Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30-foot trawler, play softball, and collect shells. That's a tragedy. Oh my, that is a classic clip from an unforgettable sermon preached 18 years ago today on May 20th, 2000 in Memphis, Tennessee. Pastor John, I know you'll never forget that moment.

You were preaching outside to about 40,000 college students at the Fourth Passion Conference, which was then called One Day. It became, of course, one of your most influential sermons. There you introduced us to the world of Bob and Penny and their seashell collection, and then you pleaded with the students, "Don't waste your life." And that plea, of course, would become the title of your book, released in 2003, which has since become a best-selling book that has now sold over 650,000 copies and has really become a staple graduation gift handed out to thousands of high school and college graduates.

You know, reflecting back 18 years to that message in Memphis, what do you remember from One Day 2000? Did the message seem particularly different to you? What was your experience of it? What has surprised you about the message now looking back on it? And if I can fit one more question into this episode, I mean, when you think of "Don't waste your life," it's so different from your other books.

How do you think of it in the corpus of your other writings? Whoa, that's a lot of questions. As I've been thinking about these questions, here's what has come to my mind, and so I'll address some of them, maybe not all of them. I've been thinking about some ironies of the book and that day, and so let me talk about several of these ironies that might get at some of what you're asking.

Number one, I think this is the only book where Bob Dylan figures in, in a pretty early significant way. And my point back in 2003 was that his song, "The Answer My Friend Is Blowing In The Wind," really did say "the answer." It didn't say "an answer," it didn't say "lots of answers," it didn't say "possible answers." It said "the answer." "The answer is blowing in the wind." Now, today, 50 years later, how ironic is it that the help that John Piper got from believing that there was "the answer" blowing in the wind that I desperately wanted to find for the meaning of my life so that I wouldn't waste my life.

I wanted "the answer," not five possible answers or not dreamy answers. I wanted "real," "the real answer." How ironic is it that 50 years later, Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize for literature in 2016 and says in his acceptance speech, which I listened to and read twice to make sure I heard it, sadly, was, "So what does it all mean?" You know, looking back over the corpus of his works, "What does it all mean?" And then he answered like this, direct quote, "My songs can mean a lot of things, a lot of different things.

If the song moves you, that's all that's important. I don't have to know what all this means, and I'm not gonna worry about it, what it all means." My heart absolutely sank. That's exactly the opposite of what I wrote my book about. It doesn't matter what it all means.

You can just let your life mean anything. A thousand ways to waste your life. I don't want to come to the end of my life or my readers to come to the end of their lives and say, "Well, it doesn't really matter what it all means, wasted or not wasted.

It doesn't really matter. What matters is how you feel about my songs or about my book." A tragic thing for a 76-year-old human being to say getting ready to meet the living God. I wrote "Don't Waste Your Life" to take people in exactly the opposite direction. How not to come to the end of your life and say like that old man did sitting on the front pew in my father's evangelistic crusade after he had pled with him to receive Christ, put his face in his hands and said as an old man, "I've wasted it.

I've wasted it." I can remember my dad telling that story over and over and everything in me as a kid. I don't want that to happen to me. I do not want that to happen to me. Now here's another irony. That sermon 18 years ago on that big field in Memphis to those thousands of students was really an exposition and an application of Galatians 6.14.

And the irony is that hardly anybody knows that. I think. I mean, if you ask people, "What do you remember from the sermon?" They say, "Shell collecting." And what struck people was the certain illustrations that I used, and I'm not sure how many people who were deeply moved by this sermon could remember that this was an exposition of these words, "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 to the world." And I remember leading up to this sermon thinking, "I just want to know what that means." So I can tell these students what that means, because Paul is saying, "Don't boast in anything except the cross." And I thought, "Are you kidding me?" I mean, Paul himself boasts in other things besides the cross, doesn't he?

He boasts in his converts, he boasts in sufferings, that word "boast" or "exalt," he uses all over the place for other things beside the cross, it seems. And so I worked and worked and worked to try to figure out what does he mean. And here's what I argued, which is what nobody remembers, it seems like.

I argued, as hell-bound, God-belittling sinners, none of us deserves one good thing from God. Not one. Not one millisecond of good health or anything else. And because of the cross covering our sin and securing God's everlasting favor for us as sinners, every single good thing that comes into our life as part of the blessings we will enjoy forever in God's favor was purchased by the cross.

And every painful thing that comes into our life that God turns for good was purchased by the cross, and therefore the cross is the foundation and the central glory of grace at every moment of our lives. That's my answer to the meaning of Galatians 6:14. And here's my suspicion about this irony that the main point of the sermon is swallowed up by the illustrations.

I think that in God's way of working through preaching—preaching solid, biblically faithful, carefully argued, clearly explained expositions of rich textual meaning—is that this exposition becomes the soil, the preaching soil, in which illustrations become credible and powerful in a lasting and substantial way. So it would be wrong—I'm trying to comfort myself now—it would be wrong to say in my low moments that because the stories in the sermon were remembered and the exegesis wasn't, therefore the exegesis was peripheral.

I think that is profoundly wrong, mistaken, because I think if a pastor gives himself, after looking at the sermon and thinking, "Oh, it's the stories that are remembered," he gives himself, "We can and we can't," and we count to story, story, story, story, story, and begins to marginalize and minimize exposition, those stories will lose their credibility.

They will lose their power. So there's my answer to that apparent irony of that message. Here's another irony. One more. I preached that sermon in Memphis to, what, 30,000, 40,000? I don't know how many were there. 18 to 25 year olds? It was very difficult, frankly. The wind was blowing my notes off.

I was preaching as a one-armed paper hanger, and I was bothered by how many people were milling around, you know, going to the bathroom, and it was very distracting. But I did preach it to 18 to 25 year olds, and I think more people in the succeeding 15 years, in their 50s and 60s, have thanked me for that book that grew out of that sermon than the 20s have.

I think I can say that with pretty serious confidence, that more people in their 50s and 60s have thanked me for that book. And I think the reason is, it's an irony, because I wrote the book for college-age people, hoping that the book would be given as a graduation gift, which I still think is what people should do with it.

But I think that irony is that the illustration that most people remembered was the contrast between two pairs of people, right? The first pair were two 80-somethings, Ruby Eliason and Laura Edwards, a nurse and a doctor, who had spent their lives serving the poor in Africa in the name of Jesus, and one of them had been single all her life, one of them was married and a widow now.

And in their 80s, they were still serving, they're driving a car, and their car's brakes give out, they fly over a cliff in Cameroon, and both of them go into heaven and meet Jesus in their 80s after a lifetime of serving the poor. And then the other couple was, whatever their names were, you mentioned them, I can't remember their names, these 50-somethings who took their early retirement, moved to Punta Gorda, Florida, which means, by the way, Fat Point, and they devoted themselves to collecting shells and playing softball and riding their 30-foot yacht.

And I asked those 30,000 young people, "Okay, was the death of these two servants of Christ entering heaven in their 80s through a car crash a tragedy? Was that a waste?" And they shouted out, "No!" What is a tragedy? I'll tell you what a tragedy is, two healthy 50-somethings wasting their lives collecting shells, that's a tragedy.

And that's the sentence that everybody remembers, "Shell collecting." Look, Jesus, here's my shell collection that I gathered for you in the last 20 years of my God-given life not to be wasted on your account. So I suppose it's not so ironic that the book not only confronts young people with the plea, "Don't get sucked into the so-called American dream," but also shakes 50-somethings who were just about to step into it, just about to spend the last 20 or 30 years of their lives dinking around, and shakes them free from their comfort trance and catapults them, hundreds of them, into something way more significant than collecting shells.

So how does the book fit into the overall Piper corpus? I suppose one way to say it would be that virtually everything I write aims to help people not waste their lives. But this one, this book, more than any other, cuts to the chase, puts the finger on the chest, and says, "Don't do that.

Don't waste your life." So good. That message 18 years ago, boasting only in the cross, became then the best-selling book, "Don't Waste Your Life," which has since sold 650,000 copies, has become a classic graduation present. And I should mention that the book is now out in two brand-new editions in 2018, both with a new preface and new cover designs.

The new paperback edition features a simple red cross which is debossed on a kraft paper cover with French flaps to mark your spot in the books. I love those French flaps. And the interior is printed on a cream stock paper with deckled edges. It is really a beautiful design by our friends at Crossway on that paperback.

And now the book is also available as a hardcover gift edition. It's a red cloth cover in a black slipcase, a really sharp gift edition now out. Both are available online now. I'm gonna leave off today's episode with four of the most memorable minutes of that message coming from the introduction, "Boasting Only in the Cross" is the title of the message, and we'll see you on Wednesday.

Ruby Eliason, over 80, single all her life, a nurse, poured her life out for one thing, to make Jesus Christ known among the sick and the poor in the hardest and most unreached places. Laura Edwards, a medical doctor in the Twin Cities, and then in retirement, partnering up with Ruby, also pushing 80, and going from village to village in Cameroon.

And the brakes give way, over a cliff they go, and they're dead instantly. And I asked my people, "Is this a tragedy?" Two women in their 80s, a whole life devoted to one idea, Jesus Christ magnified among the poor and the sick in the hardest places, and 20 years after most of their American counterparts had begun to throw their lives away on trivialities in Florida and New Mexico, fly into eternity with a death in a moment.

"Is this a tragedy?" I asked. It is not a tragedy. I'll read you what a tragedy is. I've got a little article here from Reader's Digest. You don't read Reader's Digest, I know that, but there is a generation who does. This is a tragedy. Title of the article, "Start Now, Retire Early." February 1998.

Bob and Penny took early retirement from their jobs in the Northeast five years ago when he was 59 and she was 51. Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30-foot trawler, play softball, and collect shells. That's a tragedy. That's a tragedy and there are people in this country that are spending billions of dollars to get you to buy it.

And I get 40 minutes to plead with you, "Don't buy it." With all my heart, I plead with you, "Don't buy that dream." The American dream. A nice house, a nice car, a nice job, a nice family, a nice retirement, collecting shells. As the last chapter before you stand before the Creator of the universe to give an account with what you did, "Here it is, Lord, my shell collection.

Look, Lord, my shell collection. And I've got a good swing. And look at my boat. God, look at my boat, God." Well, not for Ruby and not for Laura. Don't waste your life. Don't waste it.