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The ground of natural love is finally me, not God. If you make much of me, I feel loved, because I am the final ground of my happiness. God is not in that place. He should be, but he is not. That is what it means to be unconverted and natural. The deepest foundation of my happiness is me.

We should test ourselves with some questions. It is right to pursue likeness to Christ. But the question is, why? What is the root of our motivation? Consider some attributes of Christ that we might pursue, and ask these questions:

1. Do I want to be strong like Christ, so I will be admired as strong, or so that I can defeat every adversary that would entice me to settle for any pleasure less than admiring the strongest person in the universe, Christ?
   
   
2. Do I want to be wise like Christ, so I will be admired as wise and intelligent, or so that I can discern and admire the One who is most truly wise?
   
   
3. Do I want to be holy like Christ, so that I can be admired as holy, or so that I can be free from all unholy inhibitions that keep me from seeing and savoring the holiness of Christ?
   
   
4. Do I want to be loving like Christ, so that I will be admired as a loving person, or so that I will enjoy extending to others, even in sufferings, the all satisfying love of Christ?
   
   

The question is not whether we will have all this glorious likeness to Christ. We will. The question is: To what end? Everything in Romans 8:29 30, all of God's work, his choosing us, predestining us, calling us, justifying us, bringing us to final glory is designed by God not ultimately to make much of us, but to free us and fit us to enjoy seeing and making much of Christ forever.

Perhaps we have not posed the question in the best way. In asking whether seeing God or being like God is the greatest good of the gospel, we may have stopped short of what being and seeing are for. Perhaps neither is ultimate. Would it not be better to say that the ultimate benefit of the gospel, which makes all its other parts good news, is neither being nor seeing, but delighting and displaying, that is, delighting in and displaying "the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Cor. 4:6). In other words, is it not the case that we behold and thus become (2 Cor. 3:18; 1 John 3:2), and that we become and thus behold (Matt. 5:8; 2 Cor. 4:6) in order that ultimately we might delight in and display God? Becoming and beholding are a means to the end of delighting and displaying.

Jesus points in this direction by the way he finishes his prayer in John 17. In verse 24 he prays that we may be with him where he is, to see his glory. The emphasis falls on the great gospel gift of seeing the divine glory. But the final statement of Jesus' prayer in verse 26 is a promise that calls attention to the delight we will take in seeing this glory: "I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them."

This is an awesome promise. He is not merely saying that we will see his glory, but that when we see him, we will love him with the very love that the Father has for the Son " … that the love with which you have loved me may be in them." This is a love that consists of supreme delight. The Father has infinite joy in the glory of his Son. We are promised a share in that joy. This means that seeing and being, by themselves, are not the ultimate benefit of the gospel. Seeing leads to savoring or it is not good news at all.

Excerpted from God is the Gospel: Meditations on God's Love as the Gift of Himself by John Piper, copyright 2005, pages 147-149, 159-161. Used with permission of Crossway Books.

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

God is the Gospel: Meditations on God's Love as the Gift of Himself is available from Christianbook.com and other book retailers.

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Ask Not What Your God Can Do for You | Rather, love God for who he is, says John Piper.

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February (Web-only) 2006, Vol. 50