Categories: books

Book: Don't Waste Your Life

Read: November-December 2012 Rating: 8.5/10

don’t waste your life by John Piper is similar to the recent Francis Chan books that I’ve read. It’s a challenge. John Piper doesn’t hold the brakes and he goes all out to make sure you aren’t in your comfort zone. And for that, I appreciate him and his book. I’d recommend it to anyone who wants some inspiration to putting Christ first.

Quotes / My Notes

What would it mean to waste my life?

A life defined by the question “what is permissible?” is disgusting

In each paragraph of Scripture, one should ask how each part related to the other parts in order to say one coherent thing

“If my life was to have a single, all-satisfying, unifying passion, it would have to be God’s passion”

See Jonathan Edward’s resolutions

“Either you glorify God or you pursue happiness. One seemed absolutely right; the other seemed absolutely inevitable. And that is why I was confused and frustrated for so long.”

Life is wasted when we do not live for the glory of God

“We waste our lives when we do not pray and think and dream and plan and work toward magnifying God in all spheres of life”

Life is wasted if we do not grasp the glory of the cross

No child complains “I am being used” when his father delights to make the child happy with his own presence

“The people that make a durable difference in the world are not the people who have mastered many things, but who have been mastered by one great thing”

“May the one thing that you cherish, the one thing that you rejoice in and exult over, be the cross of Jesus Christ”

Love does not mean making much of us or making life easy

“Fleeing from death is the shortest path to a wasted life”

“What you love determines what you feel shame about”

“Death makes visible where our treasure is”

“Daily Christian living is daily Christian dying. The dying I have in mind is the dying of comfort and security and reputation and health and family and friends and wealth and homeland”

All of life for the Christian is meant to magnify Christ

How we handle loss shows who our treasure is

“The world is not impressed when Christians get rich and say thanks to God. They are impressed when God is so satisfying that we give our riches away for Christ’s sake and count it again”

“All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” - 2 Timothy 3:12

Escape from the myth of safety and security

“The enchantment of security - the notion that there is a sheltered way of life apart from the path of God-exalting obedience”

Our lives must show that he is more precious than life

We must make sacrificial life choices- we must be generous and have mercy

“Any of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple” - Luke 14:33

Jesus loves faith-filled risk for the glory of God

“I sink into a secular mindset that looks first to what man can do, not what God can do. It is a terrible sickness”

“Television is one of the greatest life-wasters of the modern age. And, of course, the Internet is running to catch up, and may have caught up.”

“Even sinners work hard, avoid gross sin, watch TV at night, and do fun stuff on the weekend. What more are you doing than the others?” - Paraphrased, Luke 6:32-34, Matthew 5:47

“Of course, we do not use the word cool to describe true greatness. It is a small word. That’s the point. It’s cheap. And it’s what millions of young people live for”

“You don’t waste your life by where you work, but how and why”

Boast in Him at (secular) work:

  1. We can make much of God in our secular job through the fellowship that we enjoy with him throughout the day in all our work
  2. We make much of Christ in our secular work by the joyful, trusting, God-exalting design of our creativity and industry
  • At the heart of the meaning of work is creativity
  • People who spend their lives mainly in idleness or frivolous leisure are rarely as happy as those who work
  1. We make much of Christ in our secular work when it confirms and enhances the portrait of Christ’s glory that people hear in the spoken Gospel
  • One crucial meaning of our secular work is that the way we do it will increase or decrease the attractiveness of the Gospel we profess before unbelievers
  1. We make much of Christ in our secular work by earning enough money to keep us from depending on others, while focusing on the helpfulness of our work rather than financial rewards
  • Do not labor for the food that cherishes (perishable things you can buy)
  1. We make much of Christ in our secular work by earning money with the desire to use our money to make others glad in God
  2. We make much of Christ in our secular work by treating the web of relationships it creates as a gift of God to be loved by sharing the Gospel and by practical deeds of help

God is only praised where he is prized

“We are hypocrites to pretend enthusiasm for overseas ministry while neglecting the miseries at home”

“Fame, pleasure, and riches are but husks and ashes in contrast with the boundless and abiding joy of working with God for the fulfillment of his eternal plans” - J. Campbell White