11 Comments

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  Comment by Ruth — March 3, 2010 @ 1:22 am

  Yea, you slipped him the book. He will take it home and will not be able to put it down. It happened to me.

  Praise the Lord our God. It is all for His glory.

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  Comment by Jesse Richards — March 3, 2010 @ 5:18 pm

  Britt,

  Love you my brother in Jesus! I have been watching reality for the last 6-8 years. I love what Jesus is doing at Reality. I would like to humbly express my concern about John Piper. Though both of you believe in a ‘BIG GOD’, in my judgment, John Piper is not as committed to scripture in His theological method and proximately His theology as I think you are. You may not agree with me, but I would humbly ask you to read my most recent blog post and the couple JETS articles there. I am deeply concerned about the ‘high-calvinistic’ soteriology that seems to be a product of aristotelian philosophy embedded into the Westminster catechism. In my judgment, Piper is committed to the Westminster catechism as a paradigmatic grid through which all scripture must be interpreted (though He would not tease it out that way). Aristotle wrote in His metaphysics that ‘God is the unmoved mover who dost not think about anyone or anything other than Himself, for the Supreme to consider anything that is not Supreme, is to make the Supreme contingent on the finite, and this can not be so with God, since He cannot be contingent, but is free’. This is why John Piper argues that God’s righteousness is ‘God’s concern for God’s own glory.’ This is why ‘high-calvinism’ of the Beza order (not calvin order) spoke of ‘Anthropopathisms’ (God does not really love, really grieve, etc.)!! In my judgment, Piper (as do all ‘high-calvinists’) accepts the aquinas synthesis of dogmatic theology with aristotelian philosophy as it comes through Beza’s (not calvins) catechism. I do not know what you think of all this, but I love you much brother. I deeply care for you and for John Piper and just want to see Jesus magnified! I know we all do, that is why we need each other as the church. I really know you are standing before God in all you believe and teach! I am zealous for myself, you Piper, and God’s church to be found blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ! Thank God by His blood we will be! But as teachers, we will receive some judgment, whatever that may be it is the Lord’s before whom we must stand.

  Blessings,

  Jesse

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  Comment by Bryan Stupar — March 3, 2010 @ 10:33 pm

  Yo, stoked for you bro…
  I love Piper! He’s had a huge impact on my life!

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  Comment by Chris — March 9, 2010 @ 1:26 pm

  AWESOME!

  Just started reading mine. Thanks and God Bless!

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  Comment by Chris Johnson — March 14, 2010 @ 5:50 pm

  Hey man, just got to know about you since my sister just started going to your church. I am VERY excited you met with John Piper. I know alot about him and look highly upon him and glad to hear you met up with him and he has your book. I will be looking for it ASAP to soak it up.

  Keep preaching the Word brother and give God all the Glory He deserves!

  1 Corinthians 10:31

  Chris

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  Comment by awax — March 14, 2010 @ 10:03 pm

  Hi Pastor Britt,
  Its your old friend Awax. I love you brother. I pray that our Lord use your book mightily for His kingdom and in bringing many souls to Christ. I love the Piper pic. Just a note: Moses, the OT prophets and poets predate Aristotle. Aristotelian categories are shabby knock-offs of the real thing.
  Your Old Friend
  Awax

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  Comment by Jesse Richards — March 15, 2010 @ 7:38 pm

  Awax,

  Amen brother, You are right! The TaNaK and its theology does come before and stand in stark contrast to Aristotelian philosophy/theology. I am praying that Piper would see the ’shabby knock offs’ you refer to and rid himself of the theology that God is the ‘unmoved mover’ who has through His ‘decretive will’ set up every detail that comes to pass in the world (including rapes, molestations, etc) to display His ‘justice’ on the ‘reprobate’ and His ‘mercy’ on the elect all for His personal ‘glory’. You must know this about Piper’s view of meticulous providence. For Piper, God’s glory would be incomplete without all of horrors that have taken place in the history of the world. Every instance of death, suffering, murder, rape, torture, and mutilation—God needs them. God wants them to happen because without them, he would not be fully glorified. God’s own (monadicly conceived, not trinitarian conceived) self-glorification is for Piper (and Beza) God’s sole and utter goal in the world to bring glory to Himself, not to care about anyone other than himself…seriously. If Piper’s God genuinely is concerned about anyone other than Himself, than Piper’s God is contingent, and for Him this cannot be. Scary stuff….

  Blessings,

  Jesse

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  Comment by Chris Johnson — March 27, 2010 @ 5:21 am

  Hey Jesse

  You really are painting John Piper in a AWFUL picture compared to what he truly believes. Please write to him and talk to him personally before you “paint” this picture of a awful man. God is sovereign, He is in control of all things. That means that bad does happen that He works for good for His elect children and, ABOVE ALL, for His Glory! Its all through out the Bible, God wants His Glory ABOVE all things but He loved us enough to send His son and kill Him and pour His wrath on Him for the sins of all who will believe.

  Wayne Grudem endorsed the book as well and holds strong to many of the same beliefs as well. Read through his “Systematic Theology” a bit and see what he has to say.

  Jesse, I love you brother, I truly do. BUT, you paint Piper in a bad picture and I would be careful. He is just preaching the Word of God.

  God Bless!

  Chris Johnson

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  Comment by physical therapist — May 5, 2010 @ 12:00 am

  Keep posting stuff like this i really like it

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  Comment by Awax — June 4, 2010 @ 1:23 pm

  Hey Jesse,
  I don’t really check this blog but I see that you are interacting with folks on this page. You misunderstand Piper and Beza (both double predestinarians) whats more is that you misunderstand the Westminster Confession which is NOT double predestinarian, but single (infralapsarian, not supera). You seem to be mixing them all up. Plus, brother Chris is right about your misunderstanding of Piper and, might I add, Theodore B. as well. God’s glory is NOT contingent, Piper and anyone in the reformed community would never say that. You might think that that is what Piper is saying but it is not. You are building a straw man. Nobody would say “God needs them,” much less “God needs anything or anything Acts 17:25.” No! for from Him and through Him and to Him are all things to Him be the glory. Doesn’t all mean all? Doesn’t this include wickedness in the world? Yes, read Prov 16:4 and meditate.
  How would you like it if I said of you, in light of your Arminian theology, that God’s glory is contingent upon the will of man, that is: He is subject to mans will. Is that what you are saying? God is contingent upon man? No of course you are not saying that. Do you see? that is how silly your comments sound. They are frot with theological jargon but they are fundamentally and simply misunderstandings of Piper’s and reformed theology.
  Listen, I don’t like doing this stuff on comment pages. Email me, lets fellowship more: pstrawax@yahoo.com. Please forgive the strong words but they help when discussing these things, for clarity sake. I trust that this dialogue is in the Spirit of Christian love and charity.
  Brit – still love you man. Just listened to your dating sermon. I still pass it on to others after all these years. I love the sermon, its filled with the gospel. You have an anointing brother.

  Your Friend
  Awax

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  Comment by Lou — July 12, 2010 @ 9:25 pm

  Britt,

  Late to the party it seems. I wanted to give you a shout out and share a bit of my heart about you and the ministry God has blessed you with.

  Many years ago a group of us from Costa Mesa used to drive to Santa Barbara to attend your Reality Bible study. What a blessed time that was! I have been keeping up your ministry and family. Praise God for Daisy Love and lives she has touched. Always in our prayers.

  I have since moved on to a different church after a two year spirtual shifting as I came to a different soteriological understanding than had been portrayed and taught formally. During this time, the church that I had had been a part of had made it very clear that my position was not accepted. I was crushed.

  Unfortunately, this soteriological argument, of regeneration preceding faith or faith preceding regeneration is burdened with so much emotional fervor. As I read above, reformed theology and those that affirm it, are constantly portrayed in a false way which really just shows a lack of understanding. I just laugh now at the above post. The gentlemen above has such the wrong understanding of Piper.

  What a blessing Piper is and the passion and love for Christ and His Word.

  The only divide that comes from this, in my lowly opinion, is not from the Christ honoring discussion and debate to rightly divide the Word, but from the dogmatic stance that does not allow a church or body to embrace and fellowship with these differences.

  Britt, I am so humbled and blown away by your conviction, leading, decision to embrace and learn from the many great Bible teachers that may have, at one time, been outside your sphere of influence (assuming). I am touched and encouraged by this. I do not know where your soteriological position is to date but what a blessing you are to reach out and learn from all the different men that God has raised up to teach of our Lord and Savior, Jesus who came to save the lost.

  You are a great example. So many, such as myself, look up to you as a great bible teacher and here you are, in my opinion, breaking the divide and through love of Jesus uniting the church. I am so glad that God is using you in such a mighty way. Keep sharing and discussing those authors and teachers that God has led you to. God bless you, your church, and your family.

  Lou

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