“To put it another way, when you put your trust in Christ, your bondage to this world and its overpowering lure is broken. You are a corpse to the world and the world is a corpse to you. Or to put it positively, according to verse 15, you are “a new creation.” The old “you” is dead. The new “you” is alive. And the new you is the you of faith. And what faith does is boast not in the world, but in Christ crucified.”
“…The world is no longer our treasure. It is not the source of our life or our satisfaction or our joy. Christ is.”
“…thus a cross-centered, cross saturated life is a God-glorifying life. All others are wasted.”
“For there is no greater joy than joy in the greatness of God. And if we must suffer to see this and savor it most deeply, than suffering is a mercy. And Christ’s call to take up our cross and join him on the Calvary road is love.
So, i purchased this book (Don’t Waste Your Life) a few weeks ago when i was buying a copy for friend of mine. I had read it a few years ago on the PDF file of the book John Piper’s website offers and i decided i’d like to read it again, mainly for the purposes of re-visiting it to remind myself what made this book so good, since i was buying it for someone else and all. What a difference the time gap has made. Because so much has drastically changed and been added into my life, my perspective on this book is vastly different. Not that it was bad before though. It’s, for one, taking me much much longer to read. it seems to take longer to process. I’m enjoying it, savoring it, being convicted by it, and being enouraged by it.
Two things from today’s excursions into the book:
The first three quotes are all in the same thought. and almost all on the same page, actually.
I’ve recently discovered that i don’t eat meat so well anymore. Doesn’t make a lot of sense to be honest, but eating vegan and vegetarian makes me feel very good, very healthy and very energetic. Eating most meats just makes me feel tired and unhealthy. Sort of like this, i have discovered that a cross-saturated life is not only the only way i should live, but the only way i can possibly live truly alive. Believe me, i have tried the alternatives. Most of them actually. They feel like they are good, especially when they involve people liking good stuff about you, nice guys paying special attention to you, success in work and play and such, but they are so empty when they are focused on ourselves (which generally, these things are very self-oriented).
The world will let you down. People leave. Guys will too. Success is so fleeting. Can i take pleasure in these worldly things alone and still find joy when they are gone? No. My focus must be on Christ and Him crucified, else all things to be enjoyed in the world are meaningless, else my life is wasted chasing after them.
It is a battle for me. I am incredibly selfish. It is so easy for me to forget about where my focus must be to live when something else pops up to alluring and flattering me. But when i pursue it, it leaves me empty. Endless-pit-of-darkness kind of empty. Hallelujah for the Great Redeemer, who looks on me as i run away from Him with eyes of pity and a heart of everlasting, unfathomable love and gently brings me back to himself, when if i were Him, i’d let me keep running and hope to never see that pesky girl again (well, more proof why God’s God and Kathryne’s not). I want to cling to Christ as he is the “source of my life, my satisfaction and my joy.“
I was going to stop at Chapter 4, but when i flipped the page and read the title, i couldn’t.
“Magnifying Christ Through Pain and Death.”
I’ve had my share of pain over the past three years. Mind you, nowhere near as much as 3/4 the people in the world, but i know that i have not lived a life typical to most covenant families in the US. My family has been struggling a lot lately with shame and bitterness, particularly towards our church in relation to my brother and their treatment of oaths he and they took upon his membership. Things were said/yelled, letters were sent, phone calls were ignored, sermons were walked out on, all resulting in Sundays being the most broken and the worst family day of the week by far, which really makes my heart sad. Thus, my interest in the 4th chapter. I found the last quote i put on here near the beginning.
I need to be reminded daily that there is “no greater joy than joy in the greatness of God. And if we must suffer to see this and savor it most deeply, than suffering is a mercy.“
He saved me from a wasted life of half-hearted passion for Christ when Stephen changed so drastically. I am a different person because of it. Not a good one, but one very keenly aware of my desperate desperate need for a Savior. I went through pain for the loss of him, horrible shame, hurt, bitterness and guilt, but that was mercy. I sure didn’t see it at the time, but it became quite obvious as i have looked back. And then He shared in my pain during those long, sleepless, and confused nights right after i found out of the pregnancy. He shared in the pain of my anger. He uprooted the bitterness so firmly set as a brick wall before me. He comforted me when i thought i had lost my brother for good. He forgave me for the horrible things i thought and said ( that, possibly being the greatest feat of all of these). And He continues to prove Himself faithful, even when i doubt him. I don’t want to doubt him anymore. It’s such a scary place to be. I am still lost though. This hasn’t been and it won’t be a swish-and-done deal. But i have faith. Faith that one day, maybe not in 5 or 10 years, my Sundays will be renewed and God will prove Himself faithful yet again.
In the mean time,
Cantaré a Jehová,
Porque me ha hecho bien
–Salmos13
