Bethlehem Baptist Church

Was Piper unprepared? Unprepared for what? Unprepared for the pastorate.

You became a pastor in 1980 at the age of 34, and when you took leadership at Bethlehem Baptist Church in downtown Minneapolis, you had what we might call some gaps in the resume.

You had zero elder experience.

You had zero experience hiring and firing people.

And I've run into people like this.

I mean, I just ran into a guy from Germany who was, I guess, attending a seminary up in Bethlehem Baptist in Minnesota, and he was homeschooling his kids, could not return to his home country, to Germany.

Yeah.

Another family that escaped Scotland and made it down into England.

So I have almost 20 years of pastoral ministry experience.

In the local church, I had the privilege of serving with John Piper at Bethlehem Baptist Church.

I was actually instrumental in starting Bethlehem College and Seminary.

So it wasn't until 1938 that I— 1938, sorry.

And that always just felt like, what? Like, that just didn't make sense to me.

And then in college, I sort of tried on, I was, I went to school two blocks from John Piper's church at Bethlehem Baptist, so I kinda tried on the-

Okay

... reformed, uh-

And those who are pro-abortion know this and have known this for a long time.

John Piper, now retired, the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, writes this.

I took an abortionist out to lunch once, prepared to give him 10 reasons why the unborn are human beings.

He stopped and said, I know that.

Yeah, I was...

I preached recently at, uh, Bethlehem Baptist Church up in Minneapolis, so kind of famous 'cause John Piper was there.

Uh, he was there that Sunday, too.

Him and... well, both there.

In this episode of Light & Truth, John Piper helps us see why God's will for our sexuality is bound up with His purpose to make us holy and to show the worth of Christ in the way we live.

This message was originally delivered at Bethlehem Baptist Church on October 13th, 2002.

Oh, Father in heaven, sexual purity is a weighty matter.

There were tears after the first service of a mother burdened for a son.

But just one quick follow-up question that I'm curious about, just about your background.

You were here in Minnesota, Minneapolis with John Piper, Bethlehem Baptist-

Mm-hmm

... and the associated institutions he was leading.