God’s intention is not to become the feel-good Father of a myriad of isolated individuals who appropriate the Christian faith as yet another avenue toward personal enlightenment.–Joseph Hellerman

For Paul, the church is a family

God, In Jesus’ great work of redemption, was not establishing a series of isolated personal relationships with His individual followers. He was creating a family of sons and daughters – siblings – who are now “all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28). The saving work of Christ therefore has a corporate, as well as an individual, dimension. For Paul, the church is a family. – Joseph Hellerman

He did not come to bring peace, but a revolution…

Jesus Christ has irreparably changed the world.

When preached purely, His Word exalts, frightens, shocks, and forces us to reassess our whole life. The gospel breaks our train of thought, shatters our comfortable piety, and cracks open our capsule truths. The flashing spirit of Jesus Christ breaks new paths everywhere. His sentences stand like quivering swords of flame because He did not come to bring peace, but a revolution. The gospel is not a children’s fairy tale, but rather a cutting-edge, rolling-thunder, convulsive earthquake in the world of the human spirit.

God himself in his especially personal and self-giving aspect

The Spirit is not some magical, mysteriously supernatural aura of a dynamistic kind, nor a magical being of an animistic kind, but God himself in his especially personal and self-giving aspect: as a power which creates life. The Spirit is God himself, a merciful power establishing his reign over man’s heart, over the whole of man, inwardly present to man and apparent in his workings to man’s human spirit. Hans Kung, The Church

The Parched Ground of Our Souls

Because we approach the gospel with preconceived notions of what it should say rather than what it does say, the Word no longer falls like rain on the parched ground of our souls. - Brennan Manning, The Furious Longing of God

Authentic Living

“When the imitation of Christ does not mean to live like Christ, but to live your life as authentically as Christ lived his, then there are many ways and forms in which a man can be a Christian.”  - Henri Nouwen, The Wounded Healer

Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love...

23      Some went down to the sea in ships,
    doing business on the mighty waters;
24      they saw the deeds of the LORD,
    his wondrous works in the deep.
25      For he commanded and raised the stormy wind,
    which lifted up the waves of the sea.
26      They mounted up to heaven, they went down to the depths;
    their courage melted away in their calamity;
27      they reeled and staggered like drunkards,
    and were at their wits’ end.
28      Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
    and he brought them out from their distress;
29      he made the storm be still,
    and the waves of the sea were hushed.
30      Then they were glad because they had quiet,
    and he brought them to their desired haven.
31      Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
    for his wonderful works to humankind.
32      Let them extol him in the congregation of the people,
    and praise him in the assembly of the elders. (Ps. 107:23-32 NRSV).