God Wrote a Book — That Changes All Other Books

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - It's been four years now since my book Lit launched

00:00:08.280 | and it's sobering to have received literally hundreds

00:00:12.440 | of emails from Christians over the years

00:00:14.240 | who have struggled to read or who were helped

00:00:17.080 | by some of the encouragements in the book.

00:00:18.720 | And books and literacy are powerful tools

00:00:21.640 | in the Christian life, as you well know, Pastor John.

00:00:24.380 | And I recently perused your little blue copy

00:00:27.600 | of The Weight of Glory, a C.S. Lewis paperback

00:00:29.840 | you bought in the fall of 1968.

00:00:33.200 | And I know you can still remember standing in the bookstore,

00:00:35.120 | reading that book for the first time

00:00:37.200 | and reading those first few pages

00:00:39.240 | and having your life changed by that little blue paperback.

00:00:43.400 | Great books have that power.

00:00:45.400 | And I've been wanting to ask you,

00:00:46.960 | speaking from a macro perspective,

00:00:49.920 | what has been the role of books in your life?

00:00:52.740 | - Well, what a wonderful question.

00:00:58.080 | It would be hard to overstate the life-shaping impact

00:01:01.560 | of books on my life, but I'm wired in such a way

00:01:06.240 | that I even feel uncomfortable saying that

00:01:10.520 | without giving a reason for it.

00:01:12.680 | Like I need to give a justification

00:01:14.960 | for why books can have such an impact on my life.

00:01:17.120 | So if it's okay with you,

00:01:18.480 | I'm going to go back a little bit and lay a foundation.

00:01:23.080 | And foundation number one is the Bible is a book.

00:01:27.560 | The implications of that fact are simply staggering.

00:01:32.400 | When God contemplated all the possible ways

00:01:36.560 | that existed for him as an infinite, omnipotent,

00:01:41.360 | all-wise God to transmit and preserve

00:01:46.360 | his revelation to the world, he chose a book.

00:01:51.360 | And that's simply astonishing.

00:01:53.640 | We have no other authoritative access to the knowledge

00:01:58.120 | of God and the way of salvation and how to live a life

00:02:02.840 | pleasing to the Lord than through this book,

00:02:06.440 | either directly by reading it or indirectly

00:02:09.560 | from others who have read it.

00:02:12.260 | The book is absolutely unique.

00:02:15.160 | It's inspired in all of its words,

00:02:17.840 | and that inspiration secures the sufficiency of the book

00:02:22.080 | in equipping us for every good deed.

00:02:24.440 | I mean, that very phrase in 2 Timothy 2, 17,

00:02:27.360 | every good deed is amazing to me.

00:02:29.780 | It's an awesome claim that we are equipped,

00:02:33.400 | fitted out by this book for every good deed

00:02:37.320 | that God expects of us.

00:02:38.560 | He won't expect of us anything he doesn't equip us to do

00:02:42.260 | through this book.

00:02:44.080 | So it's astonishing how unique and powerful this book is.

00:02:48.060 | And then you add to that Ephesians 3, 4,

00:02:50.480 | where Paul said, "When you read this,

00:02:53.720 | you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ."

00:02:58.720 | That's breathtaking to me, that reading the book.

00:03:02.280 | So the inspiration of the book and the reading of the book

00:03:07.040 | are the junctures between God and man

00:03:10.880 | where saving truth is moved from the divine mind

00:03:14.680 | into the human mind and spirit.

00:03:17.320 | This is just staggering implications of saying

00:03:19.960 | that reading is the way you can perceive my insight

00:03:23.920 | into the mystery of Christ, Paul says.

00:03:26.200 | And of course, it's not possible

00:03:28.320 | without the almighty agency of the Holy Spirit.

00:03:32.000 | It's not merely an intellectual affair,

00:03:34.640 | but it's not less than an intellectual affair

00:03:38.320 | because God has ordained that his truth come through a book.

00:03:42.240 | And reading is a work of the mind.

00:03:47.040 | And of course, it also doesn't mean,

00:03:49.440 | nothing I've said is I intend to imply

00:03:53.880 | that we could just go about this

00:03:55.760 | in our own little private cubicle

00:03:57.960 | without taking anybody else into account.

00:04:00.060 | The Bible is crystal clear that God has appointed pastors

00:04:03.880 | and teachers, people with spiritual gifts,

00:04:06.960 | and those gifts include wisdom and knowledge and prophecy

00:04:10.320 | and teaching and other ways that humans clarify

00:04:14.400 | and apply and inspire us with the scriptures.

00:04:18.320 | So even though God is giving us a book,

00:04:21.760 | he means for us to understand the book and apply the book

00:04:24.960 | and be inspired by the book

00:04:27.280 | with the help of other people who are dead

00:04:31.360 | and left their insights in books

00:04:33.680 | and who are alive and teach us and preach and counsel

00:04:37.840 | and converse with us.

00:04:39.840 | So once the reality of God's privileging the written word

00:04:44.840 | with his choice of a book as the decisive means

00:04:51.440 | by which he would reveal and preserve

00:04:54.440 | the revelation of himself, once that has sunk in,

00:04:57.880 | you just can never be indifferent to the reality of books.

00:05:01.920 | Again, God has privileged the book, honored the book,

00:05:06.040 | elevated the book, esteemed the book

00:05:08.120 | above all other means for his centuries-long preservation

00:05:13.120 | and explanation of his revelation.

00:05:16.700 | So when I say it would be hard to overstate

00:05:21.180 | the life-shaping impact of books on my life,

00:05:25.060 | I think I'm saying something very much in line

00:05:29.180 | with God's purposes for the world,

00:05:31.860 | all that to justify my sentence.

00:05:35.080 | So let me be specific and answer your question.

00:05:37.560 | Number one, books have shown me the glory

00:05:41.360 | and the greatness and the character

00:05:43.800 | and the attributes and the beauties of God.

00:05:46.600 | Jonathan Edwards' "Freedom of the Will,"

00:05:48.760 | essay on the Trinity, dozens of sermons.

00:05:51.680 | John Owen on the death of death and the glories of Christ

00:05:54.840 | in communion with God.

00:05:55.800 | Stephen Charnock on the attributes of God.

00:05:58.380 | That book sat on my bedside table for almost a decade,

00:06:01.680 | I think, because I could only manage a few pages a night.

00:06:05.780 | It was so dense with glorious truths about God.

00:06:09.300 | Number two, books have convicted me of sin.

00:06:13.580 | In fact, most books convict me of sin one way or the other.

00:06:17.760 | There was an extended period of time in Germany

00:06:20.260 | when every Sunday evening I would read an extended portion

00:06:24.480 | of Edwards' religious affections

00:06:26.720 | and found myself devastated week in and week out

00:06:30.460 | as he peeled away the layers of the self-exaltation

00:06:35.260 | of my heart.

00:06:37.020 | Number three, books have shown me the path of righteousness.

00:06:41.700 | I think of Drandy Alcorn's book on pro-life arguments

00:06:45.020 | or Carl Ellis on free at last and the experience

00:06:48.300 | of black Christianity in the 20th century

00:06:50.200 | or Soren Kierkegaard and George MacDonald and Ralph Winter

00:06:53.440 | on wartime uses of material possessions.

00:06:57.460 | Number four, books have given me inspiration

00:07:00.940 | and encouragement in some of my most difficult days

00:07:05.060 | and I'm thinking here mainly of biography.

00:07:07.940 | T.H.L. Parker on Calvin and Peter Brown on Augustine

00:07:11.140 | and Courtney Anderson on Ednar M. Judson.

00:07:13.940 | And it was a season when I was reading,

00:07:15.500 | I think there are about three volumes of little,

00:07:17.980 | little vignettes by Warren Wearsby about great pastors.

00:07:22.980 | Number five, books have shaped the way I think

00:07:27.980 | and the way I express myself.

00:07:30.180 | And here I'm thinking, of course, of C.S. Lewis.

00:07:32.920 | Here, razor sharp logic and a deep belief

00:07:37.920 | in the reality of reason and logic

00:07:41.380 | while never elevating it above the essential importance

00:07:45.260 | of the imagination and the affections.

00:07:48.400 | And it's not just only his deep belief in exemplification,

00:07:53.400 | setting an example of logic, but the touchable,

00:07:59.900 | smellable, tasteable concreteness of his language.

00:08:04.900 | Oh, the power of the concrete over the abstract

00:08:10.080 | in helping people grasp the greatest things.

00:08:13.500 | Number six, books have cultivated deep convictions in me

00:08:18.500 | about things like the aims of reading.

00:08:22.240 | I think here of E.D. Hirsch in his book,

00:08:25.040 | "Validity Interpretation" that persuaded me profoundly

00:08:29.880 | that the only objective grounds for any claim to validity

00:08:34.520 | in one's interpretation is that we have found

00:08:37.440 | an author's intention in writing.

00:08:39.600 | I think that's right and what a vast implication it has

00:08:44.040 | for how you read everything.

00:08:46.040 | And then finally, I would say books have clarified for me

00:08:50.360 | biblical concepts that I may never have gotten

00:08:54.820 | good clarity on myself because of how extensive

00:08:58.720 | the scope of one's grasp needs to be of scriptures

00:09:02.400 | in order to synthesize the way books do.

00:09:05.420 | And I'm thinking here of George Ladd, for example,

00:09:08.480 | one of my professors, George Ladd's "New Testament Theology"

00:09:11.820 | or his book, "The Presence of the Future."

00:09:14.360 | So that's a tip of the iceberg.

00:09:18.180 | To the person, Tony, who struggles with reading,

00:09:20.800 | I would simply say, join me.

00:09:22.480 | Join limited, slow reading John Piper.

00:09:25.680 | Admit your limitations.

00:09:27.800 | Lay down all resentments and anger and self-pity

00:09:32.160 | and self-justification and humbly accept your limitations,

00:09:36.760 | admit them, and then do the best you can.

00:09:40.640 | Be thankful for every measure of reading you're able to do.

00:09:45.640 | - Amen, that is wonderful and life-giving counsel,

00:09:48.160 | Pastor John, thank you.

00:09:50.080 | And thank you for bearing with some of the technical issues

00:09:53.540 | on the audio on Pastor John's end we're struggling with.

00:09:56.140 | We're just simply recording through Skype

00:09:58.560 | for the time being and we will get that fixed soon.

00:10:01.960 | Well, should we Christians care

00:10:04.360 | about how the world thinks of us?

00:10:06.840 | It's an important question

00:10:08.000 | and it's got an interesting twist to it as well.

00:10:10.360 | John Piper will explain next time why.

00:10:13.120 | For more on this podcast,

00:10:14.280 | visit us at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:10:19.120 | I'll see you tomorrow.

00:10:20.160 | (upbeat music)

00:10:22.740 | (upbeat music)

00:10:25.320 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

God Wrote a Book — That Changes All Other Books

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