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Trip Lee: For me, this will be kind of a hard question because it’s a-
John Piper: It is.
Trip Lee: It’s going to be kind of a hard question, but I think for me, probably there are seasons. And tell me if this is the same for you. Where there are things that I know about God, that I’ve seen in his word, that maybe he’s pressing through strong in his word, but also whatever’s going on in my life. I see it more clearly than I did before.
John Piper: Yeah.
Trip Lee: I think probably in the last few years, but maybe even especially in some of the last few months, God has been reminding me that he’s sovereign in a way that doesn’t get disrupted by the things that seem disruptive to me. That his plans are firm enough. That just because my plans are being disrupted, that’s a completely independent question of whether or not his plans are being disrupted.
John Piper: Right. That’s good.
Trip Lee: And as that’s happening in my life, because things can happen. And the temptation is to think, even as I pray, thinking like, “Lord, if just this thing, this disruptive thing, wasn’t there, then I could A for you and I could do B for you. And I could do C for you.”
John Piper: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Trip Lee: “I can do all these things for you, God, if just this disruptive thing wasn’t there.”
John Piper: Right.
Trip Lee: And the flaw in that thinking is that those things are obstacles to God using me.
John Piper: Right.
Trip Lee: When instead, Scripture seems to talk about it like trials are the thing that God uses in order to use you to do great things.
John Piper: Amen.
Trip Lee: And I’ve been reading James, and this was a reminder to me in James that I’ve read a million times, that God is gracious to just press home in more urgent ways. “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything.” Texts like this Just blow away that thinking.
John Piper: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Trip Lee: That things that go wrong stand in the way of God doing what he wants to do in my life. That is just false.
John Piper: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep.
Trip Lee: Things that go wrong, in my mind, are the way that God… And it’s a pathway to it. And so then that allows me to respond to my suffering differently. Instead of “Poor me, I can’t be who I’m called to be,” instead it’s, “God, help me to respond to this in a way that produces the kind of perseverance that I know is your will for me. See, I think that’s your will for me, this thing I want to do for you.”
John Piper: Amen.
Trip Lee: “It may or may not be what I know is your will for me, is that I will be complete and lacking nothing. That I would develop perseverance, that I would look more like Jesus, and this is the way you’ve decided to do it.” And I have to trust God enough to say, “I don’t see, but I know you do. I see you. And, and I’m just going to hold on to you.”
John Piper: Yeah. Got to learn it over and over.
Trip Lee: Absolutely.
John Piper: And we know it. That’s what it means to love the sovereignty of God.
Trip Lee: Yes. Amen.
John Piper: And then you lose your keys or the car goes down or the wife gets sick, and the gut emotional response is not exactly in tune with a love for the sovereignty of God.
Trip Lee: Absolutely.
John Piper: So we learn it all over again. Yeah. Yeah. So coming at a different angle from what I thought about what I learned, because my front burner is, I’m getting ready to speak tonight. Like we were at a conference-
Trip Lee: Yeah, absolutely.
John Piper: And one of the texts is 2 Thessalonians 1:10, where he’s coming to be glorified in his saints and to be marveled at.
Trip Lee: Yeah, yeah.
John Piper: And I thought, “No, it doesn’t say, ‘he’s coming for his glory.'”
Trip Lee: Yeah.
John Piper: Which would be true, but ambiguous. It focuses on what’s going on in here. I’m marveling.
Trip Lee: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
John Piper: I’m glorifying. Which means… Here’s the way I would generalize it. The ultimate end of the purpose of God in the universe is not primarily the alteration of matter, but something that goes on in the human heart that makes him look big.
Trip Lee: That’s good.
John Piper: So I posed this question to myself. This is how it gets really relevant for me. If I had a choice from God, “Okay, you can preach a sermon on Sunday morning. And the results of that sermon would be the transformation of the universe,” like new heavens and new earth. So no more volcanoes, no more tsunamis. New heavens, new earth, material has stopped groaning. It’s all fixed.
Trip Lee: Yeah.
John Piper: Okay? That’s the result of your sermon. Here’s your second choice. Now in that, in that scenario, nobody gets changed. No heart’s changing, nobody’s loving God more. Or you can preach another sermon. And one human being, all the material stuff stays the same. And one human being gets turned totally upside down.
No longer is God boring, small, insignificant, but that person has been born again and set aflame to love the beauty of God, the greatness of God, the worth of God. And they are brimming with marveling and glorifying. Which sermon would I choose to preach?
Trip Lee: Hm. Yeah. That’s good.
John Piper: I mean, are you kidding me, that the whole universe in its material dimension, made perfect, will happen? Not insignificant. It’s just not the essence. It’s not the essence. If you got to choose between a human heart, glorifying God in authentic marveling and praising, or the whole universe, all the molecules doing what they’re supposed to do? Change somebody.
Trip Lee: That’s good.
John Piper: Which caused me to feel like, “Whoa, on Sunday morning, this is better than changing the universe. This is better, because you got this.” By the Holy Spirit, God’s purpose is being fulfilled more essentially in what you do than if you could wave a wand, fix the whole world, and everybody’s heart stays the same.
John Piper:
Means a lot to me.