Great Christian Biographies with John Piper: Augustine, Part 3

Augustine’s View of Universal Desire and the Will

Now Augustine analyzed his own motives down to the root. He saw this as a universal every man. He said that's a quote. This is not John Piper. This is Augustine. Every man whatsoever his condition desires to be happy.

There is no man who does not desire this. And each one desires it with such earnestness and That he prefers it to all other things. Whoever in fact desires other things desires them for this end and This desire this delight.

This longing for happiness governs the will.

Now here's the catch.

The delight That the will always follows. We do not determine and.

And.

Pelagius smelled it and hated it. Here's the quote from Augustine. Who has it in his power? To have such a motive present to his mind that his will shall be influenced to believe. Who can welcome in his mind something which does not give him delight?

But who has it in his power to ensure that something will delight him will turn up. Or that he will delight in what does turn up? If those things delight us which serve our advancement towards God that is due not to our own whim or industry or meritorious works, but to the inspiration of God and to the grace which he bestows.

In other words.

Converting saving grace is God's giving delight in God.

Holiness Christ.

Scripture the beauty of holiness and glory.

Suddenly you see and love and.

Cherish and revel and love them. Where'd that come from?

Now the will will move with it.

But before that's given the wheels going back to the Internet and the magazine and the concubine and the television and the family he concludes this way a man's free will Indeed avails for nothing Except to sin if he knows not the way of truth.

And even after his duty and his proper aim shall begin to become known to him Unless he also take delight in and feel a love for it He neither does his duty Nor sets about it nor lives rightly. What more could I ask?

From Augustine now. In order that such a course this is still Augustine now in order that such a course may engage our affections. God's love is shed abroad in our heart Not through the free will Which arises from ourselves but through the Holy Ghost which is given to us.

He wrote to simplicity and at the end of his life for 27 three years before the end of his life in answering this question. About free will in answering this question. I have tried hard to maintain the free choice of the human will.

But the grace of God Prevailed. He was asked by Pauline's now picture this. He's 72. You're supposed to retire.

At.

65 you don't you don't take on Pelagius at 70. Which he did. Was the last battle he fought. You give that to younger people. That's your job. But he did and Pauline's his friend. Said Augustine. Why you're an old man.

Lay it down. That that's my paraphrase. But here's a non paraphrase answer quoted from Augustine. Why. First and foremost because. No subject Gives me greater pleasure. For what ought to be more attractive to us sick men?

Than grace. Grace by which we are healed for us lazy men than grace. Grace by which we are stirred up for us men longing to act. Than grace by which we are Helped. Now what makes that answer so compelling and so powerful.

Is that the healing? Stirring. Helping enabling grace. I call it future. Grace is the giving of a compelling triumphant joy. Grace governs life even the life of a 70 year old man by giving a supreme joy in the supremacy of God and his glory and his Sufficiency and his beauty and his treasure which triumphs over all other things.

And when you see a Pelagius coming along. Undermining that grace and that gift even at 70 you go to battle. This is why the concept of Christian freedom is so radically different from Augustine. Get this now.

This is just another piece that blows your mind away and shows you how far our whole discussion today is from where he was. Oh how we need to bathe ourselves in the old people. We we we are we are fish swimming in alien waters.

And we can't imagine air. From 1600 years ago.

Listen to this.

Augustine said Christian freedom is not the freedom to choose it's the transcendence of choice. Meaning it is no ideal for Augustine to stand with Pelagius in sovereign autonomous Equilibrium between good and evil and be able to go this way or that way.

Augustine regards that as the disintegration of the will. Freedom is when we are so ravished in the truth that our minds perceive it wholly for what it is and our delights and Affections embrace it so wholly for what it is.

There is no choice left. That's freedom that's heaven. That's where we're going. To argue that we should all try to cultivate a philosophy and a theology Which will help people stand in sovereign.

Autonomous.

Equilibrium with their Supposed free will between good and evil as though that is a noble human thing. Let us say it is simply not Augustinian. You can draw your own judgments about whether it's biblical or not and.

And.

You should right now simply say if you have any doubts about this. He's not quoting much scripture. And that's right, I'm not. I'm giving you this man's great vision. I Have written a few things about the scriptures.

To try to give grounding to these things, but Augustine does well so. Life's quest. What is it? What's life all about now. If this is grace. If this is the sovereignty of grace flowing through sovereign joy.

Liberating us from the power of alternative gods and and pleasures. What is life all about? This is his answer. Quote. The whole life of a good Christian is a holy.

Desire.

The whole life of a good Christian is a holy.

Desire.

The key to Christian living is.

Passion.

Desire.

Hunger longing.

One of the reasons.

These things are incomprehensible in our churches is that our people have so shriveled in their capacity to feel desire That a talk like this absolutely makes no sense. It's a foreign language. Listen to the way he describes it was true in his own day.

So don't feel hopeless about the 20th century or 21st. He said the soul of men Shall hope under the shadow of thy wings. They shall be made drunk with the fullness of thy house and of the torrents of thy pleasures.

This is Augustine the torrents of thy pleasures. Thou will give them to drink for in thee is the fountain of life and in thy light do we see light? Give me this is still a quote. Give me a man in love.

He knows what I mean. Give me one who yearns. Give me one who's hungry. Give me one far away in the desert who's thirsty and sighs for the spring of the eternal country. Give me that sort of man. He knows what I mean.

But if I speak to cold men He just does not know what I am talking the remedy for this condition of cold men cold reformed men or cold Arminian men or women is number one prayer and an utter dependence upon God and to Displaying God himself more infinitely desirable than all other things in creation to our people.

It is not an accident that every sentence in this book is Addressed to God. This is a prayer. Did you know that? The confessions are a prayer every sentence is to you O Lord. Three hundred and fifty pages of prayer.

He told his autobiography to God.

Why?

It stands on almost every page. I Am utterly dependent in everything on you. That's what this book symbolizes. It is a prayer because he is totally and utterly dependent on God for the Joy, which will liberate him from the bondage of sex.

Which was his downfall until he was 32 years old. His mother of course is famous for praying for him when he wasn't praying for him.

Self.

Oh Lord.

That I may love you freely. For I can find nothing more precious. Turn not away your face from me that I may find what I seek. Turn not aside in your anger from your servant lest in seeking you I run towards something else.

You see I Just feel this so deeply don't you. I get up in the morning and there is in me Prone to wander Lord. I feel it prone to leave the God I love. And therefore what do you do? You you cry out in prayer don't let me go.

Don't let television get the upper hand. Don't let food get the upper hand. Don't let sex get the upper hand. Bind me to you. Oh God with a sovereign joy. Anything else is legalism a lot of bound up people in the world preaching.

A lot of bound up reformed people getting a lot of bound up reformed Calvinist women. Because they don't understand that the bondage is released by a sovereign.

Joy.

Which overcomes everything else. And the last thing I said was displaying God. This is a challenge to us brothers a Challenge. Do you want souls? You want conversions, I mean real conversions. Listen to Augustine if you if you delight in souls.

Love them in God. Draw as many with you to him as you can. You yourself Oh God, are there joy. Happiness is to rejoice in you and for you and because of you. This is true happiness and there is no other.

The only evangelist who's going to produce this kind of Christian is an evangelist who.

Loves God.

Like this and then loves people in God. So we got to find words brothers. And let me read you. Let me read you some words from Augustine. I Don't have a pastor Except my staff who pastors me and loves me, but there's no older man that I can go to and I have a I'm the oldest guy on the staff now.

It used to be I'm three days older than David Livingston. So I go to David and we have a good brotherly Relationship. I have to go to these guys. I have to go to these guys Augustine Edwards Luther Calvin.

I have to.

Because.

The stuff that's being written about God by and large today doesn't come near to what I'm about to read you. So listen, this is what we have to do. What do I love when I love?

My god.

Not the sweet melody of harmony and song. Not the fragrance of flowers perfumes and spices. Not manna or honey not limbs such as the body delights to embrace. It is not these that I love when I love my god and yet When I love him.

It is true that I love a light of a certain kind a voice a perfume a food and embrace. But they are of the kind that I love in my inner self when my soul is bathed in light. That is not bound by space.

When it listens to the sound that never dies away. When it breathes the Fragrance that is not born away on the wind when it tastes food That is never consumed by the eating when it clings to an embrace from which it is not served by Fulfillment of desire.

This is what I love when I love my god. You are ever active. You always are at rest. You gather all things to yourself. Though you suffer no need. You grieve for wrong but suffer no pain. You can be angry and yet serene.

Your works are varied. But your purpose is one in the same. You welcome those who come to you though. You never lost them. You are never in need, but you are glad to gain. Never covetous yet you exact a return for your gifts.

You release us from our debts, but you lose nothing thereby. You are my God my life my holy delight. But is this enough to say of you can any man say enough when he speaks of you yet? Woe betide those who are silent about You.

The Church’s Pelagian Captivity and the Need for Augustine

That a mandate to preach or what if it's true as RC Sproul says that we have not broken free from the Pelagian captivity of the church. Then we should pray and Preach and write and teach and labor with all our might to break the chain that holds us captive.

Sproul said we need an Augustine. This is a quote from the table talk. We need an Augustine or a Luther to speak to us a new. Lest the light of God's grace not only be overshadowed but be obliterated.

And I say yes but we also need Tens-of-thousands of ordinary pastors like you and me who are ravished with the extraordinary sovereignty of joy in God. We need to rediscover Augustine's peculiar Slant, I believe a very biblical slant on grace.

Grace is the free gift of Sovereign joy in God that triumphs over and breaks the bondage of Sin in our lives and in our people's lives. We need to rethink Reformed soteriology so that every limb and every branch in this tree is coursing with the sap of Augustinian delight.

We need to understand and make clear that total depravity is not just badness.

It's deadness to joy.

It's blindness to beauty. We need to see that Unconditional election means that the completeness of our joy in Jesus was.

Planned.

For us before the foundation of the world. We need to see that limited atonement is the assurance.

That is.

Indestructible that joy in God will Infallibly, let me say it again that Christ's Infallible work on the cross will secure joy for us infallibly forever. It will not be taken away. We need to see that irresistible grace its commitment and power and.

Love.

That God has towards us to be sure that we will not stay in the bondage of suicidal pleasures. Irresistible grace is God's way of saying I have something better for you. Can we preach it that way? Why does it have to become so controversial that call my free will is at stake?

Well, who cares if you've got joy on the other side infinite and eternal absolutely ravishing forever and ever and ever. And we need to say that Perseverance of the Saints is the almighty work of God through all the affliction and suffering of the ministry.

So that we will not be lost to an inheritance of pleasures at God's right hand forevermore. That's the missing note I think. Why is it missing. This is my closing question to you. It's missing. Is it missing.

Because pastors Have not experienced it. I mean you will not go home on Sunday and preach these things unless. Can we say these words. How sweet all that once it was for me to be rid of those fruitless joys Which I had once feared to lose.

You drove them from me. You who are the true the sovereign?

Joy.

You drove them from me and took their place. Oh Lord my God my light my wealth and my salvation. Or are we in bondage? To television.

Food.

Sleep sex.

Money human praise. Just like everybody else. If so, then let us repent and fix our faces like flint Toward the Word of God with the prayer. Oh Lord open my eyes To the sovereign sight That in your presence is fullness of joy and at your right hand our pleasures forevermore.

Father I pray that you will Not just instruct us but awaken us. The need is so great in our hearts in pastors hearts. They can't preach this If they don't taste it. God, we're desperately desperately dependent on you.

This is what Augustine discovered. He could not create joy you did. Would you do it again? In these hours together and for a lifetime and in our people For the sake of the nations and the glory of your name.

I pray through Christ. Amen, we have about seven minutes for questions. So.

Augustine on Music, Beauty, and the Senses

Yeah.

The question is in book 10. This is devastating. He walked through the senses the eyes the ears the taste.

Sexuality.

Asking whether it is possible. To experience joy in any of those without becoming idolatrous. And he is incredibly suspicious of music in church, I wish. Got big circles around it somewhere, but he does thankfully come out by saying For now and tentatively, I think it's probably permissible to have music in church.

It's very tentative. Whether music should be allowed in church for Augustine.

I.

Would say That let us be biblical and not Augustine. The Psalms do virtually reverberate with music so I would have to toss some 150 out of my Bible or do some kind of Dispensational thing that says the New Testament rejects the Psalms at that point.

I Think most people say that I'm not going to go that direction and therefore I will not renounce music. However The balance to strike is to create an awareness in our people That there is an infinite Qualitative difference between spiritual delight in God and the good feelings we get from a good tune and that is Frightening because I think that there are Thousands of churches that have never even posed that question and if they've posed it haven't made the distinction and therefore are counting as Engagement with God.

Through spiritual affections. What is in fact? What Edwards would call the moving of animal spirits and fluids? Now I personally like to have my fluids moved and therefore I I run a great risk here and Am working with Chuck all the time.

I worship leaders and our staff just saying this is that this is the danger. Let us seek not to avoid good tunes that we all like But rather teach our people To with the eye and the ear of.

The heart.

To hear the music of truth and beauty in God and. There's no I can't give you four ways to do that. That's a miracle. That's regeneration. That's sanctification. That's God's work. I can describe it in words, but I can't make it happen.

And we need to point it out so that our people will cry out for it. They'll come in they'll sit down in these pews next Sunday and they have an awareness. That's a beautiful prelude. Oops. Huh? What's supposed to do with that prelude?

I'm supposed to let it be a vehicle by which My mind is drawn up to God who created those patterns and therefore What a God it must be who has created this. There's a I I don't have it in here. I don't think but there's a quote from.

His.

Seeing of the ocean. Yeah, yeah here just just use the ocean here as music. There is a grander of the spectacle of the sea itself as it slips on and off its many colors like robes. And now it's all shades of green now purple now sky blue and all these are mere Consolations for us Unhappy punished men.

They are not the rewards of the blessed. What can these be like the rewards of the blessed then if such things here are so many so great and of such Equality, that's the way to handle beauty if these things here are so great and so wonderful.

He even praised the intellect of pagans. He said if pagans can rise so high with their intellect and cause us to stand in all of The intellect with which they defend their heresies Should we not marvel at the God who created them?

So he did have a place for all the senses and all of the.

Intellect.

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