Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" Ghettos and barrios and abusive homes and trauma wards may produce scarred souls; they can cripple more human spirits than they strengthen. "

Related Quotes:

" Sometimes in churches somebody will discover a particular vein of spirituality and seek to recruit others into it, or assume a superior position because they have found certain techniques - but no one actually wants to become like them. "

" The toppling of idols - even respectable, admired, best-practice, fastest-growing idols - is always the road to liberation. "

" We call an obsession with having someone's approval 'co-dependency;' the Bible's word for it is idolatry. A country can be an idol. A family can be an idol. "

" Those of us who preach the Scriptures, along with being nourished by it ourselves, have to figure out along with our congregations how we can incarnate the gospel in our community, or we will preach to a religious ghetto. "

" The church is in the hope business. "

" Sin is, somehow, at the root of all human misery. Sin is what keeps us from God and from life. It is in the face of every battered woman, the cry of every neglected child, the despair of every addict, the death of every victim of every war. "

" The hurried can become unhurried. But it will not happen by trying alone, nor will it happen instantly. You will have to enter a life of training. "

" Spiritual formation is for everyone. Just as there is an 'outer you' that is being formed and shaped all the time, like it or not, by accident or on purpose, so there is an 'inner you.' You have a spirit. And it's constantly being shaped and tugged at: by what you hear and watch and say and read and think and experience. "

" A bad sermon is like a car wreck - everyone slows down to see what happened. "

" Women are the first witnesses to the resurrection and pillars of the early church. "

" You can only love and be loved to the extent that you know and are known by somebody. "

" There are usually multiple messages that could be preached from the same text. "

" As a preacher who is fully human, and clearly not divine, I can't speak as Jesus did. But I do seek to speak truth that carries weight and authority. All of us who preach the gospel aspire to speak under the authority of Jesus. "

" The church is in the hope business. We, of all people, ought to be known most for our hope because our hope is founded on something deeper than human ability or wishful thinking. "

" I am a political junkie. During a presidential campaign, I will often buy a couple of newspapers a day just to keep up. "

" I hate how spiritual formation gets positioned as an optional pursuit for a small special interest group within the church. "

" It strikes me that presidential campaigns can often bring out the worst as well as the best in us. "

" As a preacher, my charge is to proclaim the message of the Scriptures. To help the people in my congregation become a people of the book. I love getting to do this. "

" The New Testament doesn't present Jesus as a single man to cover up his humanity. It presents him as a single man because... he was a single man. "

" I know that those of us who go into church work are to regard ourselves as servants, are to offer our lives as a gift. "

" In the context of worship, amusement is a waste of time and a waste of life, and therefore a form of sin. "

" Prudence is foresight and far-sightedness. It's the ability to make immediate decisions on the basis of their longer-range effects. "

" People cheer the Bible, buy the Bible, give the Bible, own the Bible - they just don't actually read the Bible. "

" Some leaders are not intimidated by opposition; they actually thrive on it. It wakes them up. It energizes them. It calls them to battle. It causes them to mobilize their thoughts and energy. "

" In community, we discover who we really are and how much transformation we still require. This is why I am irrevocably committed to small groups. Through them, we can accomplish our God-entrusted work to transform human beings. "

" Tithing is a bad ceiling but an excellent floor. "

" A healthy soul is whole and integrated. It is connected to God. A person with a healthy soul is at peace with God, with himself, and with other people. "

" I don't have a problem with delegation. I love to delegate. I am either lazy enough, or busy enough, or trusting enough, or congenial enough, that the notion leaving tasks in someone else's lap doesn't just sound wise to me, it sounds attractive. "

" I am struck by how quickly I am prone to judgmentalism. "

" The only true and lasting inspiration for life is genuine love for God, and submitted gratitude that I get to be a part of the redemptive quest. "