(upbeat music) - Make war on the urge to sulk when you don't get your way. This is such an important topic and I'm glad we can get to it today. Pastor John, thank you for joining us over the telephone today. The topic comes up in an email question from a podcast listener named Christopher in Seattle, Washington.

Pastor John, thank you for this podcast. When I get angry in my home, I have a tendency to shut down. I don't lash out in anger or cuss, I sulk. I give my wife the silent treatment and I know this is wrong. Please help me better understand how to communicate in my home in or shortly after conflict flares up.

I wanna lead well and reflect Christ more in my home. And as a leader of your home, what have you learned over the years? - Seven years ago, I took a leave of absence, specifically about eight months in fact, specifically to do a self-assessment of my own soul and my family and my ministry.

I was still preaching and pastoring at the time. I came back from that leave having put my finger on five besetting sin of John Piper that I more or less count as corrupt, fallen personality traits, which means no excuse. They're just part of me. And I've seen them for decades and it was just good to get a name on them, isolate them, understand them, confess them.

And here they are, selfishness, anger, self-pity, quickness to blame and sullenness. And I mentioned this because when Christopher said sulking was one of his problems, I think he means what I mean by sullenness. So perhaps the most helpful thing I can do is to walk Christopher through my process of self-understanding and how the Lord has helped me at least make some war on these protracted sins.

So let me name them and just put a sentence of description on each one so that we just let the ugliness, it's so easy to describe our sins in a kind of self-excusing way, but if you name your sins and then define them, it starts to look pretty bad.

So here's what I mean by the first one, selfishness. And I got five things that characterize my selfishness. My selfishness is a reflex to expect to be served. My selfishness is a reflex to feel that I am owed. My selfishness is a reflex to want praise. My selfishness is a reflex to expect things to go my way.

And my selfishness is a reflex to feel that I have the right to react negatively to being crossed. And the reason I'm using the word reflex to describe selfishness is because there is zero premeditation. I don't have to decide to be selfish. When these responses happen, they're coming from my old nature, not from reflection.

They are the marks of original sin in my life and I am guilty for them. Now, what happens when this selfishness is crossed? Here's where the other sins come in. Anger, the strong emotional opposition to the obstacle in my way. I tighten up, I wanna strike out verbally or physically.

Next, self-pity, a desire that feels like I'm wounded and others can recognize in me that I want to be admired or pitied for my sense of being wounded, being mistreated by someone. I want others to know it and recognize it, feel sorry for me. Quickness to blame. This is a reflex to attribute to others the cause of the frustrating situation I'm in.

Others can feel it in a tone of voice, a look on the face, a sideways query, an outright accusation. And then lastly, sullenness or sulking, the sinking discouragement, the moodiness, the hopelessness, the unresponsiveness, the withdrawn deadness of emotion. And of course, the effect on marriage is that my wife feels blamed and disapproved of rather than cherished and cared for.

Tender emotions start to die, hope is depleted, strength to carry on in the hardships of ministry wanes. So that's my diagnosis. Now, when Charles Wesley taught us to sing, "He Breaks the Power of Cancelled Sin," he was teaching the fundamental truth about how the cross of Christ relates to our battle with our own sin.

The cross cancels sins by faith for all who believe in Jesus. And then on the basis of that cancellation of our sins, the power of our actual sinning is broken. It's not the other way around. There would be no gospel and no music if we tried to sing, "He cancels the guilt of our conquered sins." That's not gospel.

First, the cancellation, then the conquering, which means that the link between the cross and my conquered sin is a Holy Spirit-empowered willing. It works a willing in me. Listen to these texts. Romans 7, 6, "We died to that which held us captive so that we might serve in the new way of the Spirit." So I serve by the Spirit because I died on the cross.

Or Romans 8, 13, "By the Spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body." So I put to death by the Spirit. Or Galatians 2, 20, "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh.

I live by the faith of the Son of God." So I am living because I died and Christ is alive and a new I, which trusts Him, is alive. And the most important one is Philippians 2, 12, and 13. At least in my experience, it proved to be most important.

"Beloved, as you've always obeyed, so not only in my presence, but much more in my absence, work out," or literally produce, bring about, effect, "your own salvation with fear and trembling, for God is the one who is at work in you to will and to work for His good pleasure." In every single case of these texts, especially that last one, I'm working, I'm expending effort, I'm willing, I'm serving, I'm putting sin to death.

My will is engaged. But in every case, my will is empowered by the will of another. So let me close with an illustration of how this has been working over, say, the past seven, eight years of my life in a more effective way. And I really do feel that even today, seven years on from some of these key discoveries, God has given Noel and me fresh and new victories.

It was a Sunday evening, this was years ago while I was still in the ministry, about, what, I don't know, seven, eight years ago, when I was making these discoveries and trying to apply these things in a fresh way. It was a Sunday evening, it was cozy, snowy outside.

Noel and Talitha and I were at home alone, and I was looking forward to something we could do together. I had this expectation, and you know, discouragements and anger come from shattered expectations. Talitha comes in from the dining room and says, "Mommy and I are gonna watch 'Supernanny' on the computer." And they set it up on the stool, they sit in the love seat together, and they start watching it.

They don't even say anything to me. They don't ask, they don't explain, they don't propose anything else or later, and I feel, poor little John Piper, I feel shut out, ignored. Now, at that moment, the old John Piper feels an enormous temptation to anger, self-pity, blaming, sullenness, and that temptation, I think, is as dangerous for me, as big for me, as some big sexual temptation.

So I immediately said in my heart, because I had Philippians 2, 12 and 13 in my mind, that I'm supposed to work out my salvation here, I'm supposed to bring about victory over these sins, I immediately said, I said it, no, I said no to those rising temptations. And I quietly, in the power of that no, which I, by the Holy Spirit, said to those temptations, I said no, I went upstairs without any flair of woundedness, I didn't like, in a poor, wimpy, wounded way, make them try to feel bad, I just quietly went upstairs to my study, and that's not unusual, and I made war.

I turned my mind and my heart, by the power of God in His Spirit, toward the promises of God, and the surety of the cross, and the love of my Father, and the wealth of my inheritance, and the blessing of that Lord's day, which He had poured out earlier that morning, and the patience of Christ, and the fact that my wife and daughter, in their own minds, were not snubbing me, and I held those truths before my eyes, and I beat down the anger, and self-pity, and blaming, and sullen, I beat it down, and beat it down, until it died.

And later that night, I went downstairs, and I mentioned to Noel, in a way I never would have been able to before, without any, you know, subtle innuendo, I mentioned to Noel, in a non-condemning tone, which was a miracle, that I was surprised that we didn't do anything together, and we just quietly worked it out, and compared to the way things used to go, it was an amazing victory.

And yes, yes, yes, it would be far better if there were no war in John Piper's soul at all, against such rising selfishness, and self-pity, and anger, and sulking, and sullenness. Yes, that would be better. It will be that way in heaven someday, but oh, how I thank God that He breaks the power of canceled sin, and He does it sometimes through our spirit-empowered battle with our own temptation in fear and trembling, because God Himself is at work in us.

So that's what I pray for Christopher in his marriage, and his battle with sullenness. Christopher, I pray that you would reckon your sin canceled, and then you would carry it into a room somewhere, and you would hammer on it for an hour by the promises of God. - Amen, that's an incredibly helpful word, first of all.

Pastor John, thank you for this sobering glimpse into the warfare that you make on your own daily struggles with sin. I appreciate your self-disclosure in the podcast. Thank you all for listening to the podcast. At our online home at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn, you can explore all 1,200-plus of our episodes. You can scan a list of our most popular ones, read full transcripts, even send us a question of your own.

And of course, to get new episodes delivered to you three times per week, subscribe to the Ask Pastor John podcast in your favorite podcast app. Well, how much joy can we really expect to experience in this life? It's one of those questions that Christian hedonists have to answer, and John Piper will when we return on Wednesday.

I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening to the podcast. We'll see you then. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)