We must always be as intelligent, thorough, and clever as we can.
-Dallas Williard, Divine Conspiracy
Archive for the 'Bookstore' Category
“Violent revolutions, in this sense, aren’t revolutionary. Noisy regime changes are utterly predictable – bourth about by displays of power and hollow promises and indomitable wealth. In contrast, the message of Jesus may well be called the most revolutionary of all time…
“What other kind of revolution would possibly change the world? perhaps what’s crazy is what we’re doing and pursuing instead – thinking, after all these millennia, that hate can conquer hat, ware cure war, pride overcome pride, violence end violence, revenge stop revenge, and exclusion create cohesion. Perhaps we’re the crazy ones!”
The Secret Message of Jesus by Brian D. McClaren
The way we are with each other is the truest test of our faith. How I treat a brother or sister from day to day, how I react to the sin-scarred wino on the street, how I respond to interruptions from people I dislike, how I deal with normal people in their normal confusion on a normal day may be a better indication of my reverence for life than the anti-abortion sticker on the bumper of my car.
–Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel
He who is alone with his sins is utterly alone. it may be that Christians, not withstanding corporate worship, common prayer, and all their fellowship in service, may still be left to their loneliness. The final breakthrough to fellowship does not occur because, though they have fellowship with one another as believers and as devout people, they do not have fellowship as the undevout, as sinners. The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everyone must conceal his sin from himself and from their fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy. That fact is that we are sinners!
—Dietrich Bonhoeffer
God is turning the tin man into a real man, and the part that doesn’t like it is the part that is still tin.
-Dallas Willard, the Divine Conspiracy
I just finished Sex God, by Rob Bell. It was very good. I think it ended a little abruptly, but if you think of it more as a book to be thought provoking, rather than to express a complete thought, it’s great.
Anybody that is single or married should read it. Don’t let the title scare you. It’s really about that, but it’s not about that, it’s about something else.
Now I’m on to another book. We had a ton of Audible credits left about to expire, so I got Green Eggs and Ham and The Cat in the Hat and some other stories for the kids. I also got I Am Not but I Know I Am by Louie Giglio. It is good. There are a lot of good quotes that I have to keep rewinding to type out.
“We can cling to the starring roles in the little bitty story of us, or we can exchange our fleeting moment in the spotlight for a supporting role in the eternally beautiful epic that is the story of God.”
It is very unusual for me, but right now I’m re-reading Desiring God by John Piper. It’s really good stuff, but it is different than a lot of stuff I’ve been reading, and am currently listening to. I wish I could get in a room with N.T. Wright, Brian McLaren, and John Piper and ask them some questions…
Your job is the relentless pursuit of who God has made you to be. And anything else
you do is sin and you need to repent of it.
From p. 114, Velvet Elvis, by Rob Bell
These two quotes are from “Velvet Elvis” by Rob Bell, which you should go out and buy right now.
p, 144
God’s strength, not mine.
God’s power, not mine.
So what does this mean for the Christian life? To begin, Christians are people
learning who they are in Christ. We are being taught about our new identity. Do
you see how deeply this new identity affects the life of a community? I heard a
teacher say that if people were taught more about who they are, they wouldn’t
have to be told what to do. It would come naturally. When we see religious
communities spending most of their time trying to convince people not to sin,
we are seeing a community that has missed the point. The point isn’t sin management.
The point is who we are now.
p. 170
I am learning that the church has nothing to say to the world until it throws better parties.
By this I don’t necessarily mean balloons and confetti and clowns who paint
faces. I mean backyards and basements and porches. It is in the flow of real
life, in the places we live and move with the people we’re on the journey with,
that we are reminded it is God’s world and we’re going to be okay.
