LOVE

TO THE UTTERMOST

DEVOTIONAL READINGS FOR HOLY WEEK FROM JOHN PIPER

LOVE
TO THE UTTERMOST

DEVOTIONAL READINGS FOR HOLY WEEK FROM JOHN PIPER

© 2014 Desiring God

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Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus
knew that his hour had come to depart out of this
world to the Father, having loved his own who
were in the world, he loved them to the end.
John 13:1
TABLE OF CONTENTS

i Editor’s Preface

01 Prologue
A Vision for Holy Week

04 Palm Sunday Luke 12:32

Seeing the King on Palm Sunday

07 Monday Luke 9:51–56

He Set His Face for Jerusalem

10 Tuesday Romans 5:6–8

Depth of Love for Us

13 Wednesday John 13:19

Why Jesus Is All-Trustworthy

16 Maundy Thursday John 13:34

Thursday of the Commandment
18 Good Friday Hebrews 7:25
What Good Friday Is All About

21 Saturday Luke 22:63–65

A Holy Week Volcano

24 Easter Sunday John 10:17–18

Such Amazing Resurrection Love
EDITOR’S PREFACE

There’s nothing intrinsically holy about particular days,

but for most of church history Christians have set aside
eight days between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday for
solemn focus (Romans 14:5–6). This string of days pro-
vides an annual interval for us to focus intently on the
greatest events in human history, the acts of our Savior
Jesus Christ. “Fix your gaze steadily on him,” John Piper
writes of Holy Week, “as he loves you to the uttermost.”
That one word—uttermost—is loaded with significance.
Jesus willingly died for his friends and endured unimagi-
nable degrees of suffering to do so (John 13:1). To love to
the uttermost is to love freely, without reserve or limit, and
without flaw or failure. Love to the uttermost is unquench-
able, unstoppable, and resolute. As we watch his arrest and
trial and death unfold for eight days, we gaze on a Christ
who begrudges no pain or reproach on his pathway to
redeem lost sinners. This is the man who “humbled him-self
by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a
cross” (Philippians 2:8). This is love to the uttermost.

Love to the Uttermost i

 As the story of Christ’s death freshly hits our senses,
we read of a Savior who exercises his own authority
over death and promises to take up his own life in the
end (John 10:18). “Anybody who makes a statement
like that,” Piper writes, “is either mentally deranged, or
lying, or God.” Everything is at stake in how we
respond to those options. What are we to do with this
Jesus who loves to the uttermost and tramples death?
Love to the Uttermost is a devotional spanning from
Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday. It is comprised of eight
excerpts (plus one prologue reading) selected from John
Piper’s vast 33-year writing and preaching ministry at
Bethlehem Baptist Church in the Twin Cities. This
devo-tional can be used for personal, family, or group
devo-tions. It can serve anyone who seeks a steadied
gaze to watch our Savior as he loves us to the uttermost.

Tony Reinke
Desiring God

Love to the Uttermost ii

Prologue

A VISION FOR HOLY WEEK

O viziune pentru Săptămâna Sfântă

In timp ce incercam sa-mi pregatesc inima sa-L intalnesc pe Isus intr-

un mod special in duminica floriilor apoi lunia, joia si vinerea mare
apoi in dimineata invierii, o serie de imagin incepeau sa-mi inunde
inima si mintea. Am sa incerc sa le descriu pentru tine.
Un mieluti proaspat nascut cu o blana alba si deasa cu
picioruse subtire si cu un nasuc umed, cam ca oricare alt mielut
proaspat nascut. Dar pe masura ce mielutul crestea si se transforma
intr-o oaie, celelate oi au observant o diferenta in aceasta oaie. Aceasta
oaie avea o umflatura ciudata pe frunte.
La inceput au crezut ca a fost lovita, dar umflatura nu a trecut,
ci in timp un smoc alb de lana a crescut peste umflatura si a facut-o sa
fie moale dar ferma. Poate aceasta umflatura nu ar fi atras asa multa
atentie dar aceasta oaie a inceput sa se foloseasca de aceasta umflatura
intr-un mod ciudat.
Intr-un mod ciudat aceasta umflatura parea ca ingreuna capul ei
asa ca parea ca ea sta intotdeaunea intr-o pozitie de reverenta inaintea
unui imparat nevazut. Apoi ea a inceput sa caute alte oi care erau
bolnave sau ranite. Ea isi folosea umflatura sa ajute pe cei slabi sa se
ridice in picioare sis a stearga lacrimile lor.
O turma intreaga a inceput sa o urmeze, dar caprele radeau de
ea si o dispretuiau. Pentru ele o oaie era desgustatoare si asa, dar cu o
umflatura ciudata in frunte, era mai mult decat puteau sa acecepte.
Au hartuit-o tot timpul si faceau glume batjocoritoare pe seama
ei: “De ce iti atarna capul asa, ori ai plumb in acea umflatura?” Si ce l-
ea infuriate si mai mult era faptul ca ea doar trecea mai departe si isi
vedea treaba ei de milostivire.
Asa ca, intr-o zi caprele au inconjurat-o si au izbit-o cu
coarnele lor pana cand ea a murit, si au lasat-o acolo singura in camp.
Dar in timp ce ea statea acolo intinsa pe pamanta singura, ceva foarte
deosebit s-a intamplat. Ea a inceput sa se mareasca, sa creasca. Lana
insangerata a cazut de pa ea si a fost inlocuita cu un par alb, stralucitor
ca unui cal. Smocul alb de lana a cazut de pe frunte, si din umflatura
plina de mila, a crescut un corn maret de otel pur, spre deosebire de
orice corn care a fost sau va fi vreodata.
Apoi, de parca poruncit de cineva Unicornul maret a sarit in picioare. Si
statea la opt metri inaltime de paman
And then, as if by command, the massive Unicorn leaped to his feet.
His back stood eight feet above the ground. The muscles in his shoulders
and neck were like marble. The tendons in his legs were like cables of
iron. His head was no longer bowed, and when he looked to the right or to
the left, the crimson horn slashed the air like a saber dipped in blood.
When the sheep saw him, they fell down and wor-shiped. He bowed and
touched each one on the forehead with the tip of his horn, whispered something
in their ear, and soared away into the sky. He hasn’t been seen since.
That’s the vision in my mind as I enter Holy Week. It’s a

Love to the Uttermost 2

portrait of Jesus Christ painted by Isaiah under the
inspi-ration of God and put on display by Matthew
12:18–21. Like every good work of art, this portrait
has a purpose, and the purpose is to cause us to set our
hope on Jesus Christ. And I am praying that this will
happen in your life, because I know that everything
else you set your hope on will let you down in the
end. But if you hope in Jesus Christ, he will be
honored in your life, and you will never regret it.

Love to the Uttermost 3

Palm Sunday

SEEING THE KING

ON PALM SUNDAY

“Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s

good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” (Luke
12:32)

Today is Palm Sunday. We picture ourselves welcoming

the King into our city and into our hearts. He tries to
make his intentions known by coming, not on a great
stal-lion, but on a lowly donkey, meek and humble.
I wonder how many here look upon this lowly Ser-
vant-King and feel that this is just a thin veneer, and that
beneath this lowly exterior there is a terrible power and
authority which is just waiting to burst out against you if
you slip in any way. I wonder how many feel that it is
not really the deepest pleasure of this King’s heart to
serve his people and meet their needs.
I wonder how many feel that he’s riding this donkey
of lowliness as a kind of camouflage. And once he gains
a foothold, he will throw off his rags, pull out his sword,
and storm forth to do what he really loves to do, namely,

Love to the Uttermost 4

judge and destroy. Of course, some will be saved—the
few who somehow could please him. But that is not his
heart’s desire. He is basically angry—always angry. And
the best we can do is stay out of his way, and maybe, if
we keep the rules well enough, we could sneak by him
when he is in one of his temporary good moods.

God’s Deepest Delight

Jesus is at pains to help you not feel that way about God. And
I want to draw your attention to one verse, namely, Luke
12:32, because every little piece of this verse is intend-ed to
help take away the fear that Jesus knows we struggle with,
namely, that God begrudges his benefits, that he is constrained
and out of character when he does nice things, that at bottom
he is angry and loves to vent his anger.
Luke 12:32 is a verse about the nature of God. It’s
a verse about what kind of heart God has. It’s a verse
about what makes God glad—not merely about what
God will do or what he has to do, but what he delights
to do, what he loves to do, and what he takes pleasure
in doing. “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s
good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
The phrase “good pleasure,” is a verb in Greek: “to be a
pleasure” or “to be pleased by.” You could translate it: “It
pleased God,” or, “God chose it gladly.” In other words, God
is not acting in this generous way in order to cloak and hide
some malicious motive. The word “good pleasure” utterly
rules that out. He is not saying inside, “I will have to be gen-
erous for a while even though I don’t want to be, because what
I really want to do is bring judgment on sinners.”

Love to the Uttermost 5

 The Lord’s meaning is inescapable: God is acting
here in freedom. He is not under constraint to do what he
doesn’t really want to do. At this very point, when he
gives his flock the kingdom, he is acting out his deepest
delight. This is what the word means: God’s joy, his
desire, his want and wish and hope and pleasure and
gladness and delight, is to give the kingdom to his flock.

Love to the Uttermost 6

Monday

HE SET HIS FACE FOR JERUSALEM

When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he

set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent
messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a
village of the Samaritans, to make preparations for
him. But the people did not receive him, because his
face was set toward Jerusalem. And when his disciples
James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want
us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume
them?” But he turned and rebuked them. And they
went on to another village. (Luke 9:51–56)

In Luke 9:51–56, we learn how not to understand

Palm Sunday.
To set his face towards Jerusalem meant something very
different for Jesus than it did for the disciples. You can see
the visions of greatness that danced in their heads in verse
46: “An argument arose among them as to which of them
was the greatest.” Jerusalem and glory were just around the
corner. O what it would mean when Jesus took the throne!

Love to the Uttermost 7

 But Jesus had another vision in his head. One
wonders how he carried it all alone and for so long.
Here’s what Jerusalem meant for Jesus: “I must go on
my way today and tomorrow and the day following, for
it cannot be that a prophet should perish away from Jeru-
salem” (Luke 13:33). Jerusalem meant one thing for
Jesus: certain death. Nor was he under any illusion of a
quick and heroic death. He predicted in Luke 18:31–33:
“See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that
is writ-ten about the Son of Man by the prophets will be
accom-plished. For he will be delivered over to the
Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and
spit upon. And after flogging him, they will kill him.”
When Jesus set his face to go to Jerusalem, he set
his face to die.

The Time Had Come

Remember, when you think of Jesus’s resolution to die, that he
had a nature like ours. He shrunk back from pain like we do.
He would have enjoyed marriage and children and
grandchildren and a long life and esteem in the communi-ty.
He had a mother and brothers and sisters. He had special
places in the mountains. To turn his back on all this, and set
his face towards vicious whipping and beating and spit-ting
and mocking and crucifixion, was not easy. It was hard.
We need to use our imagination to put ourselves back
into his place and feel what he felt. I don’t know of any
other way for us to begin to know how much he loved
us. “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay
down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

Love to the Uttermost 8

 If we were to look at Jesus’s death merely as a result
of a betrayer’s deceit and the Sanhedrin’s envy and
Pilate’s spinelessness and the soldiers’ nails and spear, it
might seem very involuntary. And the benefit of
salvation that comes to us who believe might be viewed
as God’s way of making a virtue out of a necessity. But
once you read Luke 9:51, all such thoughts vanish.
Jesus was not accidentally entangled in a web of
injus-tice. The saving benefits of his death for sinners
were not an afterthought. God planned it all out of
infinite love to sinners like us, and he appointed a time.
Jesus, who was the very embodiment of his Father’s
love for sinners, saw that the time had come and set his
face to fulfill his mission: to die in Jerusalem for our
sake. “No one takes my life from me,” Jesus said, “I lay
it down of my own accord” (John 10:18).

Love to the Uttermost 9

Tuesday

DEPTH OF LOVE FOR US

While we were still weak, at the right time Christ

died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die
for a righteous person—though perhaps for a
good person one would dare even to die—but
God shows his love for us in that while we were
still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6–8)
As I have pondered the love of Christ for us, and the dif-
ferent ways that the Bible presents it to us, I have seen
four ways that the depth of Christ’s love is revealed.
First, we know the depth of someone’s love for us
by what it costs him. If he sacrifices his life for us, it
assures us of deeper love than if he only sacrifices a
few bruises. So we will see the depth of Christ’s love
by the greatness of what it cost him.
Second, we know the depth of someone’s love for us by
how little we deserve it. If we have treated him well all our
life, and have done all that he expects of us, then when he
loves us, it will not prove as much love as it would if he

Love to the Uttermost 10

loved us when we had offended him, and shunned him,
and disdained him. The more undeserving we are, the
more amazing and deep is his love for us. So we will see
the depth of Christ’s love in relation to how undeserving
are the objects of his love (Romans 5:5–8).
Third, we know the depth of someone’s love for us by
the greatness of the benefits we receive in being loved. If
we are helped to pass an exam, we will feel loved in one
way. If we are helped to get a job, we will feel loved anoth-
er way. If we are helped to escape from an oppressive cap-
tivity and given freedom for the rest of our life, we will feel
loved another way. And if we are rescued from eter-nal
torment and given a place in the presence of God with
fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore, we will know a
depth of love that surpasses all others (1 John 3:1–3). So we
will see the depth of Christ’s love by the greatness of the
benefits we receive in being loved by him.
Fourth, we know the depth of someone’s love for us by the
freedom with which they love us. If a person does good things
for us because someone is making him, when he doesn’t really
want to, then we don’t think the love is very deep. Love is deep
in proportion to its liberty. So if an insur-ance company pays
you $40,000 because you lose your spouse, you don’t usually
marvel at how much this compa-ny loves you. There were legal
constraints. But if your Sun-day School class makes all your
meals for a month after your spouse dies, and someone calls
you every day, and visits you every week, then you call it love,
because they don’t have to do this. It is free and willing. So we
will see the depth of Christ’s love for us in his freedom: “No
one takes my life from me; I lay it down of my own accord”
(John 10:18).

Love to the Uttermost 11

 To push this truth to the limit, let me quote for you a
psalm that the New Testament applies to Jesus (Hebrews
10:9). It refers to his coming into the world to offer himself
as a sacrifice for sin: “I delight to do your will, O my God”
(Psalm 40:8). The ultimate freedom is joy. He rejoiced to do
his redeeming work for us. The physical pain of the cross
did not become physical pleasure. But Jesus was sus-tained
through it all by joy. He really, really wanted to save us. To
gather for himself a happy, holy, praising people. He
displayed his love like a husband yearning for a beloved
bride (Ephesians 5:25–33).

Love to the Uttermost 12

Wednesday

WHY JESUS IS ALL-TRUSTWORTHY

“I am telling you this now, before it takes

place, that when it does take place you may
believe that I am he.” (John 13:19)
Jesus himself taught that all the prophecies about him
would be fulfilled. In other words, we have a testimony,
not only that the writers themselves saw Jesus’s life as
ful-fillment of prophecy, but that Jesus did, too.
For example, in Luke 22:37, Jesus says, “I tell you
that this Scripture must be fulfilled in me: ‘And he
was num-bered with the transgressors.’ For what is
written about me has its fulfillment” (see Isaiah
53:12). Jesus saw that the predictions of the Messiah
and his sufferings would be fulfilled in himself.
Jesus took up the principle of John 13:19 and foretold
numerous details of what was going to happen to him so
that we might believe when they happened. “He began to
teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things
and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and

Love to the Uttermost 13

the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise
again” (Mark 8:31). Jesus saw the predictions of the
Messiah and his sufferings being fulfilled in himself.
› He foresaw that his death would be by crucifixion
(John 3:14; 12:32).
› He predicted that the disciples would find an unridden
colt when they entered the town (Luke 19:30).

› When the disciples entered Jerusalem that last

Thurs-day, he predicted they would meet a man
with the water pitcher who would have a room for
them to meet in (Luke 22:10).
› After three years of waiting, he knew the exact
hour of his departure out of the world (John 13:1).

› Jesus knew that he would be betrayed, and who

would betray him, and when it would happen (John
6:64; 13:1; Matthew 26:2, 21).
› He knew and predicted the fact and the time of
Peter’s three denials (Matthew 26:34).
› Jesus predicted that the disciples would all fall
away and be scattered (Matthew 26:31; John 16:32;
Zechariah 13:7).
› Jesus prophesied that he would be “lifted up from
the earth” (John 12:32). That is, he would not be
stoned but crucified—not by Jews but by Romans.
So the decisions of Pilate and the Jews of how to
dispose of him were a fulfillment of his prediction.

Love to the Uttermost 14

He makes all these predictions, according to John
13:19, so that we would believe he is God, that what
he says about himself is true.
In other words, Jesus is saying, “If you are struggling
to believe that I am the promised Messiah, that I am the
one who was in the beginning with God and was God
(John 1:1), that I am the divine Son of God, who can
forgive all your sins and give you eternal life and guide
you on the path to heaven, then I want to help you
believe. And one of the ways I am going to help you
have well-grounded faith is by telling you what is going
to happen to me before it happens, so that when it
happens, you will have good rea-son to believe in me.”

Love to the Uttermost 15

Maundy Thursday

THURSDAY OF THE COMMANDMENT

“A new commandment I give to you, that you

love one another: just as I have loved you, you
also are to love one another.” (John 13:34)
Today is Maundy Thursday. The name comes from the
Latin mandatum, the first word in the Latin rendering of
John 13:34, “A new commandment (mandatum novum) I
give to you, that you love one another: just as I have
loved you, you also are to love one another.” This
command-ment was given by Jesus on the Thursday
before his cru-cifixion. So Maundy Thursday is the
“Thursday of the Commandment.”
This is the commandment: “love one another: just
as I have loved you.” But what about Galatians 5:14?
“For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You
shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” If the whole
law is fulfilled in “Love your neighbor as yourself,”
what more can “Love one another as Christ loved
you” add to the fulfillment of the whole law?

Love to the Uttermost 16

 I would say that Jesus did not replace or change the
commandment, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
He filled it out and gave it clear illustration. He is saying,
Here is what I mean by “as yourself.” Watch me. I
mean: Just as you would want someone to set you free
from certain death, so you should set them free from
certain death. That is how I am now loving you. My
suffering and death is what I mean by ‘as yourself.’
You want life. Live to give others life. At any cost.

So John says, “By this we know love, that he laid down his
life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the
brothers” (1 John 3:16). Was Jesus loving us “as he loved
himself ”? Listen to Ephesians 5:29–30, “No one ever hated
his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ
does the church, because we are members of his body.”
In the horrors of his suffering, Christ was sustained “by
the joy that was set before him” (Hebrews 12:2). And that
joy was the everlasting gladness of his redeemed people,
satisfied in the presence of the risen king.
Therefore, let us see the greatest love in action on
Maundy Thursday and tomorrow on Good Friday.
“Hav-ing loved his own who were in the world, he
loved them to the end” (John 13:1). He loved us to the
uttermost. And let us be so moved by this love that it
becomes our own. “He laid down his life for us, and
we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.” This
is the commandment. This is the Thursday.

Love to the Uttermost 17

Good Friday

WHAT GOOD FRIDAY IS ALL ABOUT

Consequently, he [Jesus] is able to save to the

uttermost those who draw near to God
through him, since he always lives to make
intercession for them. (Hebrews 7:25)
The great passion of the writer of Hebrews is that we
“draw near” to God (Hebrews 4:16; 7:25; 10:22; 11:6).
Draw near to his throne to find all the help we need.
Draw near to him, confident that he will reward us with
all that he is for us in Jesus. And this is clearly what he
means in Hebrews 10:22, because verse 19 says that we
have confi-dence “to enter the holy place,” that is, the
new heavenly “holy of holies,” like that inner room in
the old tabernacle of the Old Testament where the high
priest met with God once a year, and where his glory
descended on the ark of the covenant.
So the one command, the one exhortation, that we are
given in Hebrews 10:19–22 is to draw near to God. The
great aim of this writer is that we get near God, that we

Love to the Uttermost 18

have fellowship with him, that we not settle for a Chris-tian
life at a distance from God, that God not be a distant
thought, but a near and present reality, that we experience
what the old Puritans called communion with God.
This drawing near is not a physical act. It’s not building
a tower of Babel, by your achievements, to get to heaven.
It’s not necessarily going into a church building, or walking
to an altar at the front. It is an invisible act of the heart. You
can do it while standing absolutely still, or while lying in a
hospital bed, or while sitting in a pew listening to a sermon.
Drawing near is not moving from one place to anoth-
er. It is a directing of the heart into the presence of God
who is as distant as the holy of holies in heaven, and yet
as near as the door of faith. He is commanding us to
come, to approach him, to draw near to him.

The Center of the Gospel

In fact, this is the very heart of the entire New

Testament gospel, isn’t it? That Christ came into the
world to make a way for us to come to God without
being consumed in our sin by his holiness.
› “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the
righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring
us to God” (1 Peter 3:18).
› “For through him [Christ] we both have access in
one Spirit to the Father” (Ephesians 2:18).
› “We also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus
Christ, through whom we have now received
reconciliation” (Romans 5:11).

Love to the Uttermost 19

This is the center of the gospel—this is what the Garden
of Gethsemane and Good Friday are all about—that God
has done astonishing and costly things to draw us near.
He has sent his Son to suffer and to die so that through
him we might draw near. It’s all so that we might draw
near. And all of this is for our joy and for his glory.
He does not need us. If we stay away he is not impov-
erished. He does not need us in order to be happy in the
fellowship of the Trinity. But he magnifies his mercy by
giving us free access through his Son, in spite of our sin, to
the one Reality that can satisfy us completely and forever,
namely, himself. “You make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand
are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11).

Love to the Uttermost 20

Saturday

A HOLY WEEK VOLCANO

Now the men who were holding Jesus in custody were

mocking him as they beat him. They also blindfolded
him and kept asking him, “Prophesy! Who is it that
struck you?” And they said many other things against
him, blaspheming him. (Luke 22:63–65)
As I read these terrible words, I found myself saying to Jesus,
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Jesus. Forgive me!” I felt myself to be
an actor here, not just a spectator. I was so much a part of that
ugly gang that I knew I was as guilty as they were. I felt that if
the rage of God should spill over onto those soldiers and
sweep me away, too, justice would have been done. I wasn’t
there, but their sin was my sin. It would not have been unjust
for me to fall under their sentence.
Has it ever bothered you that sometimes in the Old
Testament when one man sins, many get swept away in the
punishment God brings? For example, when David sinned
by taking a census of the people (2 Samuel 24:10), “there
died of the people from Dan to Beersheba 70,000 men”

Love to the Uttermost 21

(2 Samuel 24:15). In another example, Achan kept
some of the booty from Jericho and his whole family
was stoned (Joshua 7:25). Maybe my experience in
reading Luke 22 is a clue to the divine justice in this.

My Volcanic Rebellion

An analogy came to my mind. The hearts of humanity

are like a molten mantle beneath the surface of the
whole earth. The molten lava beneath the earth is the
universal wickedness of the human heart—the rebellion
against God and the selfishness toward people. Here and
there a volcano of rebellion bursts forth which God sees
fit to judge immediately. He may do so by causing the
scorch-ing, destructive lava to flow not only down the
mountain which erupted, but also across the valleys
which did not erupt, but which have the same molten
lava of sin beneath the surface.
The reason I confess the sin of beating Jesus, even
though I wasn’t there, is that the same lava of rebellion
is in my own heart. I have seen enough of it to know. So
even though it does not burst forth in such a volcanic
atrocity as the crucifixion, it is still deserving of
judgment. If God had chosen to rain the lava of their evil
back on their own heads and some of it consumed even
me, I would not be able to fault God’s justice.
We may wonder why God chooses to recompense some
evils immediately and not others. And we may wonder how
he decides whom to sweep away in the judgment. Why
seventy thousand? Why not fifty thousand, or one hundred,
or ten? Why Achan’s wife and not the greedy

Love to the Uttermost 22

neighbor two tents down? I doubt that answers are avail-
able to us now. We are left to trust that these decisions
come from a Wisdom so great that it can discern all
possi-ble effects in all possible times and places and
people. How widely the lava of one person’s rebellion
and judgment will flow lies in God’s hands alone.
And I believe from Romans 8:28 that, even though
the lava of recompense overtakes me at a distance
from the volcano, there is mercy in it. I do not deserve
to escape, for I know my own heart. But I trust Christ,
and so I know the judgment will be turned to joy.
Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. For precious
in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.

Love to the Uttermost 23

Easter Sunday

SUCH AMAZING
RESURRECTION LOVE

“For this reason the Father loves me, because I

lay down my life that I may take it up again. No
one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own
accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I
have authority to take it up again. This charge I
have received from my Father.” (John 10:17–18)
Why does Jesus say this? Why does he stress his
willing-ness to die? Because if it weren’t true—if his
death were forced on him, if it weren’t free, if his
heart weren’t really in it—then a big question mark
would be put over his love for us.
The depth of his love is in its freedom. If he didn’t
die for us willingly—if he didn’t choose the suffering
and embrace it—then how deep is his love, really? So
he stress-es it. He makes it explicit. It comes out of
me, not out of cir-cumstances, not out of pressure, but
out of what I really long to do.

Love to the Uttermost 24

 Jesus is stressing to us that his love for us is free. He
seems to hear some enemy slander saying, “Jesus doesn’t
really love you. He’s a mercenary. He’s in it for some oth-
er reason than love. He’s under some kind of constraint or
external compulsion. He doesn’t really want to die for you.
He’s just got himself somehow into this job and has to
submit to the forces controlling him.” Jesus seems to hear
something like that, or anticipate it. And he responds, “No
one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I
have authority to lay it down, and I have author-ity to take
it up again.” So he is pressing this on us to see if we will
believe his protest of love, or if we will believe the opposite
—that his heart is really not in this.
Anybody who makes a statement like that is either
mentally deranged, or lying, or God. I have authority
from inside death, as a dead man, to take life back
again, when I please. Now what’s the point here? Well,
which is harder: to control when you die, or to give
yourself life again once you are dead? Which is harder:
to say, “I lay my life down on my own initiative”? Or to
say, “I will take my life back again after I am dead”?
The answer is obvious. And that’s the point. If
Jesus could—and did—take his life back again from
the dead, then he was free indeed. If he controlled
when he came out of the grave, he certainly controlled
when he went into the grave.
So here’s the point. The resurrection of Jesus is given
to us as the confirmation or evidence that he was indeed
free in laying down his life. And so the resurrection is
Christ’s testimony to the freedom of his love.

Love to the Uttermost 25

The Meaning of Easter

Of all the great things that Easter means, it also means

this: it is a mighty “I meant it!” behind Christ’s death.
I meant it! I was free. You see how free I am? You
see how much power and authority I have? I was able
to avoid it. I have power to take up my life out of the
grave. And could I not, then, have devastated my
enemies and escaped the cross?
My resurrection is a shout over my love for my sheep: It
was free! It was free! I chose it. I embraced it. I was not
caught. I was not cornered. Nothing can constrain me to do
what I do not choose to do. I had power to take my life
from death. And I have taken my life from death. How
much more, then, could I have kept my life from death!
I am alive to show you that I really loved you. I
freely loved you. Nobody forced me to it. And I am
now alive to spend eternity loving you with
omnipotent resurrection love forever and ever.
Come to me, all you sinners who need a Savior.
And I will forgive you and accept you and love you
with all my heart forevermore.

Love to the Uttermost 26

The mission of Desiring God is that people everywhere
would understand and embrace the truth that God is most
glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. Our
primary strategy for accomplishing this mission is through a
maximally useful website that houses over thirty years of
John Piper’s preach-ing and teaching, including translations
into more than 40 languages. This is all available free of
charge, thanks to our generous ministry partners. If you
would like to further ex-plore the vision of Desiring God, we
encourage you to visit www.desiringGod.org.

Desiring God
Post Office Box 2901, Minneapolis, Minnesota
55402 888.346.4700 mail@desiringGod.org
Jesus willingly endured unimaginable depths of suffering for
his friends. John 13:1 says he loved us to the uttermost.

To love to the uttermost is to love freely, without reserve

or limit, and without flaw or failure. As we journey with
Jesus for eight days — from Palm Sunday to Easter
Sunday — from triumphal entry, to arrest and trial, to
death and burial and triumphant resurrection, we gaze
on a God-man who begrudges no pain or reproach on
his pathway to redeem lost sinners. Here is the one who
“humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of
death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8).

In Love to the Uttermost: Devotional Readings for

Holy Week, John Piper calls you to fix your eyes
steadily on Jesus as he loves you to the uttermost.

John Piper is founder and teacher of Desiring God and served

33 years as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis,
Minnesota. He is author of more than 50 books, and more
than 30 years of his preaching and writing are available free
of charge at desiringGod.org.

desiringGod.org