James says, "You desire and do not have; so you kill" (Jas. 4:2). We kill marriages and we kill unborn babies because they cut across our desires; they stand in the way of our unencumbered self-enhancement. And we live in a culture where self-enhancement and self-advancement is god. And if self-enhancement is god, then the One who is at work in the womb shaping a person in His own image is not God and the assault on His work is not sacrilegious, but obedience to the god of self.
John PiperPrayer as a relationship is probably your best indicator about the health of your love relationship with God. If your prayer life has been slack, your love relationship has grown cold.
John PiperWe can be content with simplicity because the deepest most satisfying delights God gives us through creation are free gifts from nature and from loving relationships with people. After your basic needs are met, accumulated money begins to diminish your capacity for these pleasures rather than increase them. Buying things contributes absolutely nothing to the heart's capacity for joy.
John PiperThe dismembering of a human being routinely in 30 minutes on an outpatient bases - or any other way - is barbaric. Four blocks from our church all year long - like churches within smelling distance of Auschwitz or Dachau or Buchenwald.
John PiperThe critical question for our generationโand for every generationโ is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ were not there?
John Piper