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Havel reminded the Czech people that “the line between good and evil did not run clearly between ‘them’ and ‘us,’ but through each person.”
In many places we simply assume that God values effectiveness as much as we do.
“What have you done for me lately?” could be the mantra of the LIFE FROM GOD posture.
When the accolades that give pastors a sense of significance cease or never come at all, some pastors begin to nurse secret pleasures on the side to numb their pain.
They don’t ask because that might slow things down.
Pouring our lives into a mission that we believe pleases God is not the center of the Christian life.
While the sons were fixated on their father’s wealth, the father was fixated on his sons.
We affirm that Christ is indeed Immanuel, God with us,
If we peeled back the physical and metaphysical layers of time and space and peered into the very core of the universe, we would not discover divine will, natural law, personal desire, or global mission. Instead we would find God existing in eternal relationship with himself.
In other words, God would cease to be how we acquire our treasure, and he would become our treasure.
LIFE WITH GOD entails all three—treasuring, uniting, and experiencing.
in many presentations of the Christian message, uniting with God (being reconciled through the cross) is divorced from any notion of treasuring God.
The gospel is not a way to get people to heaven; it is a way to get people to God.
Faith is the opposite of seeking control. It is surrendering control.
love—a genuine desire to will what is good for our enemies as well as for our neighbors?
But as we travel each path, we are not simply looking for a way of relating to God, we are also looking for ourselves. How we understand God and his cosmos ultimately informs how we understand our own identities. • Am I a sinner—a despicable being, living under the constant threat of God’s wrath and punishment, who must appease his will through strict obedience to moral and ritual commands (LIFE UNDER GOD)? • Am I a manager—an autonomous being who has been given a divine manual for operating my life and world, and whose fate will ultimately rest upon how well I implement
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Who I really am, my truest self, my most intimate identity is something that will only be shared between me and my Creator.
John’s vision reveals countless multitudes living with God in a restored cosmos; a vibrant civilization of beauty, abundance, and order filling the earth. But amid the throngs there will continue to be a secret and intensely intimate communion shared only between each individual and God.
The goal of the examen is not to reflect on what could, should, or ought to have happened, but rather to be honest with yourself, with the Holy Spirit’s help, about what did happen and how you actually felt.
