WalkerFamilyLife Blog

What Is the Gospel? by Greg Gilbert

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Really good short book on the essential elements of the gospel as distinguished from some popular errors in modern evangelicalism. Short, too the point, and inspirational.

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Not Even a Hint: Guarding Your Heart Against Lust by Joshua Harris

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is the best book I’ve read on dealing with lust and sexual sin. I highly recommend it.

Josh Harris, author of I Kissed Dating Goodbye, deals transparently with the roots of lust and the real issues behind it. Then he equips the reader with the tools needed to fight it.

The biggest problem we have in the fight for moral purity is that we’ve let the lies of the world influence our thinking. Josh helps us see where we’ve gone astray and realign with God.

One other key point about this is that it is not just for men, but for women as well. We all battle it in different ways and Josh deals with it evenhandedly.

Read it!

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Continuing the series blogging through John Piper’s excellent book This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence we come to Chapter 2: Naked and Not Ashamed. After establishing the covenant of marriage in Gen 2:24, Gen 2:25 tells us that “The man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” So what is the point of this verse?

Piper postulates that there are two possible reasons why they would not be ashamed. First, it could be because the effects of sin had not yet blemished them and so they had perfect bodies. “In other words, their freedom from shame was because they had absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. Is that the main point” (p 32)? Piper argues no for three reasons:

1. No matter how perfect your spouse is, if you’re selfish and unkind you can make comments that shame them.
2. Verses 24-25 are intended to be relevant after the fall, not just for these two pre-fall individuals
3. Verse 24 (covenant one-flesh union) creates the relationship where verse 25 (naked and unashamed) can happen.

So instead Piper opts for the second possibility, that they are free from shame because they have no fear of being shamed by their spouse. Because each of their spouses was sinless, they would not fear the other doing anything to shame them.

So what relevance does this have for us. Notice that there is much more power for living without shame in the second reason than in the first. We might think that if I were sinless and perfect I could live shame free, but that is both untrue (I am sinful and imperfect) and insufficient (my spouse could probably still shame me). Instead the hope for living without shame is found in a covenant love that does not fear being disapproved by the other, in spite of my imperfections.

Marriage was designed from the beginning to display the new covenant between Christ and the church. We have seen this in Ephesians 5:31-32. The very essence of this new covenant is that Christ passes over the sins of his bride. His bride is free from shame not because she is perfect, but because she has not fear that her lover will condemn her or shame her because of her sin. (pp 33-34 emphasis added)

But when they sinned, each instinctively new that the other had chosen independence from God and was now selfish at heart and no longer trustworthy. They also knew they had done that and that things were no longer as they should be. Their nakedness was the first effect of their sin (Gen 3:5-7). They felt both vulnerable to shame from their spouse and defiled and unworthy because of the loss of fellowship with God. They clothed themselves with fig leaves in an attempt to deny that shame, but God foreshadowed his redemption by killing a sacrifice and using the skins to make them new clothing.

A couple of questions for thought and comment below:

• Have you ever thought about the two possible sources for shame?
• How have you been guilty of putting shame on your spouse because of your own sinfulness?
• If “the very essence of new covenant love is that Christ passes over the sins of his bride”, are you willing to reflect Christ in this way?

Continuing the series blogging through John Piper’s excellent book This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence we come to the first chapter entitled “Staying Married is Not Mainly about Staying in Love.” Here Piper first really makes the case that marriage is about something infinitely more than two people in love wanting to live their lives together. Our culture simply does not understand this, and neither did Jesus’ culture (Matt 19:10-12) or any human culture. Our sin and selfishness blind us to the wonder of God’s purpose for marriage.

Foundationally, marriage is God’s doing. Piper illustrates this in four ways:

1. It is God’s design. He saw the solitude of the man and knew that he needed a helper suited to him (Gen 2:18). When Adam realized none of the animals would do, God created another creature in His image for Adam (Gen 1:27)
2. God gave away the first bride. I’ve never seen this before but, as the Father of the bride, God “brought her to the man.” (Gen 2:22)
3. God spoke the design of marriage into existence by saying “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” (Gen 2:24)
4. God performs the one-flesh union. The preacher doesn’t make the couple one flesh and it doesn’t happen at the consummation. God joins them together and it is not in man’s power or prerogative to destroy (Mark 10:8-9).

But ultimately, Piper argues, this marriage that God has created is designed for God’s glory. That this holding fast and one flesh union is a sacred covenant is implicit in Genesis but becomes explicit in Ephesians 5.

Christ thought of himself as a bridegroom coming for his bride, the true people of God (Matt 9:15; 25:1ff; John 3:29). … Christ knew he would have to pay for his bride with his own blood. He called this relationship the new covenant … This is what Paul is referring to when he says that marriage is a great mystery: “I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.” Christ obtained the church by his blood and formed a new covenant with her, an unbreakable “marriage.”

The ultimate thing we can say about marriage is that it exists for God’s glory. That is, it exists to display God. Now we see how: Marriage is patterned after Christ’s covenant relationship to his redeemed people, the church. And therefore, the highest meaning and the most ultimate purpose of marriage is to put the covenant relationship of Christ and his church on display. That is why marriage exists. If you are married, that is why you are married. If you hope to be, that should be your dream.

Staying married, therefore, is not mainly about staying in love. It is about keeping covenant…Therefore what makes divorce and remarriage so horrific in God’s eyes is not merely that it involves covenant-breaking to the spouse, but that it involves misrepresenting Christ and his covenant. Christ will never leave his wife. Ever. There may be times of painful distance and tragic backsliding on our part. But Christ keeps his covenant forever. Marriage is a display of that! (pp 24-25)

So the most important thing about marriage is showing in real life the glory of the gospel. Let me share a couple of questions for reflection and comment below:

• How does the idea of marriage as a display of Christ’s covenant keeping love change the way you think about your own marriage?
• Does this mean that it is not important whether you stay in love? If not, what role should your feelings play in your marriage?

I recently completed my first reading of what has become my new favorite book on marriage, and it comes from my favorite preacher. In This Momentary Marriage, John Piper looks at the biblical teaching on marriage from a perspective not often taken, asking “What is it’s eternal meaning?” The result is profoundly convicting and instructive.

In her forward to the book, John’s wife Noel Piper shares about their own marriage and how their extreme differences have led their marriage to swing on a pendulum between “How in the world did I get such an amazing husband?” to “How in the world did we get into such a mess?” However, in spite of the ups and downs, she affirms that marriage is ultimately a reflection of Christ’s relationship with the church. That’s all marriages, regardless of sin. So the question she asks is, “How clear and well-focused is the portrait of Jesus that our marriage is displaying?”

The Introduction begins with the story of Dietrich Bohnoeffer, who was engaged to be married when he was hanged at dawn on April 9, 1945 by the Nazis for his involvement in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler.Piper writes:

So he never married. He skipped the shadow on the way to the Reality. Some are called to one kind of display of the worth of Christ, some to another. Martyrdom, not marriage, was his calling. (p 13)

Piper then shares the story of John and Betty Stam who were martyred in China leaving behind an infant daughter. They were reunited in heaven, but not as husband and wife for there is no marriage in heaven (Mark 12:25).

The shadow of covenant-keeping between husband and wife gives way to the reality of covenant-keeping between Christ and his glorified Church. Nothing is lost. The music of every pleasure is transposed into an infinitely higher key. (pp 14-15)

In “A Wedding Sermon from a Prison Cell,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote

Marriage is more than your love for each other…In your love you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage you are placed at a post of responsibility towards the world and mankind. Your love is your own private possession, but marriage is more than something personal – it is a status, an office. Just as it is the crown, and not merely the will to rule, that makes the king, so it is marriage, and not merely your love for each other, that joins you together in the sight of God and man.

So this is the theme of the book:

to enlarge your vision of what marriage is…The meaning of marriage is the display of the covenant keeping love between Christ and his people. … It is a good gift from God, but it is only one possible path along the narrow way to Paradise. Marriage passes through breathtaking heights and through swamps with choking vapors. It makes many things sweeter, and with it come bitter providences. Marriage is a momentary gift.

In the coming weeks, I will be blogging through the fifteen chapters of this short 180-page book, sharing some of the most meaningful insights that I have gained as a result of reading it. I hope they will be meaningful to you as well.

If you’d like to read the entire book, which I highly recommend, it is available for free in PDF form on Piper’s web site, or you can purchase it from the common sources.

Some questions in the meantime:

• Does your own marriage swing on the pendulum from idealism to pessimism? Do you spend more time on one end or the other?
• Have you ever considered marriage as a picture of the relationship of Christ and the church?
• What do you think about Jesus’ words that there will be no marriage in heaven? Does that disappoint you? What about Piper’s comment that in heaven “the music of every pleasure is transposed to an infinitely higher key?”
• Bonhoeffer talks about marriage as more than a personal thing but as a responsibility toward the world. How does that strike you? How would it change things if you approached it that way?

Share your thoughts or comments below

This Momentary Marriage: A Parable of Permanence by John Piper


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is clearly the best book on marriage I’ve ever read, hands-down. John Piper states so profoundly what I’ve been convicted is the real purpose of marriage, raising our thoughts to something much higher, and in the process giving us the power to live out a Christ-exalting marriage. This is a must-read for everyone who’s married or knows someone who’s married.

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Stayed home from church this morning trying to kick a cold I picked up while at the Biblical Counseling Training Conference in Lafayette, IN. It was an inspiring and instructional week but after 49 hours of instruction and the 11 hour drive home I was exhausted. I found myself in one of those places where my fatigue caused everything that’s going on in my life to look like an insurmountable obstacle. Ever been there?

So, honestly I was really looking forward to having some quiet hours alone this morning to do business with God. I started by going over some of the key Scriptures we covered at the conference and let them minister to my soul. Then spent some time meditating on Colossians, including a verse that has ministered a lot to me over the past few months. In Col 1:29, Paul speaks of his ministry and says, “For this I toil, struggling with all His energy that He powerfully works within me.” That’s a perspective that I need to be reminded of repeatedly. Our work here is often a struggle and toil, but it is done with energy that is provided by God. Even just now I was reminded to stop and pray for God to provide the energy that I need for each day because otherwise I’ll be overwhelmed.

There are so many exciting things happening at FamilyLife and some days are truly inspiring. Others are just work. That’s what Paul said even his ministry of the gospel was like: toil and struggle. That’s normal. It isn’t all easy just because you’re walking with God.

So what should I do about it? Part of it I’ve already mentioned: realize that it’s normal and ask God for the strength to persevere. But I also think about Jesus’ words to the church of Ephesus that had lost its first love. In Rev 2:4-5 he counsels them about how to reverse that spiritual apathy by saying:

But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.

So what does Jesus tell the Ephesians to do:

1. Remember where you have fallen from
2. Repent
3. Do the works you did at first

I think that’s not only something we need to do when we find ourselves bored with the gospel (God forbid!) but also when the work of the kingdom seems arduous and unpleasant. We need to think back to the times in the past where we had a passion for doing His work and repent of the wrong thinking that has led us away from that point. Then, we need to get busy doing the things that we did back then. Notice that Jesus addresses a lack of love by a call to repentance and action. When the actions are right, the feelings will come.

So pray for me that I will be able to live in this truth. I need it often.

What have you learned during times when God’s work seems like drudgery? Share your comments.

The battle against cancer can be one of the most difficult journeys for a marriage. Unfortunately, the divorce statistics are very high for these couples, yet I just came across this video of a couple who persevered and leaned into their covenant to make it through. Though it’s not part of this video, a Weekend to Remember they attended while he was undergoing treatments was a significant part of their story. We will all face adversity. Will it push you toward your spouse or away from him/her? toward God or away from Him?

Great quote I found on Crossway’s blog. It was taken from Raised with Christ by author Adrian Warnock

The degree to which we neglect the resurrection is also the degree to which we neglect to think about Jesus as he really is, now. Jesus is enthroned in heaven and is reigning inside every believer. His powers are limitless, and he is at liberty to do as he wishes. While on earth he did not fully reveal his glory and divine power. To only think of Jesus as a long-haired, gentle man in a robe and wearing sandals has devastating effects on the church. This perception has permeated the attitudes of many who perceive Jesus as a weak character but a good teacher. The world seems blind to the Bible’s description of the resurrected Jesus, full of power and authority. This description is highly offensive to the world. But to worship Jesus as the artists have portrayed him, instead of as the Son of Man in all his glory, is nothing short of idolatry. (Excerpt from pp 68).

In the midst of all the talk of economic hardship, and I know it’s real, here are a couple of things to balance the negativity.

FamilyLife found itself with the largest December match opportunity in our 33 year history, more than twice any previous match. A group of donors had pledged $2 Million to match donations in December. Well, this email just went out:

GREAT NEWS from FamilyLife!

Dear Friend,

We are thrilled to report that through the generous giving of FamilyLife friends and partners like you, we fulfilled the history-making $2 million Family-to-Family Matching Challenge. Thank you for the part you played in this tremendous effort!

Then, our family had personally asked our donors and friends for help with an $11,000 need and, on December 31st, God provided in His own unique way. In fact, we just learned of the gift that fulfilled the goal yesterday and were once again overwhelmed at God’s kind and unmistakable provision.

Isn’t it just like God to take a time when the world is pulling in the sails to provide in such abundance to His work? Blessed be the Name of the Lord! Never doubt His ability to provide for your needs as well. He is more than able!