John piper

John Stephen Piper (born January 11, 1946) is a Christian preacher and author, currently serving as Pastor for Preaching and Vision of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is the author of numerous books, including ECPA Christian Book Award winnersSpectacular Sins, What Jesus Demands from the World, Pierced by the Word, and God's Passion for His Glory, and bestsellers Don'tWaste Your Life and The Passion of Jesus Christ. The evangelical organization Desiring God is named for his book Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist (1986).
Biography
Piper was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Bill and Ruth Piper. His father was traveling evangelist and church planter. Consequently his mother largely raised him, but in December 1974 she died in a bus wreck in Israel(John Piper's Candidating Testimony January 27, 1980). When he and his older sister were still young, the Pipers moved to Greenville, South Carolina, where he spent the remainder of his youth and graduated from Wade Hampton High School. His father died on March 6, 2007. Piper wrote a tribute to his mother in the booklet What's the Difference? (Crossway Books, 1990), which is also chapter one inRecovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (Crossway Books, 1991).
On January 11, 2006, Piper announced that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. According to a letter sent to his church, he and his doctors believed that the cancer was fully treatable. Piper responded to his diagnosis with the following: "This news has, of course, been good for me. The most dangerous thing in the world is thesin of self-reliance and the stupor of worldliness. The news of cancer has a wonderfully blasting effect on both. I thank God for that. The times with Christ in these days have been unusually sweet." Piper underwent successful surgery on February 14, 2006.
He married Noël Henry in 1968, and together they have four sons, a daughter, and several grandchildren.
Piper attended Wheaton College(1964–68) majoring in literature and minoring in philosophy. Studying Romantic Literature with Clyde Kilby stimulated his poetic side, and today he regularly composes poetry to celebrate special family occasions as well as annually composing story-poems (based on the life of biblical characters) for his congregation during the four weeks of Advent.
In college he originally subscribed in the Pre-medprogram, only to be called to ministry during a bout of sickness. Following college, he completed a Bachelor of Divinity degree at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California (1968–71). While at Fuller, he took several courses from Daniel Fuller and through him discovered the writings of Jonathan Edwards.
Piper did his doctoral work in New Testament Studies at the University of Munich,Germany (1971–74) under Leonhard Goppelt. His dissertation, Love Your Enemies, was published by Cambridge University Press and Baker Book House. Upon completion of his doctorate, he taught Biblical Studies at Bethel University and Seminary in Saint Paul, Minnesota, for six years (1974–80).
Ministry
In 1980, after what he described as an irresistible call of the Lord to preach, Piper becamePastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he has been ministering ever since. Piper was catapulted onto the evangelical scene after the publication of his book Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist (1986) and has continued to publish dozens of other books further articulating this theological perspective. In 1994, he founded Desiring God Ministries, which todayprovides all of Piper's sermons and articles from the past three decades, and most of his books online free of charge, as well as offering for sale books, CDs, and DVDs and regularly hosting conferences.
In August 2009, Piper claimed that a wind storm occurring during a conference of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America was a "gentle but firm warning" from God.[15] He wrote a blog post tying...