What’s the Comfort If the Coronavirus Is Judgment?
00:00:00.000 | Hello, everyone.
00:00:05.920 | Well Pastor John's new book, Coronavirus and Christ, is now available in 20 languages,
00:00:12.120 | including American Sign Language, and soon to be in 29 total languages, with the potential
00:00:17.240 | for even more languages to be added in the near future.
00:00:20.800 | It's been very encouraging to see how fast this book has been translated and how far
00:00:24.560 | it has reached across the world in such a short time.
00:00:28.380 | Here in the States, we've seen pastors buying cases of the book and putting them on a table
00:00:32.540 | outside the front of their church building so that members could drive up through the
00:00:35.320 | week and take a free copy.
00:00:37.820 | We've seen family and friends posting links to the free book and the free audiobook online.
00:00:42.040 | It's been amazing to watch the DG community help us spread word online and offline.
00:00:47.120 | Thank you so much.
00:00:48.840 | So many encouraging updates have been arriving by the day, but of course, not all the updates
00:00:52.560 | have been positive.
00:00:54.200 | This week, a major news outlet reported on the book in a story of a US Army chaplain
00:00:58.920 | under fire for commending the book.
00:01:01.880 | Senior Army Chaplain Colonel Moon H. Kim.
00:01:04.920 | He's the US Army's command chaplain based in South Korea.
00:01:08.460 | He apparently passed along an email to the Coronavirus and Christ book, passed it along
00:01:12.560 | to fellow military chaplains, commended the book to them, and for it, got severely criticized.
00:01:19.460 | No criticized, there's now a call for him to be disciplined and even possibly court-martialed.
00:01:24.800 | In a letter to the Secretary of Defense published online from an organization called the Military
00:01:30.680 | Religious Freedom Foundation, accuses the chaplain of "an absolutely egregious and deplorable
00:01:36.580 | act."
00:01:38.440 | It says that in sharing the book, he gave a "full-fledged endorsement in validation of
00:01:42.360 | what the book espouses and proclaims."
00:01:46.040 | The letter recommends that Kim be "officially, swiftly, aggressively, and visibly investigated
00:01:50.980 | and disciplined in punishment for his deplorable actions."
00:01:56.020 | That is for commending your book to fellow chaplains because what you write is, the letter
00:02:00.580 | says, "unmitigated drivel."
00:02:05.120 | The letter to the Secretary of Defense is remarkable because of how much of your book
00:02:09.720 | it actually quotes, at least 10 citations in the letter.
00:02:12.800 | As you read this response, what do you think of how you're quoted and interpreted, and
00:02:18.400 | is the letter a fair interpretation of your book?
00:02:21.120 | Well, Tony, some of it is.
00:02:23.840 | I think it would be fair to say that some of my views about what the Bible teaches,
00:02:32.120 | even rightly understood, the author of that letter hates.
00:02:37.600 | He hates what I think.
00:02:40.440 | They are, he says, "incendiary, bigoted, vulgar," not just because he misunderstands,
00:02:50.520 | but because in part, because he does understand, and that's how he thinks and feels about some
00:02:57.480 | of what the Bible teaches.
00:02:59.680 | For example, the truth of Romans 5:16, that not only some death, but all death, including
00:03:09.240 | yours, Tony, and mine, is the result of God's judgment on the human race because sin entered
00:03:15.320 | the world.
00:03:16.920 | Or second, that God is sovereign over the coronavirus and sends it and ends it when
00:03:23.680 | he wills.
00:03:24.680 | Or third, that homosexual intercourse is a sin.
00:03:30.760 | Or fourth, that the coronavirus is a call for repentance to all of us, all of us, to
00:03:39.840 | bring our lives into alignment with the infinite worth of Jesus.
00:03:43.640 | I think the author of that letter considers all of those views as wrong.
00:03:50.520 | That's putting it mildly.
00:03:51.520 | I mean, his language is very colorful.
00:03:56.440 | While I consider all of those views to be true because they are what the Bible teaches,
00:04:03.680 | and therefore they're very valuable to know.
00:04:06.680 | So I think it's not just that he misunderstands, but that he gets some things right in those
00:04:13.760 | quotes and he just doesn't like them, period.
00:04:17.720 | Yeah.
00:04:18.760 | And obviously there are places where the author of this letter gets your meaning wrong.
00:04:23.560 | Take us through those areas.
00:04:24.560 | What do you see?
00:04:25.920 | Well, I see at least three things that the letter and the interview with one of the news
00:04:37.080 | outlets gets wrong about the book.
00:04:40.040 | For example, when I say some people will be infected with the coronavirus as a specific
00:04:49.560 | judgment from God because of their sinful attitudes and actions, he assumes that I know
00:04:57.440 | who those people are, or at least what kind of people they are.
00:05:04.360 | But here's what I write on page 72.
00:05:06.720 | And if anybody wants to just check it out, there's pages 69 to 72 are the real ones he's
00:05:12.300 | after and they can go look.
00:05:14.880 | But here's what I say in the summing up of that little chapter.
00:05:19.200 | The coronavirus is never a clear and simple punishment on any person.
00:05:27.240 | The most loving, Spirit-filled Christian whose sins are forgiven through Christ may die of
00:05:34.240 | the coronavirus disease.
00:05:37.280 | But it is fitting that every one of us search our own heart to discern if our suffering
00:05:45.840 | is God's judgment on the way we live."
00:05:48.240 | In other words, God does judge people with sickness.
00:05:53.480 | That's very clear from 1 Corinthians 11.32.
00:05:56.280 | And there it's even talking about Christians.
00:05:59.280 | But I can't—John Piper and you or anybody else can't determine from outside who is experiencing
00:06:09.200 | the coronavirus as judgment in a punitive sense and who's experiencing it, say, as purification
00:06:17.480 | or who's experiencing it for other reasons that God may have.
00:06:22.440 | My point was God does do all these things and all of us should do sober-minded self-assessment
00:06:34.360 | to discern as well as we can what God's purposes are in all that happens to us.
00:06:41.680 | And I take the Bible, the Christian scriptures, as the main guide in these things, and the
00:06:48.920 | author of this letter apparently doesn't.
00:06:52.960 | And there's the big canyon between our worldviews.
00:06:57.040 | Yeah, that's a really important point.
00:07:00.520 | You said there were three misunderstandings.
00:07:03.720 | It seems that one of those obviously is the question over homosexuality.
00:07:07.160 | Right.
00:07:08.160 | You could say probably that that issue is a specific instance of the first misunderstanding.
00:07:16.080 | As far as I can see, the author of that letter wants to say that Piper thinks every person
00:07:23.840 | who engages in homosexual acts and who gets the coronavirus is being punished by God for
00:07:32.760 | those acts.
00:07:34.640 | And my response is, well, no, it's not that simple.
00:07:38.320 | For sure, in Romans 1:27, the Bible says that living in homosexual behavior is sometimes
00:07:45.780 | punished by God with a "due penalty," which could be a disease.
00:07:51.720 | But not always.
00:07:54.360 | And sometimes disease comes not as punishment, but as a merciful wake-up call that results
00:08:02.080 | in repentance and reconciliation and hope.
00:08:06.880 | God's ways are simply more complex than the letter acknowledges.
00:08:13.200 | So I say again from page 72, "The coronavirus is never a clear and simple punishment on
00:08:22.400 | any person."
00:08:24.640 | It may be punishment.
00:08:26.640 | It may not be.
00:08:28.200 | And our prayer should be that all of us experience our suffering as redemptive, not punitive.
00:08:37.640 | I suspect, though, Tony, I suspect that this clarification won't even come close to satisfying
00:08:46.600 | the author of this letter, since he considers it drivel and vulgar to even suggest that
00:08:55.360 | God controls this disease and would judge anyone with it.
00:08:59.960 | Yeah, you're exactly right.
00:09:02.080 | And in the Christian Post interview, one of the rhetorical questions the author of this
00:09:06.140 | letter poses, and it's used as a kind of unanswerable argument against your view, is
00:09:12.520 | this, he says, "What are you supposed to tell a couple that has a gay child who also has
00:09:17.920 | COVID?
00:09:18.920 | Well, this is your due penalty.
00:09:20.720 | It's just horrible and wrong."
00:09:24.120 | How would you respond to that specific argument that he raises?
00:09:27.280 | Well, actually, that is the third mistake I was referring to earlier.
00:09:34.820 | He thinks that if you believe what I do, you can't possibly have any good news for someone
00:09:44.400 | who is dying of a disease that came to them because of their sin.
00:09:48.880 | Now, that's the objection in this letter I care about most.
00:09:52.720 | Actually, it wasn't in the letter, it was in the interview.
00:09:56.080 | And that's the one I care about most.
00:09:57.520 | When I read that, I thought, "Okay, even though he states this sarcastically or cynically
00:10:03.560 | as though there couldn't possibly be any answer to it, I thought, "I want to take that question
00:10:09.960 | seriously," because it's a very good pastoral question.
00:10:15.180 | But his viewpoint about what I think or would be able to say is so wrong.
00:10:23.700 | It's wrong at the very point where God's sovereign grace shines most brightly.
00:10:31.740 | Two thousand years ago, in Jerusalem, the Jewish King Herod, the Roman governor Pontius
00:10:37.660 | Pilate, the angry crowds, the brutal soldiers, all of them combined to kill Jesus Christ,
00:10:46.460 | the Son of God.
00:10:48.000 | But here's the all-important fact.
00:10:51.460 | That horror—and crucifixion is a horrible thing, especially when it's done to the most
00:10:58.060 | innocent person that ever lived and the most glorious person that ever lived—that horror
00:11:03.420 | was not a random historical event.
00:11:08.140 | The Bible says in Acts 4:27 that God predestined it and His hand brought it to pass.
00:11:18.140 | Why?
00:11:19.300 | Because He loved His enemies.
00:11:21.820 | He loved them.
00:11:22.820 | We should say He loved us, all of us who are His enemies, enough that He didn't spare His
00:11:30.260 | own Son, His only infinitely loved Son, but gave Him up for us.
00:11:38.820 | Romans 8:32.
00:11:40.340 | That was love when that happened, according to Romans 5:8.
00:11:44.900 | God shows His love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
00:11:50.940 | In other words, we have the best news in the world for someone who has lived in a homosexual
00:11:59.660 | lifestyle or homosexual behaviors and who is dying of COVID-19, and it's the same news
00:12:07.660 | that I would bring to any other sinner who is dying of COVID-19, including myself.
00:12:14.740 | It is what I want to hold on to when I die, perhaps, of COVID-19, being old like I am
00:12:22.460 | with compromised lungs.
00:12:23.900 | I'm not out of this thing yet.
00:12:26.340 | Maybe I'll be on the deathbed, and I'll be bringing all of my thousands of sins before
00:12:32.420 | the judge of the universe.
00:12:34.220 | What I'm going to do, and my answer is I'm going to hold on to the very same message,
00:12:40.700 | the grace, the good news that I'm going to bring to the person that this author says
00:12:46.180 | I don't have anything to say to.
00:12:48.380 | Jesus said to the thief on the cross who had spent a lifetime in sinning, just hours before
00:12:57.620 | he died, He looked over to Jesus and said, "Have mercy.
00:13:03.080 | Remember me when you come into your kingdom."
00:13:05.180 | And Jesus said, "Today, you will be with me in paradise."
00:13:11.180 | Are you kidding me?
00:13:13.740 | I mean, this has got to be like a bolt of lightning out of the blue.
00:13:17.220 | Can that possibly be true, Jesus?
00:13:19.740 | You're really going to forgive in this split second before I die?
00:13:23.300 | All my sins.
00:13:24.620 | That's how great God's grace is for those who repent and trust Him.
00:13:30.740 | So Tony, I hope the world hears we have a spectacularly wonderful news for all sinners
00:13:41.140 | who are dying, however they are dying, whatever they are dying from, whatever sins they have
00:13:47.660 | committed.
00:13:49.220 | And the news in a nutshell is this.
00:13:52.060 | Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.
00:13:57.980 | Turn to Jesus Christ.
00:14:00.580 | He died for sinners like you and me.
00:14:04.340 | Trust Him.
00:14:05.500 | And you can know that your suffering is not the punitive judgment of God.
00:14:13.580 | You can know this.
00:14:15.220 | You can know this as you die.
00:14:17.820 | I'm not being punished now.
00:14:20.500 | I won't be punished later.
00:14:22.420 | How can you know that?
00:14:24.060 | As Jesus said in John 5, 24, these amazing words, "Whoever hears my word and believes
00:14:32.900 | Him who sent me has eternal life.
00:14:38.740 | He does not come into judgment, but has passed already."
00:14:46.660 | That thief on the cross, he passed while he was hanging on the cross.
00:14:50.560 | He passed from death to life.
00:14:53.820 | A dying person, any dying person can know the sweet voice of God in Romans 8, 1.
00:15:02.900 | There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
00:15:09.580 | So when this letter asks, "Where's the pastoral care and comfort in that belief?"
00:15:17.140 | Namely, Piper's belief and the belief of this accused chaplain, "Where's the care and comfort
00:15:23.900 | in that?"
00:15:24.900 | And then answers, "There is none."
00:15:26.940 | That's what he says, "There's none."
00:15:29.780 | My response is, "Sir, no, you are profoundly wrong.
00:15:38.060 | We have the best news in the world for the hardest moments in the world.
00:15:45.380 | The best care, the best comfort, the very heart of Christianity is that through Christ,
00:15:53.180 | God rescues guilty sinners."
00:15:56.140 | That's me and you and all of us.
00:15:59.420 | Through Christ, God rescues guilty sinners from His own wrath.
00:16:07.300 | Romans 5, 9, "Since therefore we have now been justified by the blood of Christ, much
00:16:14.580 | more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God."
00:16:19.740 | That's what God sent Christ to do, rescue us from His own righteous punishment.
00:16:27.500 | Amen.
00:16:28.940 | That is the best news in the world.
00:16:30.820 | And it's what motivates us even now to do ministry in this hard time, to get the book
00:16:36.660 | translated as far and wide as possible.
00:16:39.740 | Thank you, Pastor John, for that.
00:16:41.260 | You're welcome.
00:16:42.260 | At the beginning of today's episode, I mentioned the "Coronavirus and Christ" book is now
00:16:45.220 | available in 20 languages, including American Sign Language, and soon to be in 29 total
00:16:51.180 | languages, with the potential for even more to be added in the near future.
00:16:55.420 | You can find links to all those translated versions at DesiringGod.org or get there by
00:17:00.500 | Googling the title "Coronavirus and Christ" by John Piper.
00:17:05.380 | It's truly remarkable.
00:17:06.380 | You see that list of translations and how quickly this international publishing project
00:17:09.740 | came together.
00:17:11.540 | Praise God and praise the Savior for His grace over all of it.
00:17:15.040 | And thank you for listening to this special episode of the Ask Pastor John podcast.
00:17:18.740 | We'll see you next time.
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