Audio Transcript

Yesterday, in our Navigators Bible Reading Plan, we read Psalm 90 together. Or maybe you’re catching up with the reading still. That’s fine. No problem there. When you get to it, you’ll see why Psalm 90 is the special, much-beloved psalm that you, Pastor John, have referenced in thirty different episodes of this podcast already to answer all sorts of listener questions. Psalm 90 is rich. Sometimes you’ll focus your attention on verses 12 or 17. As you approach eighty years old, verse 10 looms more and more on your mind.

But no verse in Psalm 90 gets more mentions from you than verse 14. And that’s just it. It only gets mentions from you — brief mentions — usually simply listed in the texts you string together in a prayer you call I.O.U.S. (an acrostic), a one-minute prayer that you pray before you read the Bible in the morning. You’ve told us about that prayer in several episodes, which you can see in that new APJ book, if you have that. On pages 16 and 17, I put those episodes together on that I.O.U.S. acrostic.

So, you often mention but rarely dwell on Psalm 90:14: “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.” For Christian Hedonists dedicated to the daily discipline of seeking our joy in God, this text is so huge. So, draw out ten minutes of insights from what you see in this text alone about our daily desire for God.

“Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days” (Psalm 90:14). There are few things, Tony, that I love to do more than to take a Bible verse like this, a word from God — and I want to underline that: this is a word from God — and then squeeze it like a sponge that has been dipped in the river of God’s delights, and see how many cups I can fill. That’s what I love to do. That’s my life.

Sometimes, a sponge is so big and so squishy with glorious truth that you have to squeeze one end and hold that and then squeeze another end and hold that. So, I’m going to squeeze this verse four times.

“Satisfy us.” I’m going to squeeze that.
“In the morning.” I’m going to squeeze that.
“With your steadfast love.”
“That we may rejoice and be glad all our days.”

So, that’s the plan.

‘Satisfy Us’

“Satisfy us.” Squeeze that end. This is a God-inspired prayer to God. That’s what the Psalms are. This means that it is God’s will for his children, for us, to experience satisfaction. It is God’s will that Christians live with hearts that are deeply content and satisfied. He does not will that our hearts be continually restless or fearful or joyless.

“It is God’s will that Christians live with hearts that are deeply content and satisfied.”

God’s will for us is that we be able to say with the apostle Paul, with complete authenticity, “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content” (Philippians 4:11) — that is, to be satisfied, to enjoy peace, contentment, confidence, gladness, joy. And notice that he’s not equating satisfaction with pleasant circumstances. They may be pleasant, and they may be devastating. God’s will is that we be satisfied. The rest of this psalm is pretty devastating.

And don’t miss that this is a prayer, which means it’s a battle. If it came naturally, we would not need to cry out for satisfaction. This is a gift from God. It’s not something we can make happen with food or caffeine or drugs or sex or wealth or health or friendships or family.

‘In the Morning’

So, the question, then, is, Well, what kind of satisfaction is it? What’s the actual source of the satisfaction? And before I tackle that — because he does answer that — he says one other thing first. So, number two, squeeze the sponge again: “in the morning.” “Satisfy us in the morning.” Why does he say that — “in the morning”? Because the morning is when we face the day.

According to this psalm, our days are filled with toil and trouble (Psalm 90:10). We’re like grass that is renewed in the morning and then in the evening fades away (Psalm 90:5–6). We are about to walk into a new day and experience the consequences of sin in this world, the limits of our own finiteness, the opposition of evil people, the futility of the fallen world system. That’s what the day is going to bring as we get out of bed and go to our kneeling bench and cry out to God.

So, what do we cry out for in the morning, facing that kind of day? We cry out in the face of sin and finiteness and opposition and futility. We cry out for satisfaction. We don’t expect all the circumstances to change; it’s just the fallen world we live in. We won’t be of any good to anybody — as George Müller taught us — if we all share in the moaning and the groaning of this sinful and broken world. What good is it to add to the world more of our own moaning and groaning?

God’s will is that we’d be satisfied in the face of all the trouble every new day will bring, which now brings us to the third squeezing of the sponge.

‘With Your Steadfast Love’

Where does the satisfaction come from amidst all this trouble? And the answer given is this: “with your steadfast love.” “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love.”

So, when you get up in the morning, and you see before you a day of trouble and problems — problems upon problems that you cannot solve — and you feel weak and sick, and the things you thought were going to bring you some happiness have all crumbled, where do you look for satisfaction?

And Moses’s (this is a psalm of Moses, by the way) answer was, “I look to the love of God for me.” Isn’t that amazing? “God loves me,” Moses says. “God chose me before the foundation of the world,” we Christians say, “to be his treasured possession. God gave me existence. God sent his Son and paid for the failures that I’ve committed and offenses against him. God opened my eyes to see the worth and greatness and beauty of Christ. God promises to be my treasure. God promises to make everything, including all my troubles and problems, work together for my eternal joy. God loves me.”

That’s the source of his satisfaction: his steadfast love. And we pray for the ability to taste it. That’s what he’s asking. “Satisfy me in that. Help me enjoy that. Help me be satisfied in that every morning,” because his mercies are new every morning.

‘That We May Rejoice’

And now comes the fourth part of the sponge to squeeze — namely, “that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.” “Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.”

“God’s will is that we’d be satisfied in the face of all the trouble every new day will bring.”

So, with the words rejoice and be glad, he underlines the emotional richness of the word satisfaction. God is telling us to ask him to make us satisfied, to make us happy, to make us glad, to make us rejoice no matter what. And the amazing thing is that he says “all our days” — not just sunny days, happy days, but all our days. The reason it’s amazing is because, in the first thirteen verses of this psalm, our days are being swept away like a flood. We are returning to the dust. We are fading and withering like grass. We pass away like a sigh. All our days are full of toil and trouble. Those are words from this very psalm.

And yet now Moses prays, “God, do your amazing, internal, miracle work of satisfying us with your love, so that in all those days — all those terrible days, including the very last one — short or long, whether the days last a long time or whether they get blown away overnight, we might rejoice and be glad.”

Psalm 90:14 is a glorious word of God to his children in the midst of their troubles in this real world. And I pray that you and I, Tony, and all of our listeners would take hold of it and wring out of it every cup of blessing that we need.

Part 12 Episode 169 Human depravity reveals itself when people sin, and when they urge others to do the same. In this episode of Light + Truth, John Piper turns to Romans 1:28–32 to give us hope in the face of all the depravity around us.

It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest, most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which — if you saw it now — you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. —C.S. Lewis

When I’ve read or heard these words over the years, I’ve typically thought of strangers. “It’s a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses” — standing at the bus stop, waiting in line at the grocery store, walking by on the street (all the people I’m tempted to see but never notice). We’re surrounded by immortal souls, all the time — but we’re often tempted to treat them like houseplants. Like nice houseplants, beautiful even, but not like humans — not like eternal souls who will stand before the living God and be ushered into a perpetual, untouchable paradise or a terrifying home of never-ending torment.

Wake up! Lewis says. You’ve never met a mere mortal. Those strangers walking by are not houseplants; they’re wonders wrapped in flesh and blood and need. That’s a good application. Every “random” person you encounter is an eternal marvel — a miracle in the making, or a nightmare, an immortal life worthy of your attention, concern, respect, love.

The quote took on even more meaning, though, when I realized that Lewis doesn’t limit the point to strangers.

No Ordinary Spouses

Keep reading, and the spectacular reality comes uncomfortably close to home:

All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another — all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit — immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. (The Weight of Glory, 45–46)

“All friendships, all loves . . .” he says. “It is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry . . . immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.” Eternal miracles or nightmares. What dawned on me is that I’m not only tempted to overlook the spiritual potential and destiny of strangers; I’m tempted to do so even with my closest relationships — my friends, my family, my bride, my kids.

Sometimes it’s the people we know the best that we most struggle to see in the light of spiritual reality. They’re almost too familiar, too predictable — too, well, ordinary. But there are no ordinary friends. There are no ordinary classmates or roommates. There are no ordinary students or teachers. There are no ordinary boyfriends or girlfriends, husbands or wives. It is a serious thing to live beside immortals.

Miracles in the Making

Where would Lewis get an idea like everlasting splendors? From verses like Romans 8:16–17:

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs — heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

If the Spirit dwells in you, by faith, then you are a child of God. And if you’re a child of God, you will be glorified with God. Have you realized that? You will be like him. God will glorify “ordinary” people like you and me — to the glory of God.

“Sometimes it’s the people we know the best that we most struggle to see in the light of spiritual reality.”

Next verses, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for —” For what? For the appearing of Christ? For the new heavens and new earth? That’s not what Paul mentions here. “The creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God” (Romans 8:18–19). The creation wants to see us — what we will become. Are you hearing Lewis yet? And we won’t be God-like splendors for mere centuries or millennia, but forever. “I give them eternal life,” Jesus says, “and they will never perish” (John 10:28).

We are miracles in the making. The oceans, mountains, and stars are lined up outside to get a glimpse of what we’ll become. If you love and follow Jesus, that’s true of you. And here’s the critical turn that Lewis takes: if the dull, uninteresting, ordinary persons you live with (or work with, or coach soccer with, or go to church with) love and follow Jesus, it’ll be true of them too. If you could see what they will be in 150 years, you would see them differently. You would treat them differently. Wouldn’t you?

Nightmares in the Making

Lewis didn’t only say everlasting splendors, though — everlasting splendors or immortal horrors, future miracles or nightmares. Have you reckoned recently with the never-ending destiny of those in your life who will not love Jesus?

For as little as we might think about the blinding glory coming to those who believe, we might think even less about the awful terror awaiting those who don’t. “As for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars” — that is, those who won’t bow and follow Jesus — “their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death” (Revelation 21:8). One purpose of the vivid imagination and visions of Revelation is to make the depths of hell feel more real. They force us to imagine real people in fire and sulfur and torture, because people we know will really suffer like that, and worse, forever.

Even among those who currently profess faith, we can’t take their future splendor for granted. Hebrews 3:12–13 warns us, “Take care, brothers” — he’s writing to the church, to those who claim to love Jesus now —

Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Part of being awake to one another’s immortality is to remember that any of us could be deceived and hardened and destroyed by sin. And if we let sin have its way in us, it will mutilate us. It will make us hideous — “a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare.” If we could see what sin does to a person — for now, on the inside, but one day, for all to see — we would pursue and exhort one another more than we do. We’d exhort one another every day.

How to Love Immortals

The truth is that Lewis exposes us. We often live and work and study and play and date functionally oblivious to both heaven and hell — as if we didn’t know that everyone we meet, everyone we love, will spend eternity in one or the other. But there’s no “spiritual Midwest” lying out there between paradise and agony, between the everlasting splendors and the immortal horrors — just heaven and hell, forever.

So, what might all of this mean for our closest relationships? What might this mean for a home, like mine, with a wife and three small kids? First, and perhaps most humbling, it reminds us to pray. Their immortality reminds us how painfully little we control in our relationships. All the things we want most for our spouse, our children, our extended family and friends are things God must do. That doesn’t mean, as we often assume, that there’s nothing we can do. There’s just nothing we can do without God.

Having first prayed, though, what else can we do? We could use more of our interactions to remind loved ones of their immortality. For those who do not yet believe in Jesus, these will likely be unnatural and awkward conversations. How they feel about the conversation doesn’t change the truth. One day soon, they will be an everlasting splendor or an immortal horror. Immortality is worth an enormous amount of awkwardness and friction.

“Christians who sense the reality and urgency of eternity don’t tolerate patterns of sinfulness in one another.”

Even those who do believe in Jesus, though, still need regular, sometimes forceful reminders of their immortality. “Exhort one another every day.” Christians who sense the reality and urgency of eternity don’t tolerate patterns of sinfulness in one another. The love of Christ controls them, so they speak up when others wouldn’t. They seek the sweet and lasting fruit of some relational discomfort. They’re also often unusually faithful encouragers. They know when to warn the wayward, and they know when to lift and strengthen and focus the weary. Every everlasting splendor is the product of consistent, meaningful encouragement.

Perhaps the simplest way, then, to apply the prospect of these two mouth-stopping eternities — future miracles and future nightmares — would be to seek to be (and stay) uncomfortably Christian. Modern life, at least in America, resists this kind of Godwardness. We quietly agree to keep our conversations to what we can see and hear and touch, but everything we can now see and hear and touch will pass away. And when it does, you and everyone you know will become the wonder or horror you will forever be.