We're working on a new "Sermon of the Day" feature and need your help.

We want you to be able to simply open the Desiring God app and, with a single touch, listen to one of John Piper's best messages while you're on the move. The point is utter simplicity and accessibility to a daily sermon that you don't have to spend time looking for and deciding on.

But not just any message will do. 

We want to feature the messages that have proven most impacting over the years — the 365 sermons, one for each day on the calendar, that have collected the most stories of life-change. So we need your help picking the right ones.

From our own experience, and the many testimonies sent to us, we know th…

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“He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” (Isaiah 53:3)

Sometimes we feel alone in the world. Jesus understands this feeling. In a very human sense, he was alone.  

Imagine what living in this world was like for Jesus. He was without sin (Hebrews 4:15). That might sound like a pleasant problem to deal with. I don’t think so. I think it was tormenting. Peter described sinful Lot’s experience in Sodom as being tormented day after day by the “lawless deeds that he saw and heard” (2 Peter 2:8). How much worse was it for sinless Jesus living in a world of sin?

Imagine what his childhood was like. He would have been odd, sticking out morally like a…

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Joel Heck, Professor of Theology at Concordia University, Texas, has served us again by publishing rare materials relating to C. S. Lewis. In 2008 he published The Personal Heresy: A Controversy. And now he has published the Socratic Digest (Concordia University Press, 2012), a digest of the biannual publication of the meetings of the Socratic Club at Oxford from 1943 to 1952. Lewis was a regular part of this club and seven of his essays are included, plus other Lewis-related interactions.

Here is an excerpt from the preface to help you know what you will find.

With the reprinting of the Socratic Digest, one more major document in Lewisiana becomes available to the general public. . . .

…

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Jesus died for me. What a treasure I must be!

I can think of a number of times over the years when I’ve heard people say something like this. And typically they were people I knew read the Bible frequently. But this idea isn’t in the Bible. Jesus didn’t die to purchase treasures. He died to ransom (Mark 10:45) enemies (Romans 5:10). We’re not the Pearl of Great Price (Matthew 13:46); Jesus is. So where did they get this idea from?

Faulty lenses.

Somewhere along the way their subjective experience and/or bad teaching caused them to look at the cross, see Jesus hanging on the cursed tree, and see a statement of their self-worth rather than amazing grace that saves wretches.

Lenses ar…

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It was fifty years ago today that Roman Catholicism launched what many consider to be the most ambitious of its 21 ecumenical councils. Called the Second Vatican Council, or Vatican II, the three-plus-year series of gatherings began under Pope John XXIII on October 11, 1962, and concluded under Pope Paul VI on December 8, 1965. Half a century later, Vatican II remains the most recent of Catholicism’s official worldwide councils.

For those of us younger than 50, all we’ve experienced of Roman Catholicism, whether from within or without, comes to us through the lens and practices of Vatican II. It’s an important reality to be aware of as we try to make sense of the (appropriately) deep rift …

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When the gospel is communicated in preachy, impersonal, intolerant, know-it-all ways, people find it hard to believe. Typically, this style of evangelism is reduced to information. We content ourselves with “name-dropping” Jesus or telling people doctrine, but rarely do we draw near enough to people to know how the gospel applies to their actual lives. People want to know why the gospel is worth believing. In the information age, people are used to seeing through words. Most evangelism offers a sound bite gospel, which is easily screened, distrusted, and dismissed. In order for people to see something of substance in our words, our gospel communication needs depth.

New Creation in Rehab

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"Harmonious complementarian marriage speaks forth the cosmic victory of Christ over evil," says Tony Reinke, speaking about the thesis of his upcoming JBMW article. In this latest episode of Behind the Blog, we discuss biblical complementarity, Trillia Newbell's newly posted review, and some takeaways from the National Conference.

You can also listen here.

Once again, thank you for reading and your partnership in spreading our resources online. If you have any suggestions or ideas, contact us at blog@desiringGod.org.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Audio and video from the 2012 National Conference
• Wise Words: Family Stories That …

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If I were asked to put my finger on Scripture’s most poignant passage about chronic suffering, near the very top of my list would be Psalm 88.

The psalms have been called “the prayer book of the Bible.” And, indeed, the better we know them, the more we see how they help us talk with God in every circumstance and mood. Psalm 88 is a plea for God to stop hiding his face from the suffering psalmist. It opens with the psalmist crying out continuously to the God of his salvation (verses 1–2) and it ends the same way (verses 13–14).

As with most of what are now known as the psalms of lament, the psalmist doesn’t say exactly what his trouble is, although he does say that he has been afflicted a…

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You have heard that it was said to those of old, “Pray to Mary, and petition the Saints.” But I say to you that there is only one mediator between God and men (1 Timothy 2:5). You need no other go-between than me. Do you not know that you already have an advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1)? Do you not know that I am the way, and the truth, and the life, and that no one comes to the Father except through me (John 14:6)? So, when you pray, ask in my name, that the Father may be glorified in the Son (John 14:13).

You have heard that it was said, “Kneel before the consecrated host, and worship the one sacrificed in the mass.” But I say to you that when I had offered for all time a single sac…

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What foundational biblical texts provide the bedrock for Christian hedonism, the idea that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him?

This was a question asked of Pastor John in a discussion recorded back in 2011. He responded with a cluster of texts: Psalm 16:11, Psalm 37:4, and Philippians 1:20–21. Here’s his brief exposition (3 minutes):

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For more on the basics of Christian Hedonism, see:

• John Piper, article, “Rebuilding Some Basics of Bethlehem: Christian Hedonism” (2009)
  
• John Piper, book, The Dangerous Duty of Delight (112 pages)
  
• John Piper, book, Desiring God (368 pages)