God is a Gift Quotes

“New covenant victory does not begin with doing but with seeing. God's presence is a gift. Therefore, God's nearness is something we perceive, not something we achieve. We overcome when we see that Jesus is in the darkest room in the house, too. The whole house belongs to Him.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Sometimes, in the midst of our trials, we think that God's greatest desire is for us to hold on; we believe He is testing our faith. And if our faith is big enough and we hold on to the promise without letting go, God will get us through our troubles. Little do we know that if our eyes are on "our faith," our eyes are still on ourselves. We are robbing God of His glory by trying to be worthy of the gift.
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When we reach the end of "our faith" we can see what true faith is. It is seeing that God holds on to us. Even if we let go, God does not. Humble faith is seeing that Christ's victory has trumped our ability to fail; He is the Victor. There are no exceptions.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“For many generations, God was preparing His people to recieve their Messiah. But as Paul testified, when it was time for the new covenant to swallow up the old, many refused to let go of the shadow for the substance.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“The Old Tesatment is filled with physical representations of the spiritual realities of Christ. And it is interesting that God said the historical events and the things people could see with their eyes were only the shadow. Unseen things, or spiritual matters, were the substance.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“The torn veil is a reminder of God's triumph, and we must be humble in this fact. But human arrogance takes many forms. One is to believe closeness to God is our achievement. Another is to believe our weaknesses and failures can undo what God has done. Contempt for our brother and "us" and "them" thinking also violates the new covenant.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“The death and resurrection of Christ totally changed the dynamics of walking with God. Under the new covenant, the emphasis changed from our works to the Christ's finished work. We still have work to do in the Kingdom of God, but much of that work is in changing our minds. Our perspective must change from getting there to being there, from doing to being, and from working to resting.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Aloneness is the greatest consequence of rejecting God's gift.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Love triumphs by not ceasing in the face of evil, because love's only defeat is in no longer loving.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“We [should] make it our goal not to get everyone on the same page but to love those with whom we disagree. In doing so, God will open our eyes to truth that goes beyond being right.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“We often equate "knowing" with having our facts straight and believe we can come to know something by reading a book or by listening to a teacher's lecture. To the ancients this alone was not knowing; to them, knowing was participating in and partaking of something. For example, when the Bible says a man "knew his wife," it was not saying he had read a book about her!”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Any efforts to corral or obtain God, whether through good behavior or good understanding, invariably lead to self-righteousness. ...

If our advanced understanding leads us to hate, what good is it? Great wisdom should not cause us to devalue our brother; it should open our eyes to our brother's worth. If we think understanding the Bible makes us better than our brother, we do not understand the Bible at all.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Religion often opposes God because of its tendency to focus on self-righteousness. Self-righteousness ... is man's attempt to gain what God has already given, and that is the antithesis of the gift. If we trust in ourselves that we are righteous, we cannot trust Christ to be our righteousness.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“It is curious that two of God's "to do" instructions are to forgive and to give. "Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you..." (Luke 6:37-38). At first glance, it might appear that Jesus is putting us under the system where we earn our standing with God. But does our giving turn the Lord into a giver? Does forgiving others make Him forgive us? ...

Christ never meant His kingdom teaching to lead to such conclusions. His sayings are not just commandments; they are a picture of a life connected to God. God IS a giver and a forgiver. The Lord's great gift to us is Himself, and if God is our gift, so is a giving and forgiving heart. ...

Jesus compares God's kingdom to a party or feast in several places in the Gospels. Giving and forgiving are our way of joining the party, and the party is not just for us, but for our neighbor--for all. Giving and forgiving do not change God; they change us.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“It is obvious that the serpent wanted Adam and Eve to disobey God, but he had an even more sinister objective: he wanted to steal the gift. He wanted to steal God from God's beloved, and he did so by offering a substitute. ... It's essence was not just evil but INDEPENDENCE from God. ... In this, we see the nature of Satan. His desire is ... disunion.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“And the Lord God said, "It is not good that man should be alone..." (GENESIS 2:18)

If we are alone, our lives are miserable, no matter how many possessions we have. Our relationships are interconnected. And we cannot separate relationship with God from relationship with each other.

John tells us in his first epistle, "...everyone who loves is born of God and knows God." He connects knowing God with loving one another. To John, knowing God is not just getting our facts straight about the Lord; it is PARTAKING of God. In other words, loving is something we do not do alone. Loving our family, friends, and even our enemies is something we do together with the Lord. We participate in His love for our neighbor.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Let us ask not just for God's blessings; let us ask for God.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Our greatest conflicts with God are still over His gift, ... He is working not so much to get us to stop doing bad things as He is to get us to embrace His grace and live in it. It is His gift that transforms us into His image.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“There are two ways we can approach our relationship with the Lord. One is the way of religion; it says our nearness to God is our accomplishment. The second is the way of grace; on this path our closeness to God is Christ's accomplishment.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“Jesus said that the greatest commandment is to love God ... and we ... think that the way we accomplish this is to become someone God could love; we believe that if we become what God wants us to be then God will become what we want him to be.

Yet the New Testament presents a vastly different way of coming to love God. It begins not with doing ... but with knowing.

... The mature Christian is not someone who has learned to behave properly, but one who has come to know God.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace

“It is curious that two of God's "to do" instructions are to forgive and to give. "Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you..." (Luke 6:37-38). At first glance, it might appear that Jesus is putting us under the system where we earn our standing with God. But does our giving turn the Lord into a giver? Does forgiving others make Him forgive us? ...

Christ never meant His kingdom teaching to lead to such conclusions. His sayings are not just commandments; they are a picture of a life connected to God. God IS a giver and a forgiver. The Lord's great gift to us is Himself, and if God is our gift, so is a giving and forgiving heart. ...

Jesus compares God's kingdom to a party or feast in several places in the Gospels. Giving and forgiving are our way of joining the party, and the party is not just for us, but for our neighbor--for all. Giving and forgiving do not change God; they change us.”
― Doug A. Reed, God is a Gift: Learning to Live in Grace