Hello again, and thank you for listening to Ask Pastor John with longtime pastor and author John Piper. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Today we have a question about John Piper's bestselling book, Don't Waste Your Life, and it comes to us from a listener named David. "Hello, Pastor John. Like so many others, I thank God for your labors and his word to bring clarity on a wide range of biblical topics.

My wife and I listen to the vast majority of Solid Joyous Devotionals and Ask Pastor John episodes, and we have learned a great deal from each of them. Over the years I've pondered Galatians 2.20. It appears to teach that the person I was in Adam is dead, and the risen Christ is now doing the living in my earthen vessel.

Would this be your understanding also, and if so, might it be appropriate to modify your book title to Don't Waste His Life? In what sense is the life we now live really a calling for his full life to manifest through us and to break through our limitations and doubts and fears?

What would you say to David?" I would say, "Yes, yes, yes." When I say to Christians, "Don't waste your life," this means don't waste Christ's life. That is, in fact, what I mean. So yes, I didn't make the connection, so thank you. I didn't make the connection with Galatians 2.20 like you did, but that is exactly right.

Let me read it so people are up to speed with what we're talking about. Paul said, "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh," paradox there, "I no longer live," and then he says, "The life I live." There's some sense in which he's not living and Christ is living instead, and another sense in which, "Oh, I am living," but what does he mean then?

He says, "And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." There's the fundamental truth about a Christian. When we, by faith, are united to Christ, we are first united to His death, Romans 6.5, if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His, and then, since our old, rebellious, unbelieving selves died with Christ in union with Him in His death, we're made alive by the Spirit to walk in newness of life, Paul says.

And David is emphasizing that we think of this newness of life as Christ living through us so that all our life becomes a display of Christ. That's good. So, let's look at some other texts and see how that works itself out. Stay in Galatians for a moment. We were at 2.29.

Let's go to 5.24. "Those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires." So, what dies in union with Christ is old passions and old, destructive, sinful, Christ-dishonoring desires. That's how we show Christ now—new desires. His desires start to rule. And then again, 6.14, "Far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I have been crucified to the world." So, being crucified with Christ means that we are not any longer slaves of the world.

We're free. We're not just echoing, conformed to, mirroring the standards of the world, which means the power of sin is broken. Romans 6.7, "One who has died has been set free from sin. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus." This is how we live the life of Christ.

We live in victory over the sin that He died to defeat. Or here's the positive way of saying it in Romans 6.13, "You have been brought from death to life, so present your members"—that is, your arms and legs and tongue—"present your members to God as instruments of righteousness." I think "instruments of righteousness" is another way of saying visible manifestations of the way Christ lived righteously in the world.

Another way Paul says it is that if we suffer for Christ, "we carry in the body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may be manifest in our bodies." So there it is, real clear, the life of Christ shining out, manifest in our suffering bodies. Still another way is to use the imagery of the aroma of Christ.

Paul says, "Thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession through us and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of Him everywhere." We are the aroma of Christ. I think that's another way of saying our life is Christ. When people spiritually smell our ethos, our attitudes, our actions, when they sniff spiritually, what they smell is the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and to those who are perishing.

So don't waste the aroma of Christ, which you are. And another way he talks about it is in 2 Corinthians 3.18. This is how we actually look like Christ. We all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

In other words, the more we see Christ clearly in the Word, the more we are changed into His image, and the more our life becomes His life for others to see. So we don't waste our lives by looking more and more like the world. We try not to waste our life by looking more and more like Christ, seeing Him more clearly, knowing Him more deeply, and so coming closer and closer to His image in the world.

One last way Paul talks about our living the life of Christ and not wasting the life of Christ in us, Galatians 3.27. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. And then again, same thing, Romans 13.14, "Put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify His desires." Or Colossians 3.10, "Put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator." So Paul thinks of Christ as our new uniform, insignia, badge maybe, put on Christ, what we put on or wear as a covering or a badge or insignia not only covers us but becomes our new identity, our appearance in the world.

And this appearance of Christ we must not waste. Maybe one last question. How do we live this new identity? Not I but Christ in me. Just two quick pointers. Galatians 2.20 says we live it by faith. The life I now live, I live by faith. And Romans 7.4 says we live it by the Spirit.

It goes like this, "It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God." So the conscious appropriation of the new life is by trusting Christ. But then Romans 7.4 says, "You have died to the law through the body of Christ so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God." We have died to the law that held us captive so that we may serve in the new way of the Spirit, not the old way of the written code.

In other words, once we thought willpower law-keeping was the key to life, but we died to that. We died to the law in that sense. And now the key is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit way. And the way he's active in us is by faith. This is the new way of the Spirit.

So the sum of the matter is, when we are saved, we are united by the Spirit to Christ. Our old self—unbelieving, rebellious, loving-sin self—dies with him. Our new self is created by the Spirit through faith, and the image of that new self is Christ—Christ himself—from one degree of glory to the next.

So yes, David, yes, don't waste his life. Don't waste Christ's life in you is good theology, and you can change the title of my book if you want. All right. Thank you, Pastor John. "Don't Waste Your Life" or "Don't Waste His Life," whatever your preferred title, you can download the book right now free of charge at DesiringGod.org/books.

The whole thing can be found there as a PDF. If you prefer a printed copy, two new editions were recently released, I think a year or a year and a half ago. A gift edition hardcover especially is worth checking out, and then a new design of the paperback. Both of those are at Amazon.

Check them out. Well, what does it mean to live like a slave of God compared to living as a son of God? Oftentimes we make a mistake here, and we fail to live in the beauty and the freedom of what it means to be a child of God. So how do we know if we are living like a slave or living like a son?

That's next time on Wednesday. Until then, I'm your host, Tony Ranke. We'll see you back here on Wednesday. 1. Desiring God - How to Live Like a Slave 2. Desiring God - How to Live Like a Slave 3. Desiring God - How to Live Like a Slave 4. Desiring God - How to Live Like a Slave 5.

Desiring God - How to Live Like a Slave