Michael Peterson > Michael's Quotes

“The history of mankind is crowded with evidences proving that physical coercion is not adapted to moral regeneration, and that the sinful dispositions of men can be subdued only by love; that evil can be exterminated only by good; that it is not safe to rely upon the strength of an arm to preserve us from harm; that there is great security in being gentle, long-suffering, and abundant in mercy; that it is only the meek who shall inherit the earth; for those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You

“Learn to say 'no' to the good so you can say 'yes' to the best.”
― John C. Maxwell

“Jesus proclaimed, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” (Matt. 5:9). Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us, “True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is the presence of justice.”46”
― Jim Wallis, America's Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America

“This is what we are called to be: a community characterized by radical, revolutionary, Calvary-quality love; a community that manifests the love of the triune God (John 17:21–26); a community that strives for justice not by conquering but by being willing to suffer; a community that God uses to transform the world by providing it with an alternative to its own self-centered, violent way of existing.”
― Gregory A. Boyd, The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church

“Why would these people do this for us?” This is the question the church ought to be continually raising in people’s minds by its radical service to the world.13”
― Gregory A. Boyd, The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church

“With reckless abandon, therefore, we are to manifest God’s unconditional love by ascribing unsurpassable worth to all people at all times in all conditions.”
― Gregory A. Boyd, The Myth of a Christian Religion: Losing Your Religion for the Beauty of a Revolution

“Our Kingdom call is to revolt against the Powers by dismantling the hierarchy of privilege, rejecting all racial stereotypes and judgments, forging meaningful relationships across ethnic lines, and submitting ourselves to one another as we listen, learn, and follow one another.”
― Gregory A. Boyd, The Myth of a Christian Religion: Losing Your Religion for the Beauty of a Revolution

“Christianity can be built around isolating ourselves from evildoers and sinners, creating a community of religious piety and moral purity. That’s the Christianity I grew up with. Christianity can also be built around joining with the broken sinners and evildoers of our world crying out to God, groaning for grace. That’s the Christianity I have fallen in love with. In”
― Shane Claiborne, The Irresistible Revolution, Updated and Expanded: Living as an Ordinary Radical

“If you have the gift of frustration and the deep sense that the world is a mess, thank God for that; not everyone has that gift of vision. It also means that you have a responsibility to lead us in new ways.”
― Shane Claiborne, The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical

“Sometimes folks ask this question about giving to beggars and panhandlers with suspicion, speculating that homeless folks will just use their money for drugs or alcohol, which happens sometimes. But we don’t always ask what CEOs are doing with our money when we give it to their companies, and they may also be buying drugs or pornography (or yachts) with our money! In”
― Shane Claiborne, The Irresistible Revolution, Updated and Expanded: Living as an Ordinary Radical

“In the words of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, “Human nature only really exists in an achieved community of minds.”
― Alena Graedon, The Word Exchange

“Billy Graham once said, “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, God’s job to judge, and my job to love.” Perhaps”
― Rachel Held Evans, Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church

“But if the world is watching, we might as well tell the truth. And the truth is, the church doesn’t offer a cure. It doesn’t offer a quick fix. The church offers death and resurrection. The church offers the messy, inconvenient, gut-wrenching, never-ending work of healing and reconciliation. The church offers grace. Anything else we try to peddle is snake oil. It’s not the real thing. As”
― Rachel Held Evans, Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church

“The annoying thing about being human is that to be fully engaged with the world, we must be vulnerable. And the annoying thing about being vulnerable is that sometimes it means we get hurt.”
― Rachel Held Evans, Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church

“Frederick Douglass wrote in his autobiography, “Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference — so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ; I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity.”
― Shane Claiborne, Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals

“I do not tire of telling everyone, especially young people who long for their people’s liberation, that I admire their social and political sensitivity, but it saddens me when they waste it by going on ways that are false. Let us, too, all take notice that the great leader of our liberation is the Lord’s Anointed One, who comes to announce good news to the poor, to give freedom to the captives, to give news of the missing, to give joy to so many homes in mourning, so that society may be renewed as in the sabbatical years of Israel.”
― Shane Claiborne, Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals

“Our idea of diplomacy is showing up with a gun in one hand and a sandwich in the other and asking which you’d prefer.”
― Jim Butcher, Turn Coat