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The Pleasures of God

Meditations on God’s Delight in Being God

by

You don’t truly know someone until you know what makes him happy. Our pleasure is the measure of our character. So it is with God. We can only know the greatness of his glory if we know what makes him glad. Therefore, we must understand the pleasures of God.

This is not a book about you. It’s about the One you were made for — God himself. In this theological tour de force, Pastor John Piper navigates the biblical evidence to help us see and savor what the pleasures of God show us about him, so that we might become like the One we behold.

What the church and world need today, more than anything else, is to know and love — behold and embrace — the great, glorious, sovereign, happy God of the Bible.

Endorsements

  • The Pleasures of God is perhaps the most important book that John Piper has written. It is certainly the freshest and most penetrating. Many preachers and writers are calling Christians today to be more God centered. The irony is that even the call to be God-centered focuses attention on us, on what we must do. Certainly the Bible spends no small part of its pages telling us what we must do, but it does so out of profound God-centeredness. And here is a book that does not tell us what we must do to be God-centered; it simply is God-centered. Intoxicating. D.A. Carson, Emeritus Professor, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
  • Run, don’t walk, to buy this remarkable work. Joni Eareckson Tada, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Joni and Friends
  • Few books are genuinely life-changing. The Pleasures of God by John Piper is clearly one of them. I’ve often said to people, ‘If I were on a desert island and could have only three books, in addition to the Bible, I’d choose Desiring God and The Pleasures of God by John Piper.’ Sam Storms, Pastor, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
  • In our fallen world, staring at the sun blinds us. But, by God’s grace, contemplating God gives us spiritual sight. Of all of Pastor John’s books, this is the most radical. Get this vision of God, and begin to see. Mark Dever, Pastor, Washington, D.C.
  • Books have profound potential—particularly the one you hold in your hand. John Piper is saturated with God, and his passion fills the pages of this book. C.J. Mahaney, Pastor, Louisville, Kentucky
  • In Desiring God, John Piper introduced us to the idea that the pursuit of God’s glory and the pursuit of our joy are not at odds, for the pursuit of God’s glory is our joy. In The Pleasures of God, Piper helps us to see that God’s glory is revealed in great part in what makes Him happy. The Pleasures of God is an invitation to meditate on what makes God happy. If what makes God happy reveals His glory, and if we become like Him as we behold His glory (2 Corinthians 3:18), then meditating on the pleasures of God will be a means for increased joy in God and gradual conformity into His likeness. If that is your desire, then take up this new edition and read it over and over again. Juan R. Sanches Jr., Professor, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
  • I encourage you to read [The Pleasures of God] twice; once to see the portrait as a whole, a second time to savor the sheer delight of loving a God so magnificent, so excellent, so holy. Erwin W. Lutzer, Pastor, Chicago, Illinois
  • There are quite a few books every Christian should read. And there are some that need to be read a second time to really digest them. But then there are a select few that should be read and reread and reread…perhaps every year. John Piper’s The Pleasures of God belongs on that ‘to be reread every year’ list. Randy Newman, Author, Questioning Evangelism
  • John Piper takes ten of God’s expressed ‘delights’ and searches their significance and implications with rare zeal. What a privilege to have someone think through these biblical realities so lovingly and seek out our biblical reactions so keenly. If all Christian books were offerings on an Australian barbecue, this would be one of the juiciest steaks around—hot, healthy, and wonderful. Simon Manchester, Pastor, North Sydney, Australia
  • This book is breathtaking in both its scope and its focus and constitutes a joyful yet prophetic call to adore and worship God—whose infinite worth and excellence is revealed in what he loves and delights in. It is at once beautiful and moving, serious, stretching, and profound. The Pleasures of God surely ranks with J. I. Packer’s Knowing God as one of the most profoundly moving and world-view forming Christian books of modern times. Reverend Richard M. Cunningham, CEO of Intervarsity UK