What Are We Saved for?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:05.000 | Well, we all need saving. We know that much. But what are we saved for?
00:00:11.000 | This question of why we are saved in the first place is essential and important.
00:00:16.000 | And it was a question John Piper tackled in a message titled "Created for Joy,"
00:00:20.000 | preached at Capitol Hill Baptist Church in D.C. back in 2002.
00:00:24.000 | Here's what Pastor John said.
00:00:27.000 | "Gospel is good news about something, but it doesn't say what the good news is.
00:00:31.000 | So it's not adequate to simply say, 'Christians believe gospel.' That doesn't say anything.
00:00:37.000 | That doesn't tell you anything. It's just, that's a zero. Good news about what?"
00:00:42.000 | So you could add, "Good news about forgiveness of sins against God, who created the universe,
00:00:48.000 | and who is angry at us because we have offended him so badly and have fallen short of what we were created to be in his image."
00:00:56.000 | And so there is just wrath against us, and we can be forgiven, and that would be our gospel.
00:01:02.000 | But if you analyze the word forgiveness, that's, somebody could say, "Well, so what? Who cares about being forgiven?"
00:01:08.000 | Because forgiveness in and of itself doesn't mean anything.
00:01:13.000 | The only value forgiveness has is if there's a relationship that's been wrecked,
00:01:18.000 | and you really, really like to have it restored because the restoration would be so pleasant to you.
00:01:23.000 | And so forgiveness in and of itself, if I say something really crabby to my wife when I wake up in the morning,
00:01:29.000 | and she's offended and I'm feeling angry, and I walk out of the room and we go down to the kitchen,
00:01:34.000 | she's in the kitchen, standing at the sink, and I'm over there pouring my cereal, and there's ice in the air.
00:01:39.000 | I know what needs to happen. I need to be forgiven, and I need to ask for forgiveness. Why?
00:01:43.000 | I want her back, right? I don't want, when I walk over to the sink and kiss her on the back of the neck,
00:01:49.000 | I don't want her to jerk away and walk out of the room. I'd like her to turn around and reciprocate.
00:01:55.000 | So the only value that forgiveness has is to get my wife back.
00:02:00.000 | So to say, "Gospel," doesn't say anything. It just leads us somewhere.
00:02:05.000 | "Good news about what?" You say, "Forgiveness," and that doesn't mean anything,
00:02:08.000 | because it's all about what forgiveness opens the door to.
00:02:12.000 | So we have to go further and say, "Well, what does it open the door to?"
00:02:15.000 | Does Christianity say this thing called "Forgiveness opens the door to,"
00:02:19.000 | and then you could use another nice Christian word called "salvation," "saved," and that doesn't tell us anything.
00:02:26.000 | "Saved from what? For what?" It's just an empty word.
00:02:29.000 | See how amazing these words are? They don't say much.
00:02:32.000 | You've got to press them and press them and press them until you arrive at something that sounds good,
00:02:37.000 | and they don't sound good yet. I mean, "saved" sounds sort of good,
00:02:40.000 | but you don't know what you're saved from or what you're saved for.
00:02:42.000 | So let's say we're saved for, well, everybody would say "from wrath, judgment, hell, condemnation."
00:02:48.000 | Yes, good. Nobody wants to be condemned. But for what?
00:02:52.000 | Maybe it would be, you could say, "eternal life," John 3:16.
00:02:55.000 | "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son
00:02:58.000 | that whosoever believes in Him should have eternal life."
00:03:01.000 | You say, "There, you could have life if you are forgiven."
00:03:04.000 | And you say, "Well, maybe I don't want it, because it might be boring.
00:03:07.000 | Endless boredom is not interesting to me."
00:03:10.000 | And so even with the word "life" we haven't gotten anywhere.
00:03:13.000 | Isn't it amazing how many words we can use to describe Christianity without saying anything yet,
00:03:21.000 | that sounds good to anybody?
00:03:23.000 | So I have to say, "saved for what?" And we can say, "life."
00:03:28.000 | And then I ask, "What kind of life? Where? With whom? Will I want this life?
00:03:33.000 | There are lives I don't want to live."
00:03:37.000 | Maybe the one you're living now you don't want to live,
00:03:40.000 | which would be a very dangerous position for you to be in tonight.
00:03:43.000 | And I'm glad you're here, because I would like to turn that around.
00:03:47.000 | So my answer, and I'm going to take this from an Old Testament passage of Scripture,
00:03:51.000 | in the Psalms, number 16, verse 11, goes like this,
00:03:56.000 | "You, O God, show me the path of life," and then it defines it like this,
00:04:02.000 | "In your presence is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."
00:04:11.000 | And now you're talking language that sounds like goodness.
00:04:15.000 | Fullness of joy, pleasures that never end.
00:04:20.000 | Gospel might not have meant very much.
00:04:23.000 | Forgiveness might not have meant very much.
00:04:25.000 | Saved might not have meant very much.
00:04:28.000 | Life might not have meant very much.
00:04:31.000 | But pleasure, I want that.
00:04:34.000 | Joy that's full and never ending.
00:04:37.000 | You see those two modifiers?
00:04:38.000 | Full means not 90% proof, but 100% proof.
00:04:42.000 | Pleasure, joy.
00:04:44.000 | And then everlasting, that means it never comes to an end.
00:04:47.000 | I'm not interested in your offer of 800 years of pleasure.
00:04:50.000 | No thank you.
00:04:51.000 | I want it to last forever.
00:04:53.000 | If this text is true, big if, right?
00:04:55.000 | If this text is true, Psalm 16, verse 11,
00:04:58.000 | the one place that can be found is in God.
00:05:02.000 | And Jesus Christ, Christianity teaches,
00:05:04.000 | the gospel is Jesus Christ came into the world to die in the place of sinners
00:05:09.000 | so that we could be forgiven, so that we could be saved from the opposite of that,
00:05:14.000 | for that life which is everlasting and ever-increasing pleasure in his presence.
00:05:25.000 | I grew up in a home with a dad who was a believer,
00:05:29.000 | who prayed every night that God would be glorified in all things,
00:05:34.000 | which creates a problem for me now with this particular train of thought.
00:05:39.000 | Because here I've arrived at a point where it looks like I'm saying,
00:05:42.000 | the gospel is all about my joy.
00:05:45.000 | And my dad prayed in a way that taught me the gospel is all about God's glory,
00:05:52.000 | his beauty, his power, his justice, his truth, his goodness, his mercy.
00:06:01.000 | It's all about making much of him, lifting up him, honoring him, worshipping him.
00:06:09.000 | So now I've got my heart longing for this joy over here,
00:06:12.000 | and the Bible saying the end of all gospel, salvation, forgiveness, life,
00:06:18.000 | is pleasures at God's right hand.
00:06:21.000 | And I've got these other passages of scripture over here that say,
00:06:24.000 | you're created for his glory, everything is for his glory.
00:06:28.000 | In other words, to show how great he is and to magnify him.
00:06:32.000 | Now here's my discovery, and I learned it indirectly from the Bible,
00:06:39.000 | through Jonathan Edwards, who lived 250 years ago.
00:06:44.000 | And my way of saying it is this, to bring these two together.
00:06:49.000 | God is most glorified, honored, praised, made much of.
00:06:59.000 | God is most glorified in me when I am most satisfied in him.
00:07:06.000 | Amen. That is what we are all about at DesiringGod.org.
00:07:10.000 | God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.
00:07:15.000 | You can go to our site to find more.
00:07:17.000 | At DesiringGod.org we have thousands of books, articles, and sermons
00:07:22.000 | to fill out what this means, to be saved, to delight in God.
00:07:27.000 | Again, our site is DesiringGod.org.
00:07:30.000 | Special thanks to podcast listener Andy Cimbala,
00:07:33.000 | who emailed us and suggested that we play this clip in the podcast.
00:07:36.000 | And it's a great clip. Thank you, Andy, for suggesting it.
00:07:40.000 | John Piper will sit down with us again tomorrow
00:07:42.000 | to address the questions that you keep sending in.
00:07:45.000 | Please keep sending those questions in.
00:07:47.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening to the Ask Pastor John Podcast.
00:07:51.000 | [Pastor John's Podcast - Ask Pastor John]
00:07:53.000 | [Pastor John's Podcast - Ask Pastor John]
00:07:55.000 | [Pastor John's Podcast - Ask Pastor John]
00:07:57.000 | [BLANK_AUDIO]