During the Monday’s Bible Study we are currently working through an 11 part series based on John Piper’s Desiring God. The handout notes (which pertain to the Chapter Two: Conversion: The Creation of a Christian Hedonist) are posted below. Please note that this handout is adapted from Desiring God Study Guide and Desiring God Study Guide for Groups which can be accessed directly from the Desiring God site (here).

The introduction to the 11-week study can be read here.

Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist

Chapter 2 – Conversion: The Creation of a Christian Hedonist

The Happiness of God

1. Read Jeremiah 32:40-41 and Isaiah 48:11 and consider how God’s happiness relates to his saving activity? How should this shape the way in which we think about our own salvation?

The Creation of a Christian Hedonist

The author writes,

In recent years I have asked, “Do you receive Jesus as your Treasure?” Not just Saviour (everybody wants out of hell, but not to be with Jesus). Not just Lord (they might submit begrudgingly). The key is: Do you treasure Him more than everything? Converts to Christian Hedonism say with Paul, “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8). (p. 55)

And then asks the question,

Could it be that today the most straightforward biblical command for conversion is not, “Believe in the Lord,” but, “Delight yourself in the LORD”? And might not many slumbering hearts be stabbed broad awake by the words “Unless a man be born again into a Christian Hedonist he cannot see the kingdom of God”? (p. 55)

2. How then does the term ‘Christian Hedonist’ help us understand what a Christian is (p. 54-55)?[1]

Our Great Need

3. How do the following passages help deepen our understanding of and our need for the gospel,

a. Isaiah 43:6-7 (p. 56)

b. 1 Corinthians 10:31 (p. 56)

c. Romans 3:23 (cf. Romans 1:23 and 3:23) (pp. 57-58)

d. Romans 6:23 and 2 Thessalonians 1:9 (pp. 58-60)

e. 1 Timothy 1:15 and Romans 4:25 (pp. 61-62)

f. Acts 3:19 and Acts 16:31 (p. 63)

The author quotes from the Puritan Preacher, Jonathan Edwards, in order to help us understand the outrageous offense of sin,

The crime of one being despising and casting contempt on another, is proportionably more or less heinous, as he was under greater or less obligations to obey him. And therefore if there be any being that we are under infinite obligations to love, and honour, and obey, the contrary towards him must be infinitely faulty.

Our obligation to love, honor, and obey any being is in proportion to his loveliness, honorableness, and authority.… But God is a being infinitely lovely, because he hath infinite excellency and beauty.…

So sin against God, being a violation of infinite obligations, must be a crime infinitely heinous, and so deserving infinite punishment.… The eternity of the punishment of ungodly men renders it infinite…and therefore renders no more than proportionable to the heinousness of what they are guilty of. (p. 60)

4. Why is it important that we feel a need for the gospel and how does a right understanding of sin help us feel this need?

Two Sides of the Same Coin

5. Read Acts 15:3, 11:18 and 14:27 and then define conversion in your own words (pp. 63–64)?

6. What two acts of conversion are highlighted in Acts 11:18 and 14:27 and why does the author say that these two acts “are really two sides of the same coin” (p. 64)?

A Gift of God

7. Read Acts 5:31, 11:18, 14:27 and 16:14. What evidence do we find that conversion is a gift of God? What other biblical texts are you able to find (in your own study and reading of Desiring God, especially pages 65 and 66) which support this truth? Why does it matter that we see that conversion is a gift of God (pp. 64–70)?

8. Read Ephesians 2:5, 8; and then 2 Timothy 2:24-26 and then John 11. Write down all the reasons you think the raising of Lazarus is a helpful picture of God’s work of regeneration (pp. 66–67).

9. The author writes at length to help us arrive at a biblical understanding of conversation, faith and understand and to help us guard against thinking of conversation as “a way of earning salvation”. Why does it matter that we think clearly about these things? What are the dangers of wrong-thinking in this area (pp. 67–70)?

Joy: The Fruit of Faith

10. Read Matthew 13:44 (cf. Romans 15:13 and Philippians 1:25). Describe the relationship between joy and faith. How is joy the fruit of faith? How is joy the root of faith? How is joy part of the essence of what faith is? (pp. 70–74)

11. Read John 3:18-20. What things, besides love for the light, might motivate a person to “come to the light”? Why would any such motives be dishonoring to the light (p. 72)?

The author makes the following observation,

Saving faith is the confidence that if you sell all you have and forsake all sinful pleasures, the hidden treasure of holy joy will satisfy your deepest desires. Saving faith is the heartfelt conviction not only that Christ is reliable, but also that He is desirable. It is the confidence that He will come through with His promises and that what He promises is more to be desired than all the world. (p. 73)

12. According to the author, what is “saving faith”? Explain why this definition leads the author to say that conversion is the creation of a Christian Hedonist(cf. pp. 72–73).

Finally, the author reminds us,

Saving faith is the cry of a new creature in Christ. And the newness of the new creature is that it has a new taste. What was once distasteful or bland is now craved. Christ Himself has become a Treasure Chest of holy joy. The tree of faith grows only in the heart that craves the supreme gift that Christ died to give: not health, not wealth, not prestige—but God! Test yourself here. There are many professing Christians who delight in God’s gifts, but not God. Would you want to go to heaven if God were not there, only His gifts?

“Christ…suffered once for sins…that he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). “Through him we…have access in one Spirit to the Father” (Ephesians 2:18). “Through him we have…obtained access by faith into this grace…and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.…We…rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:2, 11). (pp. 72-73)

10. What is the ultimate good that Christ died to secure for those who trust wholly in him. Examine your own heart. Is this ultimate good the supreme treasure of your heart? Why or why not? What are some ways in which we can evaluate our own hearts? (pp. 72–73)?

Praying the Psalms – Psalm 130