Solid Joys is the daily devotional app from the ministry of John Piper, and it is now available free for Android devices. Get it from Google Play. (It’s also available in iTunes for Apple devices).

The app is a compilation of 365 of the best excerpts from Piper's printed books and online content that are able to stand well on their own. The goal is that you'll be able to dive in for just a moment each day and come away with something solid to feed your joy in God.

For more details about the app, see its description in Google Play or iTunes.

Please let us know what you think of the app by reviewing it on Google Play or iTunes, or by emailing us at mobile@desiringGod.org.

"There's something I want you to pray about, Jason," his grandfather said. Now this at least got his attention. Jason's grandfather was a successful farmer in rural South Dakota, and not to mention, a trusted elder in the local Reformed church. When he spoke, people listened — especially Jason standing beside him under a cold, overcast sky. "I've been noticing your life," his grandfather continued, "and I believe God is calling you into the ministry."

What?

That's not what Jason expected. Matter of fact, he might as well as got a punch in the stomach. Ministry? Really? Like a pastor? Jason kept his thoughts to himself and politely listened to what his grandfather said. But it still didn't …

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I’ve had this thing going lately about biscuits. It is probably due to the colder (delicious) fall air. This is the season of comfort food. But to have comfort food, there needs to be a comfort person. This is not just the season to have a hot dinner hitting the table, it is the season to have a person who loves you putting it there. In my life (prompted by the cute faces that travel about my home at half height) this has somehow become a burning need to perfect biscuits. Of course there are other things too, but biscuits are just so symbolic.

Biscuits make up a small part of the culinary world. They are easy and quick, and have been satisfying children leaving honey trails on the table fo…

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On this episode of Authors on the Line we talk with two authors — pastor John Piper and historian Paul Maier — about tragedy, loss, and the Christmas season.

We talk with Maier to discover just how tightly interwoven into the Nativity story tragedy is found. We read there of a paranoid king named Herod, who unleashed the tragic killing of young boys in Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16). Who was Herod? And is his violent outburst in Bethlehem historical truth or fictional myth invented by Christians? And if it is true, why is there no historical corroboration that it happened?

Matthew 2:16 also provides the background for John Piper's illustrated poem The Innkeeper, and we ask him why in this seas…

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Dear Friends,

Have you ever wondered what became of the innkeeper in Bethlehem who let Mary and Joseph have their baby in his barn?

Did he have little children? When the soldiers came from Herod, did they hunt for the birth place of the dangerous baby and start the slaughter there? What did it cost the innkeeper to house the Messiah in his first hours?

In the poem called The Innkeeper, I tried to imagine what might have happened when the soldiers came. And what Jesus might have said if he showed up 30 years later to talk to the innkeeper about it. It’s fiction. But its aim is truth and hope and joy.

Desiring God and Crossway Books have teamed up to make a new video recordin…

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Who has time to celebrate Advent? That’s my initial thought each year.

But that’s the point. Advent takes time. It cannot be microwaved, it cannot be compressed into 24 hours, and it cannot be sped up to the bustling speed of our daily lives. Advent is slow on purpose, because the slowness of the celebration mirrors the slowly unfolding drama of the Advent of the Savior himself in history.

One old pastor, Octavius Winslow, penned some words in his book The Glory of the Redeemer (1844) that are relevant to this slowing season of Advent:

The entire history of the Israelites was interwoven with a system of symbols and types of the most significant and instructive character. It was thus…

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Ramez Atallah, the General Director of The Bible Society of Egypt, has given me permission to share this letter. It is at once educational, inspirational, and a call for prayer for the Coptic Church of Egypt.

On Sunday November 4th, I attended the extremely moving ceremony where the new Patriarch (Pope) of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt was chosen. The Nominating Committee had narrowed the candidates from 17 names down to five, after which 2,406 Coptic leaders and laymen prayerfully elected three people, two Bishops and one monk. 

After much fasting and prayer, by most Copts, the leadership of the Church met at the Cathedral and a young, blindfolded child put his hand in a jar contai…

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Advent is for adoring Jesus.

It’s an annual season of patient waiting, hopeful expectation, soul-searching, and calendar-watching marked by many churches, Christian families, and individual followers of Jesus. There’s no biblical mandate to observe Advent. It’s an optional thing — a tradition that developed over the course of the church’s history as a time of preparation for Christmas Day. Many of us find observing Advent to be personally enjoyable and spiritually profitable.

Why Advent

The English word “Advent” is from the Latin adventus, which means “coming.” The advent primarily in view each December is the first coming of Jesus two millennia ago. But Jesus’s second coming gets draw…

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Packer had me at “horseback.”

In his new introduction to John Flavel's Keeping the Heart, J. I. Packer tells a story from Flavel’s devotional life. Now I remembered hearing of a spiritual experience Edwards had on horseback, and of another from Moody. Then there it was again in Flavel:

It is recorded of him that he spent much time in meditation, self-examination, and prayer, and on one occasion at least he had an extraordinary experience of God. Meditating on horseback, “his thoughts began to swell and rise higher and higher like the waters of Ezekiel’s vision till at last they became an overflowing flood. Such was the intention of his mind, such the ravishing tastes of heavenly joys, and …

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Here on the last day of November — endearingly known as Movember by many working a fresh mustache for men’s health awareness — we went behind the blog for some backstories on the full face of content we grew in the last month.

Some posts are pretty straightforward in their conception, production, and presentation. But others have more disputed histories, with uncertainties about their precise genesis or even a touch of conspiracy theory. Like our new Advent ebook.

In this episode, we talk about the new collection of December devotional readings from John Piper, as well as several fresh resources from the past month. Topics range from Spurgeon’s rocker to improving your baptism to wha…

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