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This is the sixth in a series of eight short posts. They are direct quotes from the last few pages of John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life and I have found them to be informative, stirring, challenging, and/or motivating and so wanted to share them with you.

The remaining posts will appear each Friday for the next 2 weeks. If you enjoy reading them as much as I did you can download a free copy of this book here (link sourced from this page).

“There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’”¹

Christ has come into this mutinous world, which he made for his own glory, and paid for an amnesty with his own blood. Everyone who lays down the weaponry of unbelief will be absolved from all crimes against the Sovereign of the universe. By faith alone enemies will become happy subjects of an everlasting kingdom of justice and joy. Advancing this cause with Christ is worth your life.²

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1 – Abraham Kuyper, “Sphere Sovereignty,” in Abraham Kuyper, A Centennial Reader, ed. James D. Bratt (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1998), 488.
2 – John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life, (Wheaton, Illinois: 2003), 177.

This is the fourth in a series of eight short posts. They are direct quotes from the last few pages of John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life and I have found them to be informative, stirring, challenging, and/or motivating and so wanted to share them with you.

The remaining posts will appear each Friday for the next 4 weeks. If you enjoy reading them as much as I did you can download a free copy of this book here (link sourced from this page).

There is a call on this generation to obey the risen Christ and make disciples of all the unreached peoples of the world. I am praying that God will raise up hundreds of thousands of young people and “finishers” (people finishing one career and ready to pursue a second in Christian ministry). I pray that this divine call will rise in your heart with joy and not guilt. I pray that it will be confirmed with the necessary gifts, and a compelling desire, and the confirmation of your church, and the tokens of providence. Fan into flame every flicker of desire by reading biographies, and meditating on Scripture, and studying the unreached peoples, and praying for passion, and conversing with mission veterans. Don’t run from the call. Pursue it.

Let your mind dwell on the lostness of perishing individuals, but also on whole people groups that do not have any access to the Gospel. This was Paul’s great ambition: “to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named” (Romans 15:20). There will always be unconverted people to win where the church is already established. That is not the unique task of frontier missions. Frontier missions does what Paul aimed to do: Plant the church where there is now no possibility of ministry. This is the great need of the hour, not only for missionaries who go to serve the established church in other countries (which is a great need, especially in leadership development), but also for missionaries who go to peoples and places where there is no church to serve.¹

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1 – John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life, (Wheaton, Illinois: 2003), 174-5.

This is the third in a series of eight short posts. They are direct quotes from the last few pages of John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life and I have found them to be informative, stirring, challenging, and/or motivating and so wanted to share them with you.

The remaining posts will appear each Friday for the next 5 weeks. If you enjoy reading them as much as I did you can download a free copy of this book here (link sourced from this page).

One way to describe the situation is to say that about 1.2-1.4 billion people have never had a chance to hear the Gospel;¹ that is, they live in cultures where the preaching of the Gospel in understandable ways is not accessible. Other analysts estimate the number of unevangelized somewhat higher. For example, the “Annual Statistical Table on Global Mission 2002″ by David Barrett and Todd Johnson reports that there are 1,645,685,000 unevangelized people in the world. That means 26.5 percent of the world’s population live in people groups that do not have indigenous evangelizing churches.²” ³

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1 – Patrick Johnstone, The Church Is Bigger Than You Think (Ross-shire, England: Christian Focus, 1998), 215. Johnstone is more optimistic than Barrett in his numbers: About 20% of the world’s population are unevangelized; 47% are non-Christians living where they are likely to be evangelized; and 33% are professing Christians.
2 – David B. Barrett and Todd M. Johnson, “Annual Statistical Table on Global Mission 2002,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 26 (January 2002): 22-23.
3 – John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life, (Wheaton, Illinois: 2003), 173.

This is the second in a series of eight short posts. They are direct quotes from the last few pages of John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life and I have found them to be informative, stirring, challenging, and/or motivating and so wanted to share them with you.

The remaining posts will appear each Friday for the next 6 weeks. If you enjoy reading them as much as I did you can download a free copy of this book here (link sourced from this page).

We will not know God in his full majesty until we know him moving triumphantly among the nations. We will not admire and praise him as we ought until we see him gathering a company of worshippers for himself from every people group on earth – including all the Muslim and Hindu and Buddhist peoples. Nothing enlarges our vision of God’s triumphant grace like the scope of his saving work in history.
    ”​​​​​​​​I will remember the deeds of the Lord;
     yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
     ​​​​​​​​I will ponder all your work,
     and meditate on your mighty deeds.” (Ps. 77:11-12)
and,
    ”​​​​​​​​Praise him for his mighty deeds;
     praise him according to his excellent greatness!” (Ps. 150:2)
and,
    ”Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles,
     and let all the peoples extol him.” (Rom. 15:11, quoting Ps. 117:1)¹

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1 – John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life, (Wheaton, Illinois: 2003), 172-3.