Preparing well for marriage means asking hard questions.

Getting to know that special someone includes learning about family and friends and schooling and athletics, favorite pastimes, books, movies, life’s best moments and worst, the brightest places in our background and the darkest.

But what about theology? Ever think to ask about that?

We hope our free Preparing for Marriage ebook can be of some assistance.

With Help from Piper

At Desiring God, one of our most accessed pages online is a set of questions John Piper put together for couples preparing for marriage (chapter 1 in our new free ebook). There is some of the typical stuff — like friends and entertainment and lifestyle …

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Thanks to all who have been a part of the 2012 National Conference, whether by attendance or the live-stream. The audio and video of each session will be available for streaming and download by Friday, October 5.

Piper's Concluding Message

John Piper concludes the conference with his message, “Act the Miracle: Future Grace, the Word of the Cross, and the Purifying Power of God’s Promises” (the full manuscript is now available).

Here's a key excerpt:

The beauty of holiness in God’s children is the harmony, or the concord, between our lives and the infinite value of all God is. And that God predestined us to holiness because his aim is that earth be filled with the beauty of holiness —…

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The glory of God is the most important thing in the universe. But what about the most magnificient aspect of his glory?

John Piper explains in this three-minute video:

This excerpt is from the latest sermon, "Why Did God Create the World?"

Join us this weekend for the free live-stream of our National Conference.

You can also read the full manuscript of John Piper's Friday night message, "Prelude to Acting the Miracle: Putting Sanctification in Its Place."

It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king's house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful. (2 Samuel 11:2)

We are never more vulnerable to sin than when we are successful, admired by others, and prosperous, as King David tragically discovered. Imagine him reflecting on his adultery a year later.

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It was spring again. David once had loved warm, fragrant spring afternoons on the palace roof. But this year the scent of almond blossoms smelled like deep regret. 

David had no desire to look toward Uriah’s empty house. If only he had not looked that way a year ago. The memory throbbed with p…

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Everybody knows this is true. It’s a very simple principle.

But right thinking is very hard. The forces wielding a distorting influence over our reasoning powers are immense. Though God is revealing himself all the time in every aspect of his creation (Romans 1:20) and his Word (Hebrews 1:1–2), Satan is constantly trying to blind us to that revelation (2 Corinthians 4:4). And indwelling sin mixes with culture, education, and life experience in a fallen world, producing lenses that warp our perceptions of almost everything.

We probably need to fear our susceptibility to wrong thinking more than we do. We get a picture of just how vulnerable we are to it in Peter when he tries to talk Jes…

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The following quotes are taken from Steve DeWitt's outstanding book, Eyes Wide Open: Enjoying God in Everything (Credo House, 2012).

“Created beauty eclipses God’s beauty in the desire factory of man’s heart. It is a case of mistaken identity. Every created beauty was created by God to lead our affections to Him. That’s why He made the pleasures of earthly beauty so fleeting — so that on the other side of the pleasure we might experience either wonder and worship and ultimate satisfaction in God or the pursuit of the pleasure that beauty provides for its own sake. If we choose the latter, we will only be disappointed again.” (7)

“What if we were to realize that every sunset viewed, every…

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Images are designed to image — to reflect, to point.

Created in the image of God, we all are designed, like the God-man, to reflect God. To show God, to point to him, to image God.

One prominent way in which we reflect our Creator is through creating. We point to our Maker when we make. As John Piper says in the introduction to his new poetry book Esther, God made us to be makers.

It has always seemed plain to me that the imagination is a gift of God and is meant to reflect his own creativity. He thought up the universe out of nothing, then created us in his own image. So we do that kind of thing. Not that very thing. But that kind of thing. Only God creates out of nothing. We are not …

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In the past 12 months over 113,000 Portuguese speakers have visited the Desiring God website from places like Brazil, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe, Angola and Portugal. We rejoice in statistics like this, not for statistics’ sake, but because we know that each number represents a real person and a real gospel opportunity.

You may remember that last year we launched a Portuguese interface for our website. That site currently has over 100 translated Portuguese sermons and books.  

Our most recent initiative is a Portuguese-language Desiring God page on Facebook and Twitter.

We want to make it as easy as possible for the potential 180,000,000 Portuguese readers worldwide to…

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You can only dive deep in the Scriptures so long until you’re ready to get busy. Unless something’s seriously broken, you can only power up so much on theology — whether straight-up seven-point Calvinism, or something more dilute — until you're itching to pour out.

Sure, there are a few sad exceptions, but this is not where most of us live. We can only sit feasting at the banquet table so long before getting seriously eager to get up, get moving, and put the nourishment to work in legit action for something bigger than ourselves.

Reformed Restlessness Going Global

The theological substance and depth of Reformed evangelicalism has been filling our collective cup for a good season now. For …

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In his new book on holiness, Kevin DeYoung devotes an entire chapter to the pressing issue of sexual morality (chapter 8), and a large portion of that chapter addresses Christians who are dating or courting. So what would he say as a pastor to a man and woman who are asking the question, "How far is too far before marriage?" Kevin answers in this clip (4 minutes):

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Kevin DeYoung is a plenary speaker at our National Conference (which starts Friday). Visit the event page to learn more and register while there’s still time. Today is the last day for online registration.

Here’s a full list of clips from our 7-part interview series with Kevin DeYoung on The Hole In Our Holiness —

• What’s t…

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