Other Christian Leaders in Piper’s World Hold Different Positions

Dr. Wayne Grudem changed his position on divorce and remarriage and argued that serious abuse can be a biblical ground for divorce and can free the innocent spouse to remarry.

He gives several reasons: abuse can force a spouse out of the home just as effectively as desertion; Paul’s phrase “in such cases” in 1 Corinthians 7:15 may include other situations that similarly destroy a marriage; ongoing abuse is a form of enslavement rather than the peace to which God calls believers; and repeated cruelty or violence can damage a marriage even more deeply than abandonment.

He also includes severe verbal cruelty, credible threats, destructive addictions, and other patterns of substantial harm.

For his full argument, see Wayne Grudem, Grounds for Divorce: Why I Now Believe There Are More Than Two. The link is in my summary.

That matters because This Momentary Marriage is the result of Piper’s unusually rigid interpretation of well-known biblical passages. Readers should ask not only whether his arguments sound biblical, but whether his teaching helps create marriages that are safe, honest, loving, and good.

A Glimpse into John and Noël Piper’s Marriage

John Piper’s This Momentary Marriage is not merely troubling because of its theology. The book contains startling admissions about Piper’s own marriage—admissions that make his counsel to other struggling spouses even harder to accept.

In the foreword, Noël Piper says she and John are nearly opposite in personality and do not live together “with hardly any conflict” (p. 9). During difficult periods, she asks how they became so unhappy (p. 10).

She asks:

“How in the world did we get into such a mess?”

“What happened to make us feel this kind of disagreement and
unhappiness?”

She is asking the right questions, but the book never gives answers.

Her account of their twenty-fifth anniversary is worse. While guests congratulated them, their smiles were a “veneer we were all too used to.”
Noël privately imagined choosing an alias and “bolting for miles.” She stayed after an older woman assured her that the first twenty-five years were the hardest (p. 10).

That is not ordinary marital frustration. Women in healthy marriages may argue with their husbands, endure difficult seasons, and sometimes feel deeply disappointed. But they do not ordinarily describe anniversary smiles as a habitual façade, fantasize about disappearing under another name, or explain staying by saying they were told the first twenty-five years were the hardest.

Noël does call John an “amazing husband,” says he knows and loves her, and refers to him as her “favorite preacher.” But she offers almost no concrete examples of the kindness, tenderness, sacrificial care, or pursuit of her good that would explain what makes him an amazing husband. Her distress is described in detail; his virtues are largely vague.

Edition reviewed: John Piper, This Momentary Marriage (2009, first edition). All quotations and page references are from the first edition. Noël’s foreword in the latest edition is still the same.

The Closest She Comes

• She calls him an “amazing husband.”
• She says he is “the one who knew me, yet loved me still.”
• She says she sometimes wonders why he paid attention to her and asked
  her to marry him.
• She recalls one especially happy vacation when they enjoyed reading,
  talking, walking, worshiping, playing Scrabble, and simply being
  together.

But Notice What Is Missing

In the book, she never says things like:

• “John patiently listened to me.”
• “He sacrificed for me.”
• “He protected me.”
• “He pursued reconciliation.”
• “He comforted me.”
• “He apologized.”
• “He made me feel cherished.”
• “He consistently put my needs before his own.”

She does not describe him with specific qualities Scripture especially associates with a godly husband, such as:

• loving her sacrificially;
• nourishing and cherishing her;
• showing her honor;
• living with her in an understanding way;
• being gentle and not harsh;
• being patient and kind;
• protecting and caring for her;
• seeking her good;
• laying down his own interests for her; and
• being concerned with how to please her.

Those are the kinds of concrete examples readers often expect after hearing someone called an “amazing husband.”

Then John provides his own clues. He calls their marriage a journey through “wonders and wounds” and admits it has “not been trouble-free.”
His imagined picture of success is remarkably modest: reaching old age, sitting across from Noël at Old Country Buffet, and saying, “We made it” (p. 17).

Survival becomes the measure of success.

Elsewhere, the Pipers compare marital offenses to piles of manure that spouses should shovel aside instead of camping beside (pp. 59–60). John also acknowledges periods of serious strain and thanks friends who supported them through their hardest seasons (pp. 179–180).

Taken together, these passages portray a marriage marked by recurring pain, concealed unhappiness, support from trusted friends during difficult seasons, and endurance.

None of this proves that either Piper was abusive. But it does reveal a marriage with substantial conflict and pain. Piper acknowledges serious pain and sin in the marriage, but the book contains no clear personal confession such as, “I hurt Noël,” “I was wrong,” or “I apologized and made amends.” The injuries remain unnamed and responsibility remains shared or abstract.

Piper’s Theology Leads to Survival Instead of Mutual Care

His sexual teaching adds another danger. When a wife does not want sex, Piper tells her to “give it anyway” unless extraordinary circumstances exist.

The double standard is difficult to ignore. In the book, Piper’s own marriage is presented as complex enough to require concealment, loyal friends, endurance, and generous interpretation. His readers’ marriages can become occasions for a cavalry charge of doctrinal pressure.

In contrast, 1 Corinthians 7 cuts against any view of marriage that reduces it to bare endurance. The apostle Paul says that a married man should be concerned with “how to please his wife,” and a married woman with “how to please her husband” (1 Corinthians 7:33–34).

Marriage, in 1 Corinthians 7, creates real obligations of care, attention, and mutual concern. If a person is unwilling to seek the good of a spouse, then marriage is not a calling he should undertake. A theology that praises lifelong permanence while neglecting whether spouses are loved, protected, and pleased has missed something essential in Paul’s teaching.

John Piper’s Emphasis on (Literal) Martyrdom Over Love in Marriage

This Momentary Marriage begins not with biblical companionship, mutual care, or a husband’s duty to nourish and cherish his wife, but with martyrdom. In the intro, Piper tells the stories of three Christian ministry couples who died while carrying out their callings—though, in a broader sense, every faithful Christian eventually dies while living out their calling. He then invokes texts about living as though one had no wife, leaving family for the kingdom, costly obedience, expected suffering, and enemies within one’s own household. The opening on pages 13-16 conditions readers to interpret marriage primarily through sacrifice and endurance before helping them distinguish ordinary hardship from suffering caused by cruelty, domination, or abuse.

Piper quotes, “Let those who have wives live as though they had none” (1 Cor. 7:29), but the apostle Paul is not endorsing neglect. The surrounding passage teaches that the present age is temporary: mourners, buyers, and those engaged with the world should all live as though these things are not ultimate. Yet in the same chapter, Paul says married people must be concerned with how to please their spouses. Marriage creates real obligations of attention and care. That is precisely why Paul presents singleness as preferable for those seeking undivided freedom for ministry.

The apostle Paul’s point is not, “Marry, then act as though your wife does not matter.” It is that marriage is temporary, but while it lasts, spouses owe one another genuine concern. Piper emphasizes the verse that limits marriage’s ultimate significance while underplaying the same chapter’s demand for practical marital care.

These verses can also be used very easily to teach wives that they should expect little from marriage so their husbands can devote themselves to ministry. “Live as though you had no wife,” combined with texts about leaving family, costly obedience, suffering, and household enemies, can be heard as: Your needs are secondary. Do not interfere with his calling. Expect sacrifice, not attention. If you feel neglected, that may simply be the cost of serving God.

What is solidly documented from Piper’s own material:

• In 2007, he wrote that holding hands with Noël “often it is a sign of truce.”
• In 2010, he took an eight-month leave because of concerns involving his “soul, marriage, family, and ministry.” He also said the marriage was “rock solid” in commitment but admitted that this was not necessarily an “emotionally satisfying” description. Desiring God later described that leave as a “soul check” involving marriage, fathering, worship, and public life.