Brian Mackey > Brian's Quotes

“In this digital age, the claims made about the power of a mere book seem almost preposterous. Yet Christians are asked to believe that God, working through Scripture, can do mighty works. Consider the biblical call to grow in love. How can we do this? A common answer is that we become more adept at loving by loving-by doing acts of love-and there is real wisdom in that response. Yet we know that merely trying to love does not lead to love. Love is a cultivated disposition that
flourishes when our minds are trained to honor loving thoughts and our bodies are trained toward loving acts. Lectio divina can help us grow in love by experiencing God's true and healing love as we meditate on his Word and by learning to pay attention to the roots of love-our thoughts.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Soon after the New Testament was completed, Christians
were reading their Bibles for joy and transformation, as a way of simply being present with God. This practice of the devotional reading of Scripture was especially popular among those who retreated to the deserts for prayer and renewal. By the fourth century, much of the Christian church accepted the practice of the devotional reading of Scripture. Lectio divina-as this practice was named-immersed people in the reading of Scripture, and yet the point was to do the reading in the context of prayer and meditation. The point was to employ the Scriptures as a doorway into transforming intimacy.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Both experience and the Scriptures themselves teach us that the Bible is a powerful book, a life-changing book. But simply because the Bible is such a powerful book, it has been powerfully misused to cause great harm on earth.
• Bible passages have been quoted by men to justify the abuse of their wives and children.
• Bible teachings have been distorted by politicians to justify the pollution of the earth.
• Bible stories have been retold by church leaders to justify the hatred of other peoples.
It is so easy to acknowledge (rightly) the divine origin and authority of Scripture only to associate (wrongly) our own private agendas with some part of it.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“The Spirit of God, being divine, oversees this inspiration process such that the words and expression of Scripture are both naturally and authentically the words of the different writers and just what God wants to say. We listen through the words of people to the voice of God. And because it is the word of God, we must listen to these human words with profound care.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“God in his love has chosen to reveal himself. We understand God to be self-sufficient and not in need of our gifts and service. God is not "served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things" (Acts 17:25). He has chosen to speak to us because he desires to be in relationship with us-he desires to make friends with us.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“We describe people who reveal something of themselves to us as "open." Open captures an important dimension of what we call revelation. The term revelation is derived from the Latin word revelatio, and it means "uncovering." Something that was hidden has been opened or uncovered for us to see. We are unable to know God directly through our observations-unless he makes the first move, and he has done just that.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“As we read the Bible, we find instructions, moral teachings, images and history. In and through these different writings, we learn of God's active involvement in human affairs. We can perceive God acting with relationship to us even as we read the writings of Scripture. We not only read about God's blessings, we receive blessing; we do not just overhear the Father telling Jesus that he is the beloved of God, we also hear those words about Jesus spoken to us.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Relationship with God is not only expressed in the creation of Scripture, it is also part of the intention of Scripture. Consider that to understand Romans as Paul would have wanted his letter understood is to grasp the kinds of ordinary human changes-in thought, feeling, action-encouraged in it. Also consider that the book of Revelation is designed to enthrall us in the imagination of heaven and to adjust our lives accordingly. The denunciations of the prophets are structured to grip us with a sense of condemnation and sincere repentance.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“When Moses heard the voice of God, he shook with terror and hid his face in the folds of his robe. Why? Because he was about to receive a couple of chapters of the book of Exodus? No! He was awestruck because the voice he heard made real and immediate the presence of the Holy One of Israel. In the words, Moses met God. And so can we.”
― Chris Webb, The Fire of the Word: Meeting God on Holy Ground

“It is only natural for the human mind to follow verbal and conceptual triggers. One "hook word" associates with author Jean Leclercq described words in monastic reading that link passages or ideas-and the understanding of a passage builds not through logical analysis but rather through a not-entirely-random accumulation of passages, ideas and experiences surrounding the passage at hand. Psychologists who study the human brain and nervous system speak about the development and spread of neural networks. Our mind naturally tends to follow associations that are strongly connected.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“What about the passages where Scripture appears to be contradictory or those difficult matters we discover in our reading? One suggestion for our reading at these points is to rest in what we do know, trusting God (perhaps through others) to illumine us concerning what we don't know.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Another way of looking at our experience of difficulty in the text of Scripture is to receive our struggle as an inviting challenge from God. Thomas Merton suggested,
For most people, the understanding of the Bible is, and should be, a struggle: not merely to find meanings that can be looked up in books of reference, but to come to terms personally with the stark scandal and contradiction in the Bible itself. It should not be our aim merely to explain these contradictions away, but rather to use them as ways to enter into the strange and paradoxical world of meanings and experiences that are beyond us and yet often extremely and mysteriously relevant to us.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Too often we seem to have the idea that submission to Scripture means that we first come to see it as reasonable and then submit to it, but submission means, in part, a willingness to bend the knee in faith to things that are not fully resolved in our mind.”
― James C. Wilhoit, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into Ordinary Life

“Gregory’s words remain a sharp and timely rebuke to the continuing temptation to practice theology as though we could separate the exercise of our mind from the development of our character.”
― Christopher A. Hall, Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers