views here. You are a internet poster...just like me...show charity in that, your view is not wiser, certainly not more consistent, it not the "only" view. So don't be pedantic, like you have said something amazing...all I have seen is a run of the mill bad theological argument that would be hard to support, if like Joel and I you were using the Bible as a criteria. But you are not as your own website makes clear.
That is the issue, and until settled we will not agree. But friend all that means is that you are seriously wrong about more than one issue because you are seriously wrong about the big issue.
D
I only have a few more things to say in response to the past comments. Thank you D for laying out the motivation for Piper’s view of evangelism, social action, election, view of hell, which is worship. I was more caught up with defending his current actions that I didn’t get to the heart of it.
Mike-it sort of amuses me that you come across as if you’ve found some silver bullet to use to shoot down the Calvinist beliefs of election, hell, or for that manner its entire world-and-life view. Your rationale that a literal view of hell can only leave a conclusion of soul-winning evangelism or else they have no real compassion from that terrible judgment (the imbalance of faith and reason) comes across quite absolutist and narrow leaving no room for discussion. Should we forget what the word of God says in this discussion? Or should we leave it up to you or for that matter, any of our reasoning? The Biblical narrative that was inspired by God, or us whose sin nature has warped our thinking?
Forget that as the early church dispersed throughout the world, not only did conversion to Jesus Christ and the formation of new communities take place, but they also demonstrated Christ-like compassion for the poor. Forget that Paul, the apostle most known for starting communities of faith throughout the Roman Empire including the one in Thessalonica, comforts those who were experiencing persecution with the return and judgment of Christ. II Thess. 1:9 states that “He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed.” Despite Paul’s emphasis on what can only be a literal hell, he tirelessly spent his life sharing the gospel, discipling people into communities of faith, while also demonstrating compassion for the poor as evidenced by his unyielding commitment to help the Jerusalem church who had been devastated by poverty through a famine (as well as his continual admonitions in his letters to do good works). Since the early church believed in a literal hell and the Apostle Paul believed in a literal hell, did they really screw up because they didn’t expend all of their energies doing evangelism? Because they had an imbalance between faith and reason? Were they as heartless as you have Painted Piper and the rest of us Reformed types who are responding to God’s grace in Worship by believing and obeying the whole gospel, not the reductionist one?
By the way, at one time early in my missionary work, the idea of hell did consume my thoughts because I put everything on me. It was all my responsibility and it just about drove me out of my mind. When I began to discover the sovereignty of God in relation to evangelism, it freed me to really communicate my faith out of the context of loving God and loving my neighbor, not out of sheer fear, guilt, terror that I was not doing enough. And to let you know, death is not a foreign concept to me in the line of work that I do. Unfortunately several of my former students have been shot and killed on the streets of Grand Rapids. I loved them, reached out to them, called them to repentance and belief in Christ and some of them rejected it. Am I sad that they rejected Christ? Absolutely! Does it keep me awake at night? No because I didn’t damn them, rather their sin and their rejection of Christ did.
When it comes to revelation and reason, I surely wouldn’t trust my reasoning on issues such as these apart from revelation as you have. It ends up creating a God in our image (severely distorted by our sin of course) rather than figuring out how to image God from the Word of God (written and living).
Mike-it sort of amuses me that you come across as if you’ve found some silver bullet...
i don't believe i've found any bullets other than the ones your own theology uses to shoot itself in the foot. the 'humility' that the grace of God is supposed to inspire in spades in calvinists is in very short supply as it is THEY who believe after 2000 years that they've got every i dotted and every t crossed. and that anyone not falling in line is either anathema or - this is what kills me - 'hasn't comprehended the grace of God' fully.
talk about 'absolutist'.
i could have written your last comment for you if you'd let me. the same 'do we trust your reason and not revelation' arguments get tirelessly trotted out when faced with obvious questions and criticisms that hit us at the core of what we believe.
moreover (hey - i don't think i've ever used that word before...kinda neat), your verse from paul - "He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus" - begs two obvious questions that you apparently have answers to - in your head, anyway. i'd wager $$ to donuts it's your REASON that gave them to you, namely: (a) who's fault is it really if they don't know God, and (b) what does it mean to 'obey the gospel of Jesus Christ'?
the reason you can paste up verses like that and hide behind their nebulous-ity (?) is because you're quite comfortable in your churchspeak. but i bet if you asked everyone in your church today to write down their answers to (a) and (b) you'd get a wide range of responses.
each of which would be part reason and part faith.
and both of which, in the end, take root in the 'revelation' that each person receives of God working in his own life. not the systematic theologies we like to weave into great nets to ensnare others for our own selfish needs.
btw, my dad not being 'saved' DID keep me awake many, many, many nights. and i'm very sorry if your soul has been that calloused by this damnable teaching that you are ok with it. the proof-texting verses you should have fallen back on (instead of the few you picked) would have talked about God's grace, mercy, his love for the world, in-Adam-this-in-Christ-that, and how he can never turn away from the cries of people forever.
and then, looking at God's repeated calls to you in your own life, you would have seen his real heart and thrown aside once and for all the lies about Him tormenting His own creation forever and ever, amen.
Hey, um...I'm just a guy with a degree in biblical studies...and I don't really want to step my foot into what is turned into a kinda circular argument....but there is no reason you can't all be wrong! (haha)
Cause I am...totally...NOT...a calvinist...BUT!
Oh where to start. First hell exists. And God doesn't send people there. People go there because they have no relationship with God. They ultimately send themselves there.
And I also don't believe it is literal flame. But I also think that, in a way, its worse, which is why that imagery is used occasionally in the bible (that's not the only imagery used btw). Its permanent separation from God, permanent separation from his Spirit, from life.
Also spud dude, anyone who thinks that no one deserves eternal punishment hasn't seen enough of the harsh and terrible reality of the world. I don't know you, but maybe if you left the suburban safety of the US of A and spent some time in a ghetto, or in the Sudan, or thought about the Nazis instead of the Jews when you watched Shindler's list, you may change your thoughts that God couldn't possibly punish one of his own creations so.
I mean I read a story just today about a guy who killed an 18 week old baby by shaking it and slamming its head against the walls because it was crying when he wanted to play video games. A God who doesn't seek justice for that is a God I don't think I want to be associated with.
Adolf Hitler gets to spend eternity in heaven becuase God is so good? That god isn't good. that god, who isnt my go, is weak. (Not to be confused with mercy [which is what i think spud is doing, confusing mercy with weakness and injustice], if even Adolph Hitler came to Christ and humbled his heart and felt remorse he would have been saved)
But I super digress, or something-- To the other point-- following Jesus is NOT about avoiding hell, not chiefly at all--its about LIVING heaven. The work done by Piper, and Joel, and hundreds of others in ghettos and warzones, to bring peace and justice, IS a reflection of God, and furthermore, does work to draw people to God.
You say a real Christian who believes in hell should spend all of his time warning people about hell. There are Christians that do that. You know what I call them? F--king annoying. I dont need somebody preaching to me and waving a tract in my face while im trying to buy comics--or--or--shoes...
But a guy like Joel, or someone like Mother Theresa, or Bono, or Shane Claiborne? They draw me to God becuase I see the mercy and love of God in action, and there is no better form of evangelism.
And for the love of tater tots, if there wasn't a hell (oh and btw, a hell that very much exists on earth, that people live everyday) what exactly are we being saved from or to? Whats the point of Jesus's death. Did he think being crucified would be a hoot?
Anyway. yeah.
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