A few caveats to begin. Although I have known of John Piper for years, I am just now coming to read his teachings on suffering and the sovereignty of God. The book by that name is graciously made available for free download on his “Desiring God” site and is worth reading; there are multiple authors with thought-provoking comments. It was published in 2006. Finally, I know that he and the other contributors are motivated by the desire to bring healing to others and strengthen the church. I do not doubt his motivation. That being said…
In Chapter 3, “The Suffering of Christ and the Sovereignty of God,” John Piper sets out “to venture the ultimate biblical explanation for the existence of suffering.” A bold mission for anyone, to be sure, and JP gets right to it saying,
“I believe the entire universe exists to display the greatness of the glory of the grace of God.“ (p. 81, emphasis is by the author.)
The question of “why did God create the universe” is challenging, deep, and I do not have an answer, other than to suggest, we cannot know. It is a question which is never directly posed in Scripture and I would argue is not even indirectly hinted at (as opposed to why humanity or the Earth were created, there are hints and statements about that). So while I do not think we can say with any assurance why God created the universe, I question the proposition that God did so in order to revel in his own glory. Piper is effectively saying that God vainly created a giant mirror in order to preen in front of it, demonstrating to Godself how awesome God is. Yet Piper offers even greater specificity.
“This coming [of Jesus] to suffer and die is the supreme manifestation of the greatness of the glory of the grace of God. … a stunning truth is revealed, namely, suffering is an essential part of the created universe in which the greatness of the glory of God can be most fully revealed.” (p. 82)
The pinnacle of God’s glory and grace is found in the sacrifice of Jesus for our salvation and, JP argues, since that was the purpose of Creation, it was ordained from the beginning of all things that Adam and Eve should sin so that Jesus would need to die so that “the greatness of the glory of God can be most fully revealed.” Jesus and we have to suffer so that God can look good. Lest you think I am reshaping his words to make it sounds worse than it is, here are a few more quotes (italics are Piper’s and bold is mine).
“This was the moment—Good Friday—for which everything in the universe was planned. In conceiving a universe in which to display the glory of his grace, God did not choose plan B. There could be no greater display of the glory of the grace of God than what happened at Calvary.” (p. 82)
“Therefore, the suffering of Jesus was not an afterthought, as though the work of creation did not go the way God planed. Before the foundation of the world God had a book called the book of the Lamb that was slain. The slaying of the Lamb was in view before the work of creation began.” (p. 83)
“Do you see what this implies about sin and suffering in the universe? According to this divine plan, God permits sin to enter the world. God ordains that what he hates will come to pass. It is not sin in God to will that there be sin.” (p. 85)
[Using as an analogy Jospeh’s comments to his brothers in Gen. 50:20] “As for you, Adam and Eve, you meant evil against God as you rejected him as your Father and Treasure, but oh what an infinite good he planned through your fall!” (p. 85)
“You have fallen, and now the stage is set for the perfect display of greatness of the glory of the grace of God.” (p. 85)
It boils down to this: JP argues that God created the universe to exhibit his glory ⟹ that is best exhibited in Jesus’ suffering ⟹ humanity must sin so that Jesus must suffer therefore it was part of God’s plan all along that Adam and Eve should sin so that Jesus would die so that God’s glorious grace would be know.
What a torturous train of thought! He tells Adam and Eve “you meant evil against God as you rejected him as your Father and Treasure, but oh what an infinite good he planned through your fall!” Yet it was an “infinite good” only made necessary by God’s need for self-aggrandizement.
JP argues that Jesus/we must suffer so that God’s gracious glory might be known. But if God is God surely there are other ways that he could make his glory known. And if God is the God JP describes he is an incredible narcissistic and vain God.
I understand the motivation: to provide comfort and a sense of purpose to our suffering, to encourage us that it is not in vain, but rather a part of God’s plan for us and the universe. Yet this has led JP to described a twisted and warped vision of God who is self-centered and vain, who “will sins” (yet “it is not sin in God to will that there be sin”), and who needs Jesus’ consequential suffering and death just so that this God might be glorified.
What damage can be done by the best of intentions.
There are many other concerns, comments, and critiques that I would explore. Such as the assertion that “everything that we will ever enjoy will come to us because of suffering” (so his teachings and example of life is meaningless?). My concern is not with proving an obscure theological point, but with encouraging and building up the faithful through a compassionate embrace of the full biblical testimony and their personal experience.
This book begins with a quote from David Wells stating, in the aftermath of 9/11, that “Evangelicalism…is simply not very serious anymore” (p. 17). I agree wholeheartedly. When JP says that “our vision of God in relation to evil and suffering was shown [by recent catastrophes] to be frivolous,” (p. 18) I say, “Amen!” Sadly, his theological approach does not show a serious and deep reading of the Bible, but rather a rigid and fragile human construct that will not hold up to serious examination. It is crystalline, seemingly perfect and very attractive and yet unable to withstand the stress of real life or even logical thought.
That being said, I know that this view brings comfort to many and I do not want to take that from them. But I also know that it has brought great grief to many, even to the extent of driving them from the church. It cannot stand unexamined.
This world of God’s creation is “full of beautiful and terrible things” and in the midst of this Life God meets us. That is the message of Scripture and God’s grace.
8 thoughts on “John Piper’s Warped & Harmful Teaching on Suffering”
It is genuinely sad to see that you have such little thought of God or recognition of Who he is – that you would even suggest He can preen in front of a mirror or does things for self aggrandizement. That suggestion and yes, twisting of Piper’s statements, underscores you think of God not much more than an elevated mortal.
Derek, you have misunderstood both me and John Piper. I, in fact, have a very “high” view of God, far beyond our mortal visions of determining history and justice. It is *Piper* who depicts God as nothing more than a preening peacock. He writes, “I believe the entire universe exists to display the greatness of the glory of the grace of God.” The entire universe exists, according to Piper, solely for the purpose of showing off how gracious God is, how great God is. This is the definition of virtue signaling; God created the world (and sin according to Piper) just so that God could come in and save humanity to show what a great and gracious God he is.
I agree with you, this is a sad view of God, the has such little thought and recognition of who God is and why God created this universe and humanity. (I tend to go with the old catechism, so that we, humanity, might live in relation with God and “enjoy him forever,” but that’s me. Entirely too orthodox in my theology.) I hope you are following these replies, because this is really important, to see that it is Piper himself who is limiting and framing God into the shape of an egotistical monster, who introduces sin into the world, allowing the death of billions, solely so that God can swoop in and literally be the savior. Warped indeed.
I just came across this article while doing a search for a specific sermon preached by John Piper on glorifying God in the midst of suffering. I noticed that you wrote this almost two years ago and was just curious if you have continued reading any more of Piper’s works, such as The Pleasures of God. Based on your quotes above, it seems to me that you misunderstood the full context of the author’s statements. If you have reached a different conclusion, it would be worth adding an addendum to this article.
Thank you Eric. I have continued to read Piper’s work and while I appreciated (and agreed with) his comments before the election regarding what sort of leaders Christians should be praying for, voting for, and calling for in our country, his theological teachings have not changed. At least not in so far as I can see.
As I stated two years ago, this is a distillation of Piper’s teachings, but it is all his words. It seems that rather than accept that this is, in fact, Piper’s teaching, people regularly tell me that I have misunderstood him or have not read him carefully enough. Not so. I have read him and I understand him clearly. I have not misunderstood either those statements or the context and I urge those who think I have misunderstood him to read his work again, particularly this one.
Piper says quite clearly that, God “ordained” that sin should enter into the world, that suffering should exist all so that His glory might be “most fully revealed.” Now, I do not deny that God’s glory *and* grace IS fully revealed on Calvary, it surely is!, but it is quite another thing to say that God ordained and designed this universe with the intent purpose to cause all this suffering just so that his grace and glory might be displayed.
Again, this was the whole point of this post, to show in Piper’s own words, and I urge everyone to go back and read his chapter, exactly what his theology of suffering is. After all, that was the goal of that chapter, “to venture the ultimate biblical explanation for the existence of suffering.”
Now, if he has changed his mind and has written something new, retracting these teachings, then I am eager to read it and glad to hear of it.
I’ll admit I have not yet read the book you reference in this article. But from the sections you’ve quoted and your general paraphrase of the point he is trying to make, this feels like yet another Calvinistic attempt to force the mysteries of God into a tidy 5-point construct that neatly makes sense of it all.
Years ago I got into a “healthy” debate with a group of Christian friends who were on opposite sides of the Calvinist vs. Arminian debate about salvation. The Calvinist accused me of being Arminian. And the Arminian accused me of being Calvinist. When I asserted that I was neither, both of their heads almost exploded, and they both insisted I must be one or the other. What I asserted then is what I still believe — there are aspects of theology that simply cannot be known for sure. This is what separates the limited human intellect from the omniscience of God. Do I believe that God is sovereign and predestined the elect to be saved? Yes. The Bible clearly says so. Do I also believe that God offered salvation freely to all and that He gave us a will to either accept or reject that offer? Yes. The Bible clearly says so. So why would I be so arrogant as to try to explain away that paradox? The best I can do is to say that to the extent I am able, I will try to conform my will to His. And whether I truly had any say in the matter is not something I will ever know. Perhaps he compelled me and gave me the faith that I then exercised like a cog in a machine. If so, I’ll be grateful and praise Him for choosing to save me. But if He instead gave me the ability to choose salvation or damnation, I will praise him for giving me the will and opportunity to choose salvation. Either way, I don’t need Him to fit into my theological box.
To me, this is what Piper seems to be doing. He needs to make suffering fit within his theological understanding of God’s sovereignty and how that applies to things like free will. So he seems to go off on this logical crusade to fill all the gaps and make it all make sense within that construct. The only way to do so is to assume that God “willed” sin to exist. But this seems clearly contradictory to Scripture — most notably James 1:13-14: “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed.” The message here is pretty clear. Just because God is sovereign and His hand is at work in history and in our personal lives, that doesn’t mean that the temptation that faces us is His doing. So if God is not at work in the temptation I face today, what would lead me to believe He was at work in the first temptation of Adam and Eve that introduced sin into the universe?
Why not let the mysteries of God remain mysteries and instead say that a sovereign God allows suffering for reasons we do not fully understand, but we can be confident from Scripture that in the end he will wipe away all tears and end the suffering of all those whom He has redeemed?
hi. this is months later and you probably won’t see this but i wholeheartedly am of the same position of you. i think when it comes to suffering, so many Christians have tried to poorly explain it – whether it be the free will argument of perhaps Piper’s book in itself depending on your opinion. I genuinely think that as Christians AND humans in general, there are just some things we will never understand, with suffering being the prime example. Suffering is awful, but we don’t know the reason and I don’t think we will ever find out. Countless theologians have tried to frame one of the biggest questions in the world into their own take on the issue (evidenced with the Bible in many cases) yet, the bible never explicitly states such reasoning.
It sucks that it’s one of the biggest unanswered questions. In fact, this exact issue is what is stopping some of my friends and people in general from becoming Christian. However, I tend to tell my friends that I want them to pretend that their assertion is correct – God isn’t real because suffering exists and how could a loving God create suffering right? But then I ask them “ok, so we’ve acknowledged your hypothesis, but what other religions/world views actually answer this question too?”. The answer is none. Even the belief in absence of God doesn’t answer why there is suffering. Islam doesn’t answer it. Buddhism doesn’t answer it – the list continues.
Even if they don’t understand how God could exist in a world full of suffering, I think it’s actually interesting to ask them where else they would find this answer, which is nowhere.
However, I then tell them that whilst there is no clear answer on why suffering exists because we can’t know everything about God, I reassure them that what Christianity does do is reassure us in suffering of a greater hope. A greater hope that means we can be bold and joyful in suffering.
I am totally with you on your perspective. It is my firm belief that the reasoning behind suffering is something that will never be revealed to us here on earth. God may well have created suffering for free will, or even to Glorify his presence as noted by Piper. However, we truly do not know and I think instead of focusing on trying to answer this question, theologians should instead focus on showing others how being a Christian gives us a greater hope in suffering. Love your comment – very insightful!
Thank you Elanor! I did see your comment and I thought I had replied, I apologize for the delay in acknowledging it. I appreciate your candor and perspective.