Battling Unbelief

Every summer I try to read as many of the books we are selling at our high school conference, MOVE. This past week I picked up and read the first one, Battling Unbelief by John Piper. Usually, when I think about a Piper book, I know I have to brew a pot of coffee and read about one page per day. And then I have to read that same page again 4 times. But honestly, Battling Unbelief was a smooth read (I wouldn't say easy) and I was able to get a ton out of it.

The book is an excerpt from one of his larger books The Purifying Power of Living by Faith in Future Grace. Piper walks through 8 different applications on to live by faith in knowing there is future grace and how not to let these 8 sins continue to make us stumble. The 8 things we need to battle are anxiety, pride, shame, impatience, covetousness, bitterness, despondency, and lust. Below are a few things that stood out to me.

Battling ANXIETY
The thing that stood out to me in this chapter was when Piper is faced with anxiety about a range of topics, he has scriptures of the promise of future grace memorized. And then when he is anxious about _____, he quotes the scripture to himself. Example - When he is anxious about decisions he has to make about the future, he battles unbelief with the promise, "I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you." (Psalm 32.8)

Battling MISPLACED SHAME
Piper describes two different kinds of shame: misplaced shame and well-placed shame. Misplaced shame is the shame you feel when there is no good reason to feel it - or, shame for something that's good, that doesn't dishonor God. Well-placed shame is the shame we feel when we are ashamed of something because our involvement in it was dishonoring to God.
The part that resonated with me was hearing about inflicting shame. I can look back over the past year and thing of a few specific examples where I made someone else feel shame that I never should have inflicted.

Battling IMPATIENCE
Last week, I gave a devotion to our MOVE interns about how God can call you to "not move" at a particular time. This chapter showed me that our faith in future grace will allow us to walk with God and to wait in his place, and go at his pace.

Battling BITTERNESS
This chapter really made me think. It states that faith in God's judgment is another form of faith in future grace. We need to overcome vengeance and bitterness by trusting God to settle all our accounts justly.

Battling DESPONDENCY
This is not something I have really ever thought about, but after reading the chapter I know it has been true in my life as I am sure it has been in every Christian at some point. Despondency is becoming dejected and/or depressed about our spiritual lives. We have to fight this by preaching to ourselves and believing in future grace.

There are many things I got out of this book and many things that make me think (Piper has a tendency to do that). I also know I will keep this book on my shelf and refer back to it in the future.