Here are some more notes and comments from John Piper’s “Don’t Waste Your Life”.

To make others glad in God with an everlasting gladness, our lives must show that He is more precious than life. If Christ is an all-satisfying treasure and promises to provide all our needs, then to live as though we had all the same values as the world would betray Him. If we look like our lives are devoted to getting and maintaining things, we will look like the world, and that will not make Christ look great. He will look like a religious side-interest that may be useful for escaping hell in the end, but doesn’t make much difference in what we live and love here. He will not look like an all-satisfying treasure. And that will not make others glad in God.

When was the last time someone asked you about “the reason for the hope that is in you”? That’s what Peter said we should always be ready to give an answer for (1 Pet 3:15). Why don’t people ask us about our hope? The answer is probably that we look as if we hope in the same things they do. Our lives don’t look like they are on the Calvary road, stripped down for sacrificial love, serving others with the sweet assurance that we don’t need to be rewarded in this life. Our reward is great in heaven (Matt 5:12)! “You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just” (Luke 14:14). If we believed this more deeply, others might see the worth of God and find in Him their gladness.

If we want to make people glad in God, our lives must look as if God, not possessions, is our joy. Our lives must look as if we use our possessions to make people glad in God - especially the most needy.