A friend and I were talking a few weeks ago about our shared desire to read more unassigned books.  As students, we read what we have to read.  But it can be difficult while in school to read what we want to read and what we need to read.  So while I do think there's wisdom in putting off some chosen reading until a later season in life when we won't have as much assigned reading, I also realize in my saner moments that life is not going to get less busy.  To think that I'll have more time to read in the future is pretty naive.We started with Let the Nations be Glad! The Supremacy of God in Missions by John Piper.  He writes:

The zeal of the church for the glory of her King will not rise until pastors and mission leaders and seminary teachers make much more of the King.  When the glory of God himself saturates our preaching and teaching and conversation and writings, and when he predominates above our talk of methods and strategies and psychological buzz words and cultural trends, then the people might begin to feel that he is the central reality of their lives and that the spread of his glory is more important than all their possessions and all their plans.*

The negative could also be stated:  When the glory of God Himself does not saturate our preaching and teaching and conversation and writings and blogging and studies and family times and classes and cafeteria meals and weekends and when He does not predominate above our talk of methods and strategies and psychological buzz words and cultural trends and fashions and March Madness and the latest news and 24, we will never be able to feel that He is the central reality of our lives and that the spread of His glory is more important than all our possessions and all our plans.  We will think that everything else is more important.  We will think that the street lights are brighter than the stars.

So here's to the supremacy of God in all of life, over all that we own and all that we dream.  Let us make much of our God, and let the glory of the King rise.

God claims every inch of your life and every breath you take.  His glory is knocking on the door of every comparmentalized room in your life, wanting to fill it and overflow it.  From the living room to the kitchen to the basement to the pantry to the hot-water-heater closet, He says "Mine."  And when it is given freely to Him, the glory of God will begin to fill the earth like the waters fill the sea, and the nations will be glad.

* First Edition, 38.