. . . I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who gives me strength. (Philippians 4:11–13)

Smash a homer. Climb a mountain. Blast through the pile for a touchdown. Run a marathon. Establish a new personal best on the bench press. Hit the game-winning shot. You can do it. I can do all things through him who gives me strength!

So some would say.

Snatch this powerful verse from its context and plug it right into your triumphalistic American athletic Christianity. Or take a step bac…

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In case you missed it, Texas Ranger Josh Hamilton hit four home runs in one game last week.

In case you don't know baseball, that's a big deal. Only 15 other players in Major League history have accomplished the feat.

But what's impressive about Hamilton is that it's not just one good game. It's now several outstanding seasons, and an unusual career. An unashamed evangelical, Hamilton is one of the more amazing sports stories of our time as he has recovered from drug addiction and alcoholism, with God's help, to become one of the game's elite players. Not only is he a four-time All-Star, and the 2010 Most Valuable Player, but he currently leads the American League in batting average, ho…

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Matt Chandler:

Grace-driven effort is violent. It is aggressive. The person who understands the gospel understands that, as a new creation, his spiritual nature is in opposition to sin now, and he seeks not just to weaken sin in his life but to outright destroy it. Out of love for Jesus, he wants sin starved to death, and he will hunt and pursue the death of every sin in his heart until he has achieved success.

This is a very different pursuit than simply wanting to be good. It is the result of having transferred one’s affections to Jesus. When God’s love takes hold of us, it powerfully pushes out our own love for other gods and frees our love to flow back to him in true worship. And when…

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Gospel preaching is a serious endeavor. And the mantle of preaching isn't to be worn flippantly.

Because God is God, and the Bible is his word, the heralding and exposition of that word is central to the corporate life of his redeemed people. In his message at the inaugural Together for the Gospel Conference, John Piper explains why.

God did not ordain the cross of Christ or create the lake of fire³ in order to communicate the insignificance of belittling his glory. The death of the Son of God and the damnation of unrepentant human beings are the loudest shouts under heaven that God is infinitely holy, and sin is infinitely offensive, and wrath is infinitely just, and grace is infinitely pr…

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With this week’s Together for the Gospel conference (T4G) gathering at the basketball arena in Louisville, it seemed like hoops was the right direction to take the promo.

But, come on, it’s Opening Week in Major League Baseball, and there are nine speakers giving nine plenary addresses. Nine. Nine innings. Nine men on the field. The list of nine speakers is almost a lineup card, is it not?

Which got some of us at the DG offices thinking, Forget the conference, if this were a baseball lineup card, would it make sense to bat the players in this order? And what positions would they play in the field?

So, first, here’s the order for this week, and second, some of our commentary on the line…

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Year after year, as Christians walk through the Passion week with Jesus, our hearts are knit to him. He is our greatest hero, at the climax of his greatest feat. As we relive the story with him, we pull for him, and against his enemies.

We feel varying levels of disdain for Judas who betrays him, Peter who denies him, the chief priests who despise him, Herod who mocks him, the people who call for his crucifixion, Pilate who appeases the mob and washes his hands, and Barabbas who is guilty but gets to go free.

But wait. Barabbas — the guilty who goes free? Barabbas — the sinner released to new life while the death he deserves is paid by an Innocent Substitute?

Take careful note of wher…

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Update 4/24: My Future at Desiring God.

Bethlehem Baptist is one step closer to commissioning John Piper from the local church pastorate to greater involvement with Bethlehem College and Seminary and to a wider ministry nationally and internationally through Desiring God.

The Bethlehem elders are announcing to the congregation their candidate for Associate Pastor for Preaching and Vision and, God willing, John Piper's eventual successor as the church's senior pastor.

Jason Meyer, 36-year-old Assistant Professor of New Testament for Bethlehem College and Seminary, is the elders' recommendation for congregational consideration and vote at a special May 20 all-church meeting. Meyer …

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An essential mark of a solid seminary experience is continually being stunned by how everything relates to Jesus. When we look long enough, press hard enough, and feel deeply enough, we discover again and again that it all comes back around to him.

The whole universe is about Jesus. The whole Bible is about Jesus. Our whole lives are designed to be about Jesus. And, for the love of God, any seminary experience worth a dime should be all about Jesus as well. Any institution, course of study, class, professor, or text that teaches aspiring pastors any differently — explicitly or implicitly — is throwing them under the ministerial bus.

My Worst Experience in Seminary

I remember it all too…

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"Today is one of the best days of my seminary life." So wrote John Piper in his journal on Wednesday, March 24, 1971, during his final semester at Fuller Seminary.

On that Monday, March 22, "Dr. Schaper called me and asked me to speak in chapel today," he explained. "I agreed to and went straight to God, and all I did from that phone call until chapel this morning (except go to 2 classes) was pray, think, and write for the sermon I gave."

The team at Desiring God just recently came across this 40-year-old recording, and we now have made it available as the oldest Piper message on the site. This is one of the very first messages Pastor John preached. He graciously gave us permission to po…

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Psalm 40:6–8,

In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted,
but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
  Then I said, “Behold, I have come;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
  I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”

For many of us, Psalm 40:6–8 is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma — as Winston Churchill once said of Russia.

Verses 1–10 are David’s song of thanks to God for rescuing him from dire straights. Verses 6–8 then raise the issue of what should David do in response to God’s life-saving rescue. Slaughter another sheep? Sacrifice a bull or goat? Is that re…

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