The following message is by pastor John Piper. More information from desiring God is available at

W. W.W.

D. desiring God. O'R G.

Before I pray, let me say some things about my own marriage because it seems to me that if I'm going to talk about marriage lived to the glory of God that you should know a little bit about me and be immediately relieved of any thought that I have a perfect marriage.

I've been married to Noel for almost 38 years.

If my math is right,

1968, December 21st. We have five children, four sons who are grown, married, and all of them have children.

They range in age from 36 to 23.

And then we have Talitha

who is 11 years old as of yesterday

Talitha we adopted when I was 50, so you can do the math, which is old to adopt a baby. She was eight weeks old when he adopted her but if you've never had a daughter

and you want a daughter you do it however you have to do it. My wife always wanted a

daughter and the Lord in his way gave us son one son two son three

son four and so we did daughter five and I think he was pleased with the way we did it.

So we were walking through parenting a little one again and now we're learning what it means

to be a married couple parenting adult children with all of the pain and joy that that involves.

I had the naive notion when I was 30 that parenting lasted until a child was 18 and then they're gone.

That's not true.

You never stop being... That's not true.

You never stop being a parent.

That is, you never stop carrying the burden

that your children will walk with the Lord,

...