I have listened to considerably more John Piper in the last two weeks than I have before and I have some thoughts to share.
1. The recommened sermons / talks from the desiring God conference Piper put on about “Sex and the Supremecy of God” were awesome. I recommend you go download them now, as they are free from the website linked to above.
2. I still hate the way he speaks. I enjoy his enthusiasm and passion. And for that I am grateful, because I found it inspiring the other day while in a traffic jam, and I was listening to him speak on worship. Worship should always be a subject spoken about with passion and joy I think.
3. The reason I can’t stand his style of speaking is he speaks too much in absolutes. (or as I know call it…the anti-Schmelzer style) I can agree with everything he is saying and I still want to argue with him. Lauren is worse…she has a very very strong adversion to this kind of speaking. This makes it hard to listen to Piper in the car together. Now, I don’t think most people see the world in absolutes, even the people who talk in absolutes. But, I still get really annoyed with talking in absolutes because it leaves little room for personal differences, idiosynchracies, and discussion. No one is right 100% of the time, and rarely is someone 100% right (or found total truth) when commenting on a single situation.
4. If Piper uses a word a lot, and he means definition 1 out of the dictionary, definition 1 is usually not the definition I most associate with the word. Symantic games plauge me in lots of discussions and debates. (sometimes arguing with Jeff, who makes up his own definitions, or Caleb, who tends to favor definition 1, when I favor 2) But it is weird how Piper wanted to make the word “Supremacy” sound appealing in a way that I would normally assoicate with love, knowledge, and other good stuff not related to someone lording power over me.
5. Piper preaches really really smart. He has lots and lots of subpoints for his subpoints. Sometimes I have a hard time tracking and wish i was making a tree diagram as he goes, but alas, you can’t do that while driving. This is coming from someone who has very good short-term recall abilities. Sometimes I think I lose track of him, cuz he just said something in such an absolute way that I’m thinking of a response on how to disagree with him…..Others he is just going all over the place.
Preaching in absolutes, with really complex organization in his sermons, and with a lot of passion leads to two kinds of followers I think. Really smart people, who agree with you. Or sheep that need to be drug around by a ring in their nose. Being in the city where his huge-ass church is I can testify to having met both. Unfortunately, I thought I had a marker for the sheep whenever I heard “I got to Bethelem baptist, Piper’s preaching is really POWERFUL”, but I found out that the smart people say that too. I, of course, would use the adjactive “passionate” instead of powerful, but the guy isn’t busy changing my life like he is the people who choose to attend there.
All-in-all, I’m feeling pretty confident about our church-plants chances in the shadow of that big chruch. It is often intimedating to plant somewhere where there is a renown scholar / preacher who has a huge chruch. For example I wouldn’t want to plant anywhere near Saddleback or Willow Creek. But here, I think Jeff’s style and attitude (the part that all of us here seem to share / enjoy) in how he preaches will attract people who don’t want to be in a church like Piper’s. And, we are a charismatic church, which Piper doesn’t have going that much for him right now despite his efforts for otherwise. So we got that going for us, and I feel good about that.
Next stop, figuring out / praying until I find out, where I fit in this stuff so I can contribute to the things we have going for us.
Aside: The in-laws are gonna be here in about two hours….and I am trying to open an honest dialoge with them about the past events that have been bad in Lauren’s life. I hope this goes well, and doesn’t cause more damage than is already there. I’ve been praying a lot about it, and I have prayed a whole hell of a lot about this over the last couple of years, and I think God is saying he wants good things for this family. But with this much disfunction I’m afraid of what bad can happen. Pray for me to have faith, and to be an amazing listener through their visit (both listening to them and my wife, and God’s voice).