You can now listen to John Piper's message from this morning. The manuscript will be posted tomorrow.

You can now listen to the panel discussion.

Follow along with the conference at TheaterofGod.com.

Mark Talbot gave a message entitled, "The Broken Stage in the Theater of God: Sin and Suffering in Calvin’s World." You can now listen to it or read the notes.

Follow along with the conference at TheaterofGod.com.

Marvin Olasky just finished his message entitled, "The Secular Script in the Theater of God Calvin on the Christian Meaning of Public Life." You can listen to it or read the notes.

Follow along with the conference at TheaterofGod.com.

This morning, Doug Wilson gave a message entitled "The Sacred Script in the Theater of God: Calvin, the Bible, and the Western World." You can now listen to it or read the notes.

Follow along with the conference at TheaterofGod.com.

Tonight's sessions from our conference are now available to listen to:

• Julius Kim: "Calvin the Man and Why I Care" (Read the notes.)
• John Piper and Doug Wilson discussCollision. (Read the questions.)

Check out TheaterofGod.com to keep up with the conference.

Whether you can come to our conference that starts today or not, you may be interested in the site we set up for it.

Visit TheaterofGod.com to keep up with our live blogging and everyone's tweets about the conference, as well as get the conference media when it becomes available.

Come meet Elyse Fitzpatrick! She'll be talking with attendees at the National Conference and signing copies of her various books, which will be available at a significant discount.

Elyse Fitzpatrick has been counseling women since 1989, holds a M.A. in biblical counseling from Trinity Theological Seminary, and is the author of numerous books including the award-winning Women Helping Women.

Married for over 35 years, she has three children and six grandchildren. She is a frequent conference and retreat speaker and, along with her husband, Phil, is a member of Valley Center Community Church in Southern California.

Her latest book, co-authored with Dr. Dennis E. Johnson, Counsel from the Cross: Connecting Broken People to the Love of Christ, demonstrates the “why” and “how” of consistently biblical, cross-centered counseling. Her passion is to help women become equipped to mentor and disciple one another in applying the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ to their daily lives.

Besides the talks, the wonderful times of corporate worship, the opportunity to pray and fellowship with other believers, and the chance to be some of the first to screen the movie Collision, there are a couple more reasons we're stoked about this year's conference.

1. The Conference Bookstore

Fifteen-thousand square-feet of helpful resources at great prices, with lots of friendly people to serve you.

2. The Conference Exhibitors

We have invited a select group of other ministries and publishers in order to expose you to different aspects of how God is working in the Church in our day.

• Action International
• Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals
• Baker Books
• Banner of Truth
• Bethlehem College & Seminary
• Canon Press
• Christianaudio.com
• Christian Focus Publications
• Covenant College
• Crossway
• Children Desiring God
• Desiring God International Outreach
• Evangelical Press
• P&R Publishers
• Reformation Heritage Books
• Reformed Theological Seminary
• Table Talk Magazine (Ligonier)
• TCT Church Planting Residency Program
• World Magazine

If you're attending our upcoming national conference, don't forget to make your hotel reservation soon. Many of the hotels have cut-off dates, after which the special 'conference rate' will no longer apply.

Check out a list of hotels offering special reduced rates for our conference.

Desiring God will provide a special screening of the film Collision, featuring Doug Wilson and Christopher Hitchens, on Friday evening, September 25, at our national conference in Minneapolis.

Christopher Hitchens is one of the most popular new atheists. He wrote God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Collision is an 80-minute, documentary that follows him and Wilson on a 4-stop tour as they debate whether Christianity is good for the world.

Doug Wilson is a winsome defender of the faith and has proven immensely helpful to many in his engagements with Hitchens. Since Wilson is a speaker at our conference, we thought many attendees would be eager to view the film with us.

The screening will happen in the main auditorium at 9pm, following the opening session of the conference. Immediately following, John Piper will ask Wilson several follow-up questions about the film and his collision with Hitchens.

The aim of our conference is to look at the majesty of Jesus and his purposes for the world through the lens of Scripture, with John Calvin’s life and theology adjusting the focus. We think John Calvin would like the way God is exalted in this film, and we trust it will strengthen your faith.
  
Here’s the trailer to whet your appetite. We look forward to seeing you in Minneapolis this September!

At our national conference, Mark Talbot will give a message entitled "The Broken Stage in the Theater of God: Sin and Suffering in Calvin."

Here he shares his initial thoughts on the topic:

Desiring God and christianaudio are giving three audio books to everyone who registers for our national conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God."

• John Calvin and His Passion for the Majesty of God
• Calvin: Of Prayer and The Christian Life
• Calvin for the Armchair Theologian

Register for the conference and your confirmation email will tell you how to get the free books. If you're already registered, you'll also be getting an email with instructions.

Three speakers from our upcoming conference answer the question, "What intrigues or surprises you about Calvin?"

Doug Wilson is intrigued by the counter-intuitive applications of Calvinism.

John Piper is intrigued by the quantity, extent, and quality of Calvin's expository preaching.

Sam Storms is intrigued by Calvin's productivity despite physical infirmities.

*               *               *

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

Our pastors conference coming this February will be called "The Pastor, the People, and the Pursuit of Joy."

The speakers are Sam Storms, Eric Mason, and John Piper (doing a biography of C. S. Lewis).

Registration and more information, including one more speaker, will be available soon.

We asked four of the speakers from our upcoming national conference what they would change about Calvin if they could. Here are their answers:

Sam Storms

1. "I would love to have heard more from him about his conversion."
2. "I wish he'd given a greater hearing to the Anabaptists."
3. "I wish he'd written a commentary about the book of Revelation."

Marvin Olasky

"I would change the way he responded to Servetus."

John Piper

"If I could change one thing about John Calvin it would be that he not have been a part of the Servetus affair."

Doug Wilson

"If I could change one thing about Calvin, I'd say it would probably be his attitude toward the arts."

*               *               *

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

Doug Wilson, Mark Talbot, and Sam Storms—3 speakers at our upcoming conference—answer the question, "Why was Calvin controversial?"

Doug Wilson

Calvin is controversial for the same reason Athanasius or the Apostle Paul was: He was a faithful servant in a fallen world.

Mark Talbot

Calvin is controversial because any time you clearly speak Christian truth, you will necessarily arouse opposition.

Finally, Calvin is controversial because of us, his followers. We are often harsh and narrow and unloving, when we should be winsome and loving.

*               *               *

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

Several of the speakers from our upcoming conference answer the question, "What can we gain from Calvin today?"

Mark Talbot

We can gain an awareness that the best theology comes from ministering to people.

Sam Storms

We can gain a deep appreciation for the Lord's Supper.

John Piper

We can gain an orientation on the majesty and holiness of God.

Doug Wilson

We can gain a rock solid, absolute confidence in the Bible.

Marvin Olasky

We can gain an understanding that it's important to write clearly without losing depth.

The last national conference speaker to introduce is Julius Kim. John Piper talks about why he invited him:

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

John Piper talks about inviting Marvin Olasky to our national conference:

You can also watch Olasky's testimony:

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

John Piper talks about why he invited Mark Talbot to speak at our upcoming conference on Calvin :

For more from Mark Talbot, check out the message he gave at our 2005 conference, "Seeing God's Gracious Hand in the Hurt Others Do Us."

You can also watch his testimony:

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration

John Piper on why he invited Sam Storms to our national conference:

For more about Sam Storms, visit Enjoying God Ministries and watch his testimony:

Learn more about DG's conference, "With Calvin in the Theater of God":

• John Piper's invitation
• Speaker information
• Dates and schedule
• Registration