Posted on 03/15/2024 2:29:38 AM PDT by Morgana
You may remember last year when The Dissenter published an article denouncing the deeply erotic and nearly pornographic nature in which a TGC author, Joshua Butler, described Christ’s relationship to the Church. While his description was extremely graphic, comparing Christ’s relationship to the Church with a graphical description of a man’s sexual relationship with his wife, the root issue is a distinct misinterpretation of the kind of love that differentiates the two scenarios.
The New Testament primarily uses three Greek words to describe love: agape, philia, and eros. Agape is often described as the highest form of love, a selfless, sacrificial, unconditional love, prominently featured in the Christian scriptures. Philia refers to brotherly love, friendship, or affection. Eros, traditionally understood, refers to romantic or passionate love, often associated with physical attraction and desire.
This past week, John Piper, at John MacArthur’s Shepherd’s Conference, while not in such graphic detail, mangles the doctrine of Christ’s love for the Church and our love for Him in just the same way. In a clip of his sermon, Piper states:
What are we after in our people’s lives? And everybody said, obedience. So did I, amen. But you had already quoted, if you love me, you will obey me. So I’m thinking, I’m after love, folks. And you are too.
And because that love, that love is not equal to obedience and that love is not equal to agape, that love is erotic to the core. That’s an overstatement. Eros means I find pleasure in you, Jesus. I find pleasure in you, Jesus.
You are my preciousness. And there comes obedience.
Piper’s use of “erotic” to describe our love for Jesus is at the very least unconventional and it seems that his intention is to emphasize the intensity and personal nature of our love for Christ—not in a physical or sexual sense, I don’t think, but in the depth of passion and desire for closeness and communion with Jesus. He appears to be attempting to reclaim the term “eros” to illustrate a deep, consuming love for Jesus that seeks pleasure in the joy of communion with Him. But that isn’t biblical, and that is the problem.
Not only does the New Testament never once use the term “eros” to describe the love between Christ and the Church, but the biblical portrayal of our love for Jesus is deeply relational, characterized by agape—selfless, sacrificial love. It is not typically associated with the English term “erotic,” due to its contemporary connotations.
John Piper’s error in labeling our love for Jesus as “erotic” is a manifestation of a deeper theological misinterpretation concerning the Christian’s relationship with Christ, deeply entrenched in what he terms “Christian Hedonism.” This doctrine, which posits that “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him,”—a doctrine by which his entire ministry revolves around—fundamentally misinterprets the essence of Christian joy and our pursuit of God.
While the desire to find satisfaction in God is biblically sound, the framing of this pursuit as “hedonism”—a term historically associated with the pursuit of pleasure as the highest good—skews the biblical portrayal of self-denial, sacrifice, and the taking up of one’s cross to follow Christ (Luke 9:23). By equating our deepest, most righteous desires for God with a term laden with connotations of self-centered pleasure-seeking, Piper’s theology shifts the focus from God’s glory to our own emotional satisfaction.
This fundamental error in understanding leads to problematic assertions, such as the controversial use of “erotic” to describe our love for Jesus. It’s also how we get strange, even heretical, doctrines like “final justification” when worked out to their logical conclusions.
In Scripture, our relationship with Christ is depicted as one of deep adoration, commitment, and reverence, encapsulating joy, peace, and fulfillment in serving Him and living according to His will. However, these experiences of joy and satisfaction in the Christian life are the byproducts of our obedience and submission to God’s will, not the primary goal of our faith journey. Piper’s “Christian Hedonism” elevates the pursuit of personal joy over the pursuit of holiness, obedience, and the sacrificial love modeled by Christ and it distorts the nature of true Christian discipleship, which calls for a focus on God’s sovereignty, righteousness, and the joy that comes from selfless love and service, rather than an undue emphasis on personal fulfillment.
The question that I continue to see popping up around the Shepherd’s Conference and other conferences is “why is John Piper even there?” It is a good question, indeed. It’s like Tim Keller—he is elevated to the status of “great thinker” and “superb theologian” when, in reality, so much of what they say is reduced to mere sophistry and casuistry. God is not the author of confusion, and so much of what John Piper says is, at best, confusing—and at worst, blatant false teaching.
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There's a very big element to erotic love that is related to the "forbidden." I don't think that is what God has in mind.
One might even go so far as to say that the desire for erotic love cuts to the very core of our fallenness.
There are drugs that produce the same or very similar neuro-chemical effect as erotica and erotic sex. The hunger that such drugs elicit is powerful to the point of being addictive (just ask Hunter Biden). I have known men and women who are overwhelmed by the need to feed that hunger.
This seems to be one of the hallmarks of human fallenness (that is, the obsessive need to satisfy a hunger that is opposed to obedience to God).
Wow that’s just weird and wrong
Seeker sensitive?
It’s just bizarre
I am starting to wonder if John Piper is a closet homosexual.?.?
Yes, it is. There are some who are compelled to attack Christianity in every possible way, all the time. They are often the same kind of people who see every aspect of reality through the lens of carnal fixations.
At 77 Piper has fallen to the vanity of trying to be of worth by originality and offering unique thought. Twenty years ago he would have never spoken like this .
Many Christian mystics, like John of theCross and Theresa of Avila speak about God’s love in much this way.
Not a fan of Piper.
If Jesus were born today the Dems would crucify him in the manger.
Or, they’d forced the abortion.
I read John Piper’s book - “Desiring God” and it had a profound impact on my relationship with my Heavenly Father. As a child listening to the Baptist preacher literally loudly rant & rave about sin and going to hell, scared me. I answered the altar call and professed my belief, but to be honest, it was more from fear of hell than what I would find nearly 20 years later as a deep love for the Lord because of His gift of Grace to me even though I am a sinner.
My prayers to Him were full of praise, thankfulness, confessions, and requests. But I still didn’t feel really “close to Him.” I knew that something was missing in my walk with Him because I was doing all the above as a duty, an obligation to be obedient. Yes, I felt confident that I was “saved”, but I yearned for more and prayed for the Holy Spirit to open my eyes to what I was missing.
Fast-forward to 2016. I was building the website for the PCA Church I had joined in our new hometown. They wanted a link to the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and I noticed :
Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.
It was like a light popping on! …. “to enjoy him” …. WOW! Looking for a book to read about how to “enjoy him”, I found Piper’s book. Not the end of my story…. A glorious new beginning. Now I look for ways to “glorify God”, not from a sense of duty but because it makes me gloriously happy. Other things also make me happy, my husband, Grandchildren, my garden, playing music, but nothing compares with Joy in the Lord! Talking to Him all through the day, He is part of all decisions, orders all my steps, a constant companion, protector.
Today I am reading that John Piper is evil and creepy. In defense I submit the following for you to consider.
There is no author’s name on the article but I suspect it comes from the organization of E.S. Williams, a Doctor in the UK who has multiple blogs and articles with the same criticisms expressed in this article. I am wondering if he is much like the Baptist preacher from my childhood…. Boastfully spouting orthodoxy and without understanding the context of some misunderstood words he narrowly defines that cause his audience (like today) to cringe. There are many well known Christians who praise Piper’s books.
Please consider the following comments in his defense that I have gathered:
In defense of the term "Christian hedonism" from Piper’s book Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist:
1. The term "hedonism" means "a living for pleasure". If the chief end of man is to enjoy God forever, then we should live our lives for pleasure -- the pleasure of knowing God.
2. The term does not refer to a single, pagan philosophy but is a generic term that has been applied to a wide variety of philosophies that elevate the pursuit of pleasure. For the Christian hedonist, it includes the idea of pursuing the greatest pleasure, not in the short term, but maximized over eternity.
3. Many wise, old Christians have chosen to describe the Christian life in these terms. C. S. Lewis and Soren Kierkegaard are among them.
4. The term has a jolting effect. This is appropriate for a philosophy that has a life-changing effect on its adherents. Furthermore, this philosophy can be extremely threatening to nominal adherents of Christianity, since it focuses on the motives of the heart rather than superficial actions.
5. Although the word definitely has a pagan connotation in most circumstances, Scripture itself uses words with normally negative connotations to teach positive truth. For instance, Jesus compared himself to a thief in the night. He also commended the shrewdness of an unrighteous steward. Surely, a word that is in essence quite neutral can be used to express the truth that we should find our highest delight in God!
6. Finally, the word "Christian" as a modifier of the term "hedonism" signals loud and clear that this is no ordinary hedonism. It is controlled and defined by the Christian revelation, the Bible. Only by submitting ourselves to the authority of Scripture can we know what is everlastingly most pleasing.
Christian Hedonism is a vision of life and ministry based on the truth that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.
The Westminster Shorter Catechism summarizes the "chief end of man" as "to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever." Piper has suggested that this would be more correct as "to glorify God by enjoying Him forever."
Christian hedonism was developed in opposition to the deontology of Immanuel Kant, who argued that actions should be considered praiseworthy only if they do not proceed from the actor's desires or expected benefit, but rather from a sense of duty. On the contrary, Christian hedonists advocate for a consequentialist ethic based on an understanding that their greatest possible happiness can be found in God.
Some Christians object to Christian Hedonism's controversial name. It has little commonality with philosophical hedonism; however, Piper has stated that a provocative term is "appropriate for a philosophy that has a life changing effect on its adherents." Critics charge that hedonism of any sort puts something (namely, pleasure) before God, which allegedly breaks the first of the Ten Commandments: "You shall have no other gods before me." In response, Piper states on his website that:
“By Christian Hedonism, we do not mean that our happiness is the highest good. We mean that pursuing the highest good will always result in our greatest happiness in the end. We should pursue this happiness, and pursue it with all our might. The desire to be happy is a proper motive for every good deed, and if you abandon the pursuit of your own joy, you cannot love man or please God.
Scripture commands us to find delight in God: “Delight yourself . . . in the Lord” (Psalm 37:4). Over and over, the Bible speaks of the rewards of obedience (Luke 12:33; Hebrews 11:6), great gain (Philippians 3:8; 1 Timothy 6:6), and joy (John 15:11; Nehemiah 8:10).
In Hebrews 11, Moses is said to have refused “the passing pleasures of sin,” choosing instead “the reproach of Christ” (verses 24–25). Why? “He looked to the reward” (verse 26). Moses, therefore, was a true Christian hedonist. He sought the eternal reward that only God can give, spurning this world’s counterfeit—and temporary—pleasures. In so doing, Moses achieved the most fulfilling happiness—in God. And God was glorified.
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