Welcome to a new week on the Ask Pastor John podcast with longtime author and pastor John Piper,

and thank you for listening to the podcast. We appreciate it. We begin the week with a short

question, but a very good one from a listener named Bryce. He asks, Pastor John, hello.

Can you tell me why did God wait so long in human history, centuries, even millennia before

he finally sent Jesus to earth? Why the long wait for the incarnation? I don't think that

in this life we will have a complete answer to that question. I am going to suggest

some pointers, but in the end I know that even the pointers I'm going to suggest do not completely

or satisfyingly answer the question, but they might be helpful. They've been helpful to me

over the years to think about. In general, the answer is going to be something like

given the way God chose to prepare for Christ in the world and to make the gospel clear in

the world and prepare for the mission of the church to the nations. In the light of his design for

how to do that, this kind of history for thousands of years leading up to Christ was necessary,

was fitting. This length and this kind of history leading up to Christ so that Christ becomes

clear and so the gospel can be clear. This was the most suitable, the most appropriate, the most

effective way to get the world ready for Messiah or gospel for mission. That's why I think the

general answer is God has designed the world and cultures and the nature of humanity so that

certain conditions, certain states of affairs come about in the world gradually. We can always

second guess why God would ordain it to be that way, but He has told us that some things take

time, meaning taking all of reality into account, God thought it wise that things would develop

the way they do. Here's some examples. God tells Abraham in Genesis 15 that there will be

four long generations that will elapse before Israelites come back to the promised land and take

it over and God intends for there to be roughly 400 years and here's the reason He gives. They

...