So Paul is saying, all right, I might live, and if I live, I want Christ to be central in my life, and I might die, and if I die, I want Jesus to look really good in the way I die, that will happen by counting death gain and death will be

gain because to die is to be with Christ, which is far better.

It's hard to say out loud, but sometimes we treat death as the worst case scenario.

And yet for Paul, it was something he longed for.

Not because he hated life, but because he loved Christ.

I'm Dan Kruver.

In this episode of Light and Truth, John Piper helps us see what made death gain for Paul and how that changes everything.

This message was originally delivered at the Bethlehem Baptist Youth Retreat in the winter of 2004.

The focus in the previous session was God's passion for his glory.

And our theme is God's glory and our gladness, are they really one? Can they really be one? Do they have to be in

competition? Does God's pursuit of his glory and my pursuit of my happiness have to be at odds,

which is what I grew up feeling? Missionaries would come to the church, I remember, and they would say, okay, all you young

people, stop doing your will and do God's will.

And I always feel like, isn't there a third alternative?

Like maybe my will could correspond to God's will so that I would do his will and it would be my will

and therefore I wouldn't be condemned to endless frustration in following Jesus?

I mean, that's the way I felt.

And I just want to liberate you from feeling like that's the choice you got to make.

Pursue God's glory or pursue your happiness.

If those are the two, you're damned, you're just condemned to a life of endless frustration.

At least if you try to be a Christian you are, you do not have to choose.

That's the whole theme.

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