Book Recommendation

Over the past few months I've been slowly reading through a little book by John Piper called, Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die. This book came out a few years ago under a different title. It was called "The Passion of Jesus Christ" . . . back when every book published by a Christian publisher was using the word "passion" in the title . . . you know, just after that phase when they were all using the word "purpose" . . . Christian publishers are not an especially creative bunch.

Anyway, the book is composed of 50 2-page meditations on the reasons--in the plan of God--that Jesus came to die. I have read the book as a devotional, one reason at a time, and have found it to be stirring, powerful, and thought provoking.

Piper does not eschew Biblical or theological language in order to be "winsome."

• Reason 1) To absorb the wrath of God.
  
• Reason 8) To become a ransom for many.

And yet he consistently brings eloquence and insight to his subject, and is able to startle his readers from the drowsy blur with which we often receive theological language. Among those that I was especially "startled" by:

• Reason 28) To free us from the futility of our ancestry
• Reason 33) To make his cross the ground of all our boasting
• Reason 35) To give marriage its deepest meaning
• Reason 43) To unleash the power of God in the Gospel
• Reason 44) To destroy the hostility between races.

But the real power of this little book is in its cumulative effect. Used as a daily devotional, again and again the reader is encouraged to turn and look "with fresh eyes" at the cross of Christ and think again of what it really means for each one of us who believe.

I am not done with this little book. I intend to read it again, and perhaps again. I give it my highest recommendation.

[BTW, you can get a pdf of the first five chapters here.]