“What does ‘learning’ mean to a Christian?”

A preacher, pastor, theologian and also an 'educator'
John Piper doesn't waste our learning
Passing on lifelong habits to lead people to worship that pleases God!

★Preface by Pastor Lee Jeong-gyu (Sigwang Church)
★Recommended by Albert Mohler, David Dockery, and Thomas Schreiner

God has revealed Himself to us by giving us the Word of Truth and a vast world to explore throughout our lives.
And He gave us senses, intellect, and a heart to know, enjoy, and communicate with God forever.
This book helps us explore and apply all the information we encounter every day in a way that glorifies God.
It will add genuine joy to the lives of Christians, filled with diverse learning experiences, not only for students and teachers.

If so, we must ask ourselves:
Why, even in this environment, should we push ourselves to study, learn, share, and practice?
And I will tell you why you have to do this for the rest of your life.
And we must conclude that:
Without God, there is no reason to study.
If there is no God, no one has the right to condemn anyone who uses study as a tool to rise above others.
No one can say that it is wrong for someone to abuse the advantageous position they have gained through studying for unethical and self-centered reasons.
So why should we study? John Piper has written a wonderful book that provides a clear answer to this question.
Although he is a retired pastor, he is currently the president of Bethlehem University (i.e., an educator) and presents a God-centered pedagogy.
We can ask ourselves several questions about study, and he answers them throughout the book:

First, why should we study? We were created to glorify God and please Him.
Therefore, we must study to glorify God, to know Him, to rejoice in Him, and to proclaim Him.
This applies not only to theological studies, but to all studies.
Second, how should we study? We must observe and understand God's creation and the Word He has given us, evaluate the world and ourselves based on that understanding, and use our emotions to rejoice, enjoy, apply, and express what we have learned.
Third, what are the fruits and results of study? God is glorified through our learning, application, and expression, and people also benefit.
Through what we learn, we do not use the world, but enjoy and serve it.
The better Christians study, the more joyful and better the world can be.

These principles are especially important to think about and learn in depth in South Korea, where competitive education focused on entrance exams is the center of all studies.
Otherwise, we will only end up with monsters, those who are better educated (as we always see) and are no better ethically, no deeper in their thinking, and no more loving in their outlook on the world than those who are not.
But if we study, if we study toward God as John Piper suggests, Christian study will become a lifelong habit, a worship that enriches the world and glorifies God.
--- From "Preface: Why and What Should Christians Study?"

God created the 'world' and inspired His 'word' to reveal His glory.
Therefore, a well-educated person sees God's glory in the Word He inspired and in the world He created.
Moreover, such a person understands the glory of God and evaluates, feels, applies, and expresses it, so that others also see it and enjoy it.
That kind of attitude towards others is called love.
Therefore, the goal of lifelong learning is to glorify God and develop the ability to love people.
We believe that these six habits of mind and heart well illustrate that process of growth.
So we hope you'll join us in this process.
--- From "Introductory Note: The Education of Serious Joy"

However, based on the discussion so far, it would be a grave misunderstanding to conclude that the natural world is unimportant beyond glimpses of God's supernatural nature.
The creatures of this world are not an annoying curtain that must be pulled aside to reveal the hidden glory.
If the sun were taken away, the light of God within it would disappear (Psalm 19:4-5).
If the thunder is silenced, the voice of God within it will also be silenced (Psalm 29:3).
We must not understand the created world as secondary to the purpose of God's self-revelation, as if once we have seen God, the material world is no longer necessary.
God doesn't do that.
God could have created the world without matter or materials.
God could have simply created a soul containing all the moral attributes found in humans.
But God didn't do that.
Indeed, when we look at the astonishing richness and variety of wonders contained in creation, it becomes clear that God delighted in creating the material world, from the human body to the endless galaxies.
--- 「1.
From "Observation"

It breaks my heart when I hear people say that logic is cold and lifeless.
The logic of the Bible is not cold and lifeless.
Every 'therefore' in the Bible is a passageway to life and love.
This is as we saw earlier in Matthew 7:7-12.
The logic in Matthew 7:12 is entirely for the purpose of love, and this logic is not cold.
Rather, it is like a power plant that turns the engine called love.
Jesus never says “therefore” for no reason.
God is a good father, and he gives good things to his children who ask him.
"Therefore," he said, "love people!" Jesus wants us to see and consider the logic behind his words.
And he wants us to return to the premise of God's fatherly care, to believe in it, and to draw strength and comfort from it as we do the difficult work of loving others.
This is the benefit of logic.
This logic is not lifeless, but rather breathes life into it.
--- 「2.
From "Understanding"

The most fundamental reason why fair and truthful evaluations bring glory to God is because God alone is the ultimate standard for judging the truthfulness of all evaluations.
Without God, there can be no true evaluation.
Because there will be no ultimate standard by which something can be called true.
In this regard, we have already seen that God is the indispensable being of ‘observation’ and ‘understanding.’
The ultimate reason we have any hope of accurately 'observing' something is because the object of observation actually exists outside of us.
And that is possible because God created the world and holds it together so that it can exist.
God and His creative acts are the basis of observation.


Likewise, the reason God is the foundation of all 'understanding' is because sound logic is completely rooted in His character.
In this way, it is impossible to understand the reason for anything without the existence of God at the source.
Because if God is not the God of ‘reason’ who gives validity to ‘realizing reason’, then such ‘realizing reason’ would be nothing more than the meaningless movement of material that occurs in our brain.
So now the same is true for evaluation.
A valid evaluation is only possible when it is based on an ultimate standard that can determine whether something is true or false, good or bad, right or wrong, beautiful or ugly, just or unjust.
And that standard is God.
The reason God is the ultimate standard is because there is no independent standard that does not come from God.
--- 「3.
From "Evaluation"

The clearest example of a rightly directed, balanced, and vibrant emotion is feeling genuine happiness in God Himself.
The emergence of these spiritual emotions is a sign of the breath of eternal life, of rebirth.
For example, let's say our entire life is a solar system, and our various emotions and behaviors are planets within it.
When we discover God as the brightest sun at our center and feel fulfilled there, then all the surrounding planets begin to find their places in the orbits God has ordained.
That is, finding the greatest satisfaction of our soul in God becomes the living force that balances all other desires in the right direction.
--- 「4.
From "Emotion"

As explained earlier, the biblical emphasis on moving from “knowing” to “doing” is fundamentally rooted in Christian love.
And that love comes from the overflowing joy we enjoy in God.
We saw one example of this in the previous chapter, 2 Corinthians 8:1-2.
The reason the Macedonian believers could be an example of love was because “in a severe ordeal of affliction, their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed in the riches of their generosity” (v. 2).
The action of giving abundantly came from the emotion of joy.
And Paul calls this behavior “love.”
Christian joy is essentially an overflow of joy to meet the needs of others.
That is, good deeds overflow from that joy.
This is what we mean by the word 'apply'.
--- 「5.
Among the "Application"

Not only did God speak and reveal himself in human language, but he also made us speakers like himself.
Animals communicate in a very primitive way.
But human language is so rich that it can express the thoughts of the mind and the emotions of the heart, a gift that God has given only to man.
The reason for doing so was to enable people to communicate with God through it and also to talk to each other about God and the world that God has made (1 Corinthians 10:26).
He has ordained that salvation come to us through the Word.
“So then faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of God” (Romans 10:17).
“For it pleased God through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe” (1 Corinthians 1:21).

--- 「6.
From "Expression"