Reactivity Quotes

“Our culture of reactivity is a culture of tribalism. The message we communicate is, “I don’t respect you because I don’t respect your tribe, so I will respond to you in ways that I would never think of responding to someone in my tribe.” This means I live in a tribal culture of groupthink and group do, never benefiting from the challenging and potentially transforming insights from someone from another tribe. We are too divided, separated into racial, political, theological, ethnic, economic, gender, age, and class groups. We build walls not bridges. We yell over the wall at one another, but we don’t stop to listen, consider, and learn. We make uninformed assumptions that turn potential helpers into enemies while thinking we know best and, because we do, we don’t need “them.” We even react against our own when we think they are building bridges and not shoring up our walls. Tribalism produces endless war and leaves lots of casualties but never produces the community that is essential if we are ever going to grow to be what God intended us to be and together live as he created us to live.”
― Paul David Tripp, Reactivity: How the Gospel Transforms Our Actions and Reactions

“Love of others is not natural for us. Because of the selfism of sin, humble people-helping and God-honoring love is always the result of divine intervention. As John says, the reason we have any ability whatsoever to love one another is because we have first been loved by God (1 John 4:19).”
― Paul David Tripp, Reactivity: How the Gospel Transforms Our Actions and Reactions