When John Piper visited in England in 1997 he spoke at Clarendon Fellowship and the Banner of Truth Conference. Clarendon is part of the Pioneer House Church movement verging on restorationist theology. During the conference Piper displayed intense emotional reactions in corporate worship: tears, hand raising, etc. At the same time the review of the conference by Banner of Truth and another journal (CRN) both criticized Piper's 'Christian Hedonism' primarily on the grounds that the theology is charismatic. Such a claim Piper denies in a sermon entitled, "Brothers Consider Christian Hedonism." Piper outlines the reasoning behind his belief that our duty as a Christian is to maximize our joy in God:

Quote
Christian hedonism aims to replace a Kantian morality with a biblical one. Immanuel Kant, the German philosopher who died in 1804, was the most powerful exponent of the notion that the moral value of an act decreases as we aim to derive any benefit from it. Acts are good if the doer is "disinterested." We should do the good because it is good. Any motivation to seek joy or reward corrupts the act.

Against this Kantian morality (which has passed as Christian for too long!), we must herald the unabashedly hedonistic biblical morality. Jonathan Edwards, who died when Kant was 34, expressed it like this in one of his early resolutions: "Resolved, to endeavor to obtain for myself as much happiness in the other world as I possibly can, with all the power, might, vigor and vehemence, yea, violence, I am capable of, or can bring myself to exert, in any way that can be thought of."
You can take it from here.


Reformed and Always Reforming,