Towards a Deeper Experience of God's Grace - Five Points

Outstanding, but read at your own risk!! This booklet is not for the faint of heart & may devastate your personal retirement plans. But who wants to sit back & "take it easy" while serving our Lord & Savior in the midst of spiritual warfare? We can 'rest' when we get to heaven. A must read!! Ray H

Really enjoyed each chapter even the switch of the the arrangement of tulip. He puts irresistible grace next really makes the Gospel enriching in doing so without compromising the precious truths behind them.

Be prepared that this CD is only 35 minutes long. Also the title and description of the CD are misleading, as the talk is very minimally about retirement. The focus and content is primarily about "Fear of Losing One's Salvation" before death. Altogether, the CD is very disappointing and I felt it was a waste of my time and money.

A great intro or review for those that are wanting to understand the Five Points. I bought it as a resource while teaching Romans, and really only used it for the "I" in TULIP, but I found it to be helpful. It is a very short book written for anyone to understand. I will keep it on the shelf for future reference.

Excellent work by Piper. Even if you are familiar with the 5 Points of Calvinism, this likely will add to your understanding and help you in explaining it to those who are uninformed or misinformed on this core Reformed theological underpinning.

Bought it to go through with another friend, and we've enjoyed it so far. It's a pretty short/basic read, but the concepts are very thought provoking if you stop and think about it. Piper does a good job bringing up the key and relevant passages used to support these Calvinistic points. If you haven't studied Calvinism in depth before but would like a decent exposition of its main points, I would recommend this book.

A great, humble, and yet short explanation on the five points of Calvinism. Piper explains the meaning and key texts behind each point quite well, without leaving it cold or lifeless. He believes that embracing these five points should drive us to worship, and that is evident all throughout.

I wish he had included one more chapter graciously challenging a few of the most popular arguments against Calvinism, but the book does fine without it.

Very good description of the 5 key beliefs of Calvinism. John Piper's writing is detailed yet clear and easy to understand. I especially liked the brief history up front that describes how these 5 points came about. This is a good book to use for a small group study as it inspires lively discussion.

Piper hits it out of the park, giving great details of the five key points of Calvinism yet it is concise and to the point. Highly recommend for someone looking to good information on Reformed theology.

No meat to this. Author doesn't think kicking back and enjoying retirement is a good thing -- you need to work harder to do God's work. I'm all for doing God's work, but I think enjoying some of the pleasures in life, i.e, golf, travel, etc are also part of retirement.

Beautiful!!! I've been a Calvinist for some years and it's certainly helpful to get refreshed on the doctrine of sovereign grace. Knowing my God is fully sovereign has helped my faith and passion for Jesus' mission. Piper uses plenty of scripture and is sold out for making much of Jesus.

I remember fighting the doctrines of grace in Bible College. Perhaps it was the moniker, "Calvinism" that put me on edge. I remember believing in perseverance1781912521_b of the saints (inconsistently I might add), but rejecting the other points of Calvinism. While I affirmed the doctrine of sin, like all Arminians - I refused to embrace the doctrine of radical depravity. I held to election according to foreknowledge but denied the doctrine of unconditional election. I believed that God's grace could be resisted in an ultimate sense (which is rooted in a robust belief in libertarian free will) and I found the doctrine of limited atonement deplorable.

I remember battling with my roommate in Bible College, mustering every argument I could to defend my rather fragile Arminian stance. However, it the late 80's my Arminian worldview came came apart at the seams. First, the book of Romans dealt a devastating blow to my man-centered theological views. Ephesians, the Gospel of John, and Galatians moved in and graciously woke me up. R.C. Sproul's book, Chosen by God confirmed what I was learning about the doctrines of grace and God's redemptive purposes. John Piper's book, The Pleasures of God played a huge role in my thinking during those days.

Five Points by John Piper is a short but powerful summary of the doctrines of grace. The author's aim is to "persuade the mind concerning biblical truth and thus awaken a deeper experience of God's sovereign grace." And he succeeds at every level. The historical roots of the debate are explored which provide a helpful context context to this much debated topic. Piper maintains, "These five points are still at the heart of biblical theology. They are not unimportant. Where we stand on these things deeply affects our view of God, man, salvation, the atonement, regeneration, assurance, worship, and missions."

The next five chapters unpack the doctrines of grace, carefully. While Piper rightly utilizes logic, the main driver is Scripture - which supports the five points throughout. The arguments are clear and compelling and serve to magnify the greatness of God's worth and lead worshippers to a deeper experience of God's grace.

Piper includes some helpful personal reflections and shares how the doctrines of grace have revolutionized his life:

1. These truths make me stand in awe of God and lead me into the depth of true G0d-centered worship.

2. These truths help protect me from trifling with divine things.

3. These truths make me marvel at my own salvation.

4. These truths make me alert to man-centered substitutes that pose as good news.

5. These truths make me groan over the indescribable disease of our secular, God-belittling culture.

6. These truths make me confident that the work which God planned and began, he will finish - both globally and personally.

7. These truths make me see everything in the light of God's sovereign purposes - that from him and through him and to him are all things, to him be glory forever, and ever.

8. These truths make me hopeful that God has the will, the right, and the power to answer prayer that people be changed.

9. These truths remind me that evangelism is absolutely essential for people to come to Christ and be saved, and that there is great hope for success in leading people to faith but that conversion is not finally dependent on me or limited by the hardness of the unbeliever.

10. These truths make me sure that God will triumph in the end.

In the end, John Piper makes his point and leaves no room for misunderstanding. This powerful little primer deserves a wide readership and is destined to help many as their navigate their way to the Celestial City. Soli Deo Gloria!

The writer wrote about not just having fun and relaxing during retirement. He was very vague about what you should be doing with that time. He also does not back up his assertion with any scripture. While I think work is valuable and plan on working long into retirement, I did not get much help from this book.

Chris Wodke
Author Running for My Life-Winning for CMT

Decent, simple explanation of the 5 points of Calvinism. Love John Piper! Though I myself an not strictly a Calvinist (nor am I Armenian) I find much to agree with in the teachings of many who are. Still have a bit of a problem with the hermeneutic approach of some of these points but I have a better understanding of how they reason it out.

The only thing about retirement is attacking christian slow down their work.
Nothing on how "older" Christian can do and be be salt and light that Jesus told me to do.
Author needs to go back and study what Jesus teaches in Simon of the Mount, rather keep quoting on Paul.
We believe in Jesus not Paul.

His book title should whatever age for the glory of Paul.

Very encouraging and challenging! I am ever more aware of my lazy inclinations for retiring, but confident that through Christ alone I will not only persevere but increase in love and delight in Him. His work in me, not my work for Him!!!!

What's the stereotype of the Calvinist? Depending on who you talk to, you'll probably hear something like this: he's a grumpy, joyless, theological nitpick who obsesses over an acronym and secretly (or maybe not so secretly) relishes the thought of people spending eternity in Hell.

But should this be the case?

Should the so-called doctrines of grace really lead to a lack of grace among God's people?

John Piper certainly doesn't believe so. Instead, he firmly believes that our doctrine should bring us joy. So, with that in mind, he's penned this short book, Five Points: Towards a Deeper Experience of God's Grace. In ten easy-to-read chapters, Piper sets TULIP--total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of the saints--in its historical context, offers a brief biblical survey for each, as well as the personal and historical testimonies of many faithful men of God who truly did believe that these truths are essential to our faith.

Piper's goal is less about defending the five points of Calvinism for the sake of defending Calvinism as it is helping readers better see God--not just for the sake of knowing what He is like, but enjoying Him. "[T]o enjoy him we must know him. Seeing is savoring," Piper writes. "If he remains a blurry, vague fog, we may be intrigued for a season. But we will not be stunned with joy, as when the fog clears and you find yourself on the brink of some vast precipice." (8)

What's most helpful in the book is, I believe, Piper's honesty about his own view of the five points. One can't help but come away from the book thinking Piper isn't as much a fan of the modern construct of TULIP as he is the realities they point to:

* He sees the implications of the doctrine of total depravity--of man's open and continual rebellion against his Creator--and it causes him to wonder at the mercy of God.
* He sees the necessity of understanding exactly for whom Christ died, but not so he can rejoice in the fate of those who die apart from Christ, but because the definitive nature of the cross should cause us to rejoice and to realize that Christ's sheep are far more numerous than we might be tempted to believe.
* He sees the unconditional nature of election as being a wonderful beacon of hope, for if salvation depended on anything but God loving us simply because He loves us, we'd be doomed.

Piper's point again and again is simple: when we see the five points rightly, they should cause us to give thanks for the wondrous grace of God.

"If we want to go deeper in our experience of God's grace this is an ocean of love for us to enjoy. God does not mean for the bride of his Son to only feel loved with general, world-embracing love. He means for her to feel ravished with the specificity of his affection that he set on her before the world existed. He means for us to feel a focused: 'I chose you. And I sent my Son to die to have you.'" (52)

Not too long ago, I was roped into an online conversation about the angry perception of Calvinists and the problem of TULIP. One gentleman pointed out that he sees a consistent problem with TULIP--that it leads not to joy but to condemning anger. When reading this book, I had this person in mind. Is this the kind of book I'd give to this man? Did it perpetuate the stereotype he believes is more or less true of many who hold to the five points--is this yet another "angry Calvinist" manifesto?

Although he doesn't shy away from calling into question certain interpretations of Scripture's teaching, Piper's language is far from combative. Instead, there's more of an earnest sense of wonder that permeates the book's pages. Piper desperately wants to see the love of God in the five points of Calvinism; to see the doctrines of grace manifest their fruit: faithful joy in the lives of God's people. Five Points is the kind of book I want to give to the person who struggles with the idea of Calvinism. It's readable, challenging, thoughtful, and, most importantly, faithful to God's Word.

As the title suggests, _Rethinking Retirement_ by veteran pastor-theologian John Piper challenges traditional views of retirement. At the outset of this small booklet of roughly 30 pages, Piper lays his cards on the table: "Finishing life to the glory of Christ means resolutely resisting the typical American dream of retirement." (p. 6)

It will likely come as no surprise that Piper specifically targets baby boomers in this booklet since many of them are near or in retirement right now. Identifying as a baby boomer himself, Piper points out that research shows the baby boomer generation to be generally a selfish generation (p. 23). This may mean that counter-cultural efforts are required if Christian baby boomers are to finish the Christian life well in America. Says Piper, "Millions of Christian men and women are finishing their formal careers in their fifties and sixties, and for most of them there will be a good twenty years before their physical and mental powers fail. What will it mean to live those final years for the glory of Christ?" (pp. 24-25)

The question, then, has to do with a "theology of time." How do Christians use their time at the end of life in ways that please God? If they've worked a long, hard, productive life, will God be happy if they rest, play, and travel in their last years?

Piper's answer is that God is pleased when we use our time in retirement - indeed, at any point in life - to make him look glorious (p. 9). To operationalize that a bit, God is pleased when we do things in retirement that show that we are more in love with him than we are with the typical, American retirement lifestyle. When we serve others more than ourselves.

Wearing his pastor hat, Piper spends some time in this booklet dealing with a fear that presumably afflicts many Christians (count me in), namely, the fear of not finishing life well (p. 10). He notes that there are two responses to this fear, each being spiritually damaging. One response is to say that finishing life well doesn't matter. The other response is to say that it does matter and then to rely on one's own efforts and strength to persevere well onto the end (p. 11). Piper forges a middle-road response to this fear, affirming the necessity of perseverance for salvation, but denying any reliance on our own strength to achieve it. He says, "So what is the right way to overcome the fear of not persevering in old age? The key is to keep finding in Christ our highest Treasure. This is not mainly the fight to do but the fight to delight." (p. 17)

Along the way, Piper offers some inspiring stories of Christians who finished their lives well including Raymond Lull, Polycarp, Charles Simeon, and J. Oswald Sanders. It was the latter who said, "O God, don't let me waste my final years! Don't let me buy the American dream of retirement - month after month of leisure and play and hobbies and putzing around in the garage and rearranging the furniture and golfing and fishing and sitting and watching television. Lord, please have mercy on me. Spare me this curse." (pp. 27-28)

I myself am just entering my 30s, but I have been thinking a lot about retirement. This is in part because of the prognosticators who are saying that my generation will not be able to retire due to the ageing population and the lowering worker-to-retiree ratio, which will require that productive citizens work longer to pay for the government entitlements (e.g., social security, healthcare) promised to retirees.

But the more important question is whether the retirement lifestyle is pleasing to God. Piper's small booklet offers a hard-hitting and convicting answer to this question. It whets my appetite for more detailed reflections on this subject.

John Piper, Five Points: Towards a Deeper Experience of God’s Grace (Ross-Shire, UK: Christian Focus Publications, 2013). Ppb, 94 pgs. $8.99.

A Review by Brian H. Cosby

Mark Dever, pastor of Capital Hill Baptist Church, recently articulated 12 sources God has used to reinvigorate Reformed theology among a younger generation in our day. Among them, he named John Piper. Piper, said Dever, is probably “the single most potent factor in the recent rise of Reformed theology.” As part of the young, restless, and Reformed movement myself, I concur.

Piper’s new book, Five Points, summarizes the basic doctrines of Reformed theology in a clear, accessible, and winsome way. If you’re wondering, “What are the ‘five points of Calvinism’ all about?” this book is for you.

John Piper served as Pastor for Preaching and Vision at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota for 33 years before stepping down earlier this year to devote his time to the ministry he founded, Desiring God. He is an award-winning author of a number of books including Desiring God, Don’t Waste Your Life, God’s Passion for His Glory, and Finally Alive.

Although the so-called “five points of Calvin” didn’t actually come from John Calvin in its present-day form—they find their roots in the Synod of Dort in 1618-1619—Calvin certainly affirmed all five in his famous Institutes of the Christian Religion (1559). The five points, known by the acronym TULIP, are:

1. Total Depravity
2. Unconditional Election
3. Limited Atonement
4. Irresistible Grace
5. Perseverance of the Saints

After a pastoral introduction and some historical context, Piper goes through each of these, though not in this order. While he values the traditional order of TULIP, he says, “people grasp these points more easily if we go in the order in which we ourselves often experience them when we become Christians” (14). Thus, the order Piper outlines throughout the book is:

1. Total Depravity
2. Irresistible Grace
3. Limited Atonement
4. Unconditional Election
5. Perseverance of the Saints

Like many pastors and theologians, Piper acknowledges that these labels have been and continue to be misunderstood. For example, “Perseverance of the Saints” might communicate to some that we are the ones who make it to the end by our own effort and works; that God starts us in the right direction, but it’s up to us to continue on to glory. This would be the opposite teaching of perseverance.

Piper also gives some rationale and defense for this book, placing his starting point with Scripture: "I do not begin as a Calvinist and defend a system. I begin as a Bible-believing Christian who wants to put the Bible above all systems of thought. But over the years—many years of struggle—I have deepened in my conviction that Calvinistic teachings on the five points are biblical and therefore true, and therefore a precious pathway into deeper experiences of God’s grace" (9).

Two points from the book stood out particularly to me. First, the God-ness of God. I came away with a greater appreciation of the truth that God is self-sufficient, complete in himself from all eternity. He does not need us, but loves us when there was no condition in us to love. In an age that is brimming with narcissism and self-help “guides,” we should be radically God-centered in our theology and worship.

The second point that I found particularly helpful in Five Points was the personal and historical testimonies at the end of the book on the “doctrines of grace,” as the five points are oftentimes called. Piper pulls back the curtain to his own life experience with these five points and this only gave the book a raw, down-to-earth, practical side—helping the reader experience these doctrines for himself. They are not ethereal ideologies, but concrete and living truths we can experience now.

I highly commend Five Points to those who have no idea what all the fuss is about, but also to the highly trained pastor, wanting to somehow communicate biblical doctrine in a clear and pastoral way.

The topic of Calvinism and the acronym known as TULIP most often associated with and used to describe that theological system has certainly seen its share of scholarly books written about the purported pros and cons contained in its approach. Many volumes grace my own bookshelves on this topic so who really needs yet another book on how to understand Calvinism, right? The answer is I submit is there is still room to discuss the issue of God’s sovereignty and grace and Dr. John Piper in his latest book Five Points: Towards a Deeper Experience of God’s Grace does a tremendous job of explaining why we should care.

Unlike other more voluminous books on the subject, Five Points is Piper’s effort to break the issue down to its basic roots, focusing on the so what of TULIP in a very practical and useful manner. As he rightfully notes at the outset of the book, “These five points are still at the heart of biblical theology. They are not unimportant. Where we stand on these things deeply affects our view of God, man, salvation, the atonement, regeneration, assurance, worship, and missions.” For those unfamiliar with what TULIP stands for, the acronym is broken down as follows: (T) Total depravity, (U) Unconditional election, (L) Limited atonement, (I) Irresistible grace, and (P) Perseverance of the saints. In this book, Piper engages each element of TULIP while also providing a personal testimony of the impact of this issue in his own life, concluding the book with testimonies from some great church leaders of yesteryear as to why this issue is so important to include its impact on their lives and ministries.

For a book just shy of 100 pages, it is nevertheless packed full of valuable insight. Piper is very gifted at taking a rather complicated theological issue and breaking it down to its component parts in a way that both scholars and laymen will find helpful. In his discussion of total depravity, Piper aptly comments “total depravity means that our rebellion against God is total, everything we do in this rebellion is sinful, our inability to submit to God or reform ourselves is total, and we are therefore totally deserving of eternal punishment.” A rather depressing statement some may say, but as Piper also notes, this reality check leads to the real thrust of this book, namely a discussion of God’s grace towards filthy rebellious sinners.

I appreciated how Piper mixed up the order of TULIP choosing to discuss the topic of irresistible grace immediately after the chapter on total depravity. Such an approach immediately shifts the focus of the discussion where it belongs, that of identifying the solution to the problem and how that solution plays out in our lives. Our movement from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of God is definitely not due to anything act we could conjure up or perform. When you think about it that is really a good thing for it places us at the foot of the cross as the starting point for how to deal with this sin problem. Piper rightly comments “One of the most wonderful statements about how all of us were brought from blindness to sight – from bondage to freedom, from death to life – is: “God has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” This irresistible grace draws us to the light found at the cross where the penalty of sin was paid on our behalf.

Arguably, one of the thornier issues when it comes to Calvinism is that of unconditional election or the idea that God elected certain people from before the foundation of the world to be His. Numerous debates have taken place on the veracity of this concept as well as how it works. In its simplest form, election is the idea that God chose whom He would save. It is unconditional as Piper notes because “there is no condition man must meet before God chooses to save Him.” Admittedly, this is a difficult topic to grasp and it really comes down to simply having faith in God’s sovereignty and the fact that while hard to understand, this is nevertheless a truth found throughout Scripture. Piper does an excellent job of walking the reader through this element of Calvinism. For example, He engages passage such as Romans 8:28-33, Romans 9, and Ephesians 1:3-6. Romans 8 is perhaps the most important passage on this subject and Piper spend a good amount of time and effort discussing this passage. He aptly states “what this magnificent text teaches is that God really accomplishes the complete redemption of his people from start to finish. He foreknows (that is, elects) a people for himself before the foundation of the world, he predestines this people to be conformed to the image of his Son, he calls them to himself in faith, he justifies them through that faith alone, and he finally glorifies them.” Quite frankly, that is TULIP in a nutshell.

Those desiring to better understand Calvinism and how God’s grace operates in the life of the believer from beginning to end will truly appreciate Piper’s book. It is informative without being too scholarly, short without overlooking the relevant issues and it will provide the reader with an excellent overview of this topic and why the reader should care. While it will not stop the age old Calvinism/Arminianism debate, it will provide some valuable food for thought in a way every reader will appreciate.

I received this book for free from Christian Focus Publications via Cross Focused Reviews for this review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”