The Way of the Lord Quotes

“To suggest, therefore, that as Christians we should support the state of Israel because it is the fulfilment of prophecy is, in a quite radical way, to cut off the branch on which we are sitting. It is directly analogous to the mistake of the Galatians, who thought that if they were members of Abraham’s family they should go the whole way and get circumcised. It is similar to the mistake of which the Reformers accused the mediaeval Catholics, of supposing that in every Mass they were actually re-crucifying Jesus, when Jesus’ death had been once and for all, never to be repeated, on Calvary. It is a way of saying that in the cross and resurrection God did not actually fulfil his whole saving purpose; that Jesus did not in fact achieve the fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy; that his resurrection was not the start of God’s new age; that Acts is wrong, Romans is wrong, Galatians is wrong, the letter to the Hebrews is wrong, Revelation is wrong. Say that if you like, but don’t claim to be Christian in doing so.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“In the Lord, your labour is not in vain: what you do here in faith will stand, will last.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“Many people, including many Christians, live out their lives under a weight of unforgivenness, blaming themselves for things that have gone wrong in their lives, blaming other people, particularly parents, children and spouses, for things that have gone wrong, feeling the weight of everyone else doing the same thing to them. Many people live with a sense of great obligation: obligation to God, to be impossibly perfect; obligation to other people, to be everything they need all the time; obligation to themselves, to achieve the highest results and position they possibly can. And since these obligations are usually impossible to attain, we live out our lives under a burden of guilt. Often people whom others regard as happy and sunny, outgoing and successful, are crippled inside with a sense of failure and inadequacy. And then there are, of course, the real sins, the real shortcomings: the violent temper, the sexual wrongdoings, the subtle cheating and lying and financial trickery to which most are tempted and many are prone. And over all this sorry mess, guilt both real and imaginary, is written the words, ‘It is finished.’ Jesus has dealt with it. The only reason for hanging on to that guilt and sense of failure is if you want to stop being one of Jesus’ friends. If you are a friend, you are a forgiven friend. Calvary achieved it. When you are invited to walk the way of the cross you are invited to do so as a forgiven friend. You’ve got nothing to prove any more. The only person worth trying to please loves you already so much that he died for you. If you are one of Jesus’ friends, every breath you take you should breathe in that sense of relief, of letting the past go, of forgiveness. That is the birthright of all who travel the way of the cross. This is the reality to be inserted into the tissue of the rest of our life.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“We are the people called into Passiontide, into Gethsemane-tide, into prayer and fasting, into betrayal and suffering, into the ambiguous and agonizing position of wrestling with the purposes of God, into knowing that we might have got it wrong, into wondering in anguish if maybe there’s a different way after all, into being misunderstood by friends and family, into fightings without and fears within. The disciples fell asleep in the garden; we are called to stay awake, to be alert, to see what the issues are and what stand must be taken, to do business with the one Jesus called Abba, Father, even if voices all around us, and even within us, tell us we might be getting it all horribly wrong.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today

“If your vocation, your God-given path, should lead you in the way of pain, your own or someone else’s, that may itself be a sign that you are called to make another journey up the mountain, to glimpse the vision of glory once more and to gather fresh strength for the journey. The first thing Jesus had to do on coming down the mountain was to heal a demon-possessed boy. The final thing he had to do was to go to Jerusalem and die. But he did the one and the other strengthened and encouraged by what had happened on the mountain. From the top of the mountain you can see the villages and lanes of the way ahead laid out before you. When you go down to the valley, you need to remember what you saw on the mountain, if you are not to lose your way.”
― N.T. Wright, The Way of the Lord: Christian Pilgrimage Today