This Momentary Marriage

 

I love to read. I decided this year that among the fiction that I was reading, I wanted to throw in some books with more meat and application for my life. So, I started with This Momentary Marriage by John Piper. 

If you don't know John Piper and haven't read any of his stuff. Do it. His writings will challenge and stretch you in your walk with the Lord a lot.

Piper has this way of writing that makes me mad. He makes me want to put the book down and tell him he's wrong. However, he backs his writing up with scripture so much that there is no way I can tell him he's wrong, which makes me mad too. And then the Holy Spirit humbles me and I submit to the truth of God's Word despite my selfish opinions and desires.

He's brilliant and is doing great things for the Kingdom, namely challenging me in my walk.

If you haven't heard him preach and you look him up, prepare for your mind to be blown.

The first book I read by him was Let the Nations be Glad. I read this in high school with some friends. We would get together and discuss it with our youth pastor and have some great discussions. 

I'll never forget sitting in Wendy's on Hillsborough Rd as we all complained that we were so mad Piper was saying God is arrogant (that's what we felt like he was saying from the points he was making)...that God knows He's awesome and therefore demands glory and our worship. 

I struggled with that, but realized through scripture that it's true. 

I will never fully understand God and who He is, but with the small amount of knowledge that I do have and understand, my response can't help but be to fall on my knees and worship. 

He's perfect; I'm far from perfect. 

But, He loved me enough to send His Son to live a perfect life and die for me so that I might be able to have a relationship. 

My mind can't understand the kind of perfect, unconditional love that is offered to me, but I accept it and live in it and give Him the glory and praise.

That leads into This Momentary Marriage. Piper spent a lot of the book saying that "marriage was designed by God, most deeply and most importantly, to be a parable or a drama of the way Christ loves the church and the way he calls the church to love him."

Marriage is a small glimpse at the way Christ loves us and how we're called to love Him. Marriage is between humans and is not perfect, but it paints a picture for us of this bond that we have with Christ. 

However, it is just that, a parable, a drama, a glimpse; it is not eternal. In eternity we'll be "married" to Christ and spending eternity with Him. There is no marriage beyond this life here on earth.

The hopeless romantic in me didn't like that. But, through studying the scriptures and learning from Piper's insight, I realized the truth in this. 

I learned that once I'm on the other side of this life, I won't be upset about it anymore because I'll be in His presence, which is far better than anything here on earth.

As JD says, Heaven, eternity with Christ, will be the complete fulfillment of everything here on earth...the supercharged version...the varsity level of things...Piper said it's like wanting a thimble full of ocean water vs. wanting the whole ocean. It doesn't even compare! My human mind can't begin to comprehend the awesomeness of Heaven. Heaven is so great I won't need, want or miss being married because I will be completely new and fulfilled in Christ in a way that I can't experience on this side of Heaven.

This book was really eye opening to how marriage paints the picture of the bond between Christ and the church. I learned a lot from it!

If you're married, engaged, thinking about getting married, or single, I would recommend this book. I may have offended you with this brief review (I told you Piper does that), but give it a chance. It's really cool to see how marriage portrays this bond with Christ.

Go let Piper offend you and then let the Holy Spirit humble you and help you see how selfish and wrong you are!

How's that for a selling point of a book?