305 results for tag: Quote for today
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 27, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“When the power and purity of the gospel is preached, religious authorities whose religion is based on law cannot restrain themselves. The response of legalistic religion to the gospel of grace includes thundering, emotional and high-volume-laced threats about the importance of working harder and doing more, being diligent and always giving more energy, time and money.”
Originally published in:
Letters to My Friends
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 24, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“By God’s mercy, we have freedom in Christ, but this freedom is not merely given to us that we might breathe clean, clear spiritual air now that we have been redeemed from the bondage of a religious prison. We are not free merely for ourselves, so that we might luxuriate in the life Jesus lives in us.
It is an incredible, unbelievable blessing to be free in Christ, but it’s not enough to give thanks for what has happened in our lives alone. Jesus is not the new Moses, setting us, as one of many captives, free, merely so that we might be free. There’s more to freedom in Christ ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 22, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“When Jesus came into this world, he was rejected by the most religious and pious and ‘righteous’ people because they simply could not accept a person who had no known ulterior motives. Jesus was happy to hang out with the last, the least and the lost. He wasn’t interested in ‘winning’ – he came to die, not to live as long as he possibly could. Jesus’s love was genuine and unconditional – he came to serve rather than with the expectation of being served.”
Originally published in:
Letters to My Friends
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 20, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“We are near to God, not because of our religion or race, we are close to God not because of our religious deeds and creeds, God is available to us because of Jesus. Up until the Cross of Christ, his resurrection and the new covenant, the Jews had been given a law by God. They felt that their law made them better and superior, though that was not God’s intent in giving them the law. They believed their law codes, the covenant of Sinai, and how they carefully obeyed that covenant meant that God loved them more.
The law with all its detailed ordinances of ceremonies and regulations ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 17, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“You may have heard the story of a ‘golf widow’ who asked her husband why he wasn’t golfing anymore with his former golfing partner, Bob. As he was headed out the door for the golf course, the husband responded to his wife, ‘Would you keep playing with a man who moved his golf ball a few feet closer to the hole when you weren’t watching?’ His wife was appalled. ‘Well, no, I wouldn’t.’ Her husband said, ‘Well, neither will Bob.’”
Originally published in:
Rejecting Religion – Embracing Grace
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 15, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“When introducing myself to an audience that does not know me, I often adapt the phrase customarily used in Alcoholics Anonymous – except I apply it to Not So Anonymous Legalists. ‘Hi, I’m Greg, and I’m a religious legalist.’ Of course, by God’s grace, much of my legalism is in the past. However, I never want to be so naïve as to think that legalism can never get its grimy tentacles on me again.
I am, by God’s grace, a recovering legalist. I have legalistic scars. I am as susceptible to religious legalism as a recovering alcoholic is to wine. Given the ever-pre...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 13, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Brainwashing does not depend on the overt imposition of physical restrictions, because it is subtle and covert. Those whose spiritual beliefs and values are subverted over a long period of time are often unaware of their plight – their predicament is somewhat like the proverbial frog in a kettle. They are oblivious of the dangers confronting them and are content to remain in a pot of water while the heat gradually increases until they are boiled alive.
People who are brainwashed and indoctrinated often experience a methodical process during which their values are sabotaged and corrupted ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 10, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“The most important spiritual need in our world today is for the image of God most people believe is true and authentic to be healed and transformed – so that they know who God really is, and who he is not.”
Originally published in:
Christianity Without the Religion magazine, June 2022
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 8, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“According to religious expectations and definitions, many of the parables of Jesus make the wrong person the hero. Who stars in the parables of Jesus? Who shines? The wasteful prodigal son, not the obedient elder brother – the good Samaritan (despised by religion) rather than Jewish rabbis (admired and honored by religion) – the scorned and reviled tax collector who did not even look up to heaven as he prayed rather than the righteous Pharisee – the poor, homeless beggar named Lazarus and not the rich man.”
Originally published in:
Wonders of His Grace
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 6, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“During a recent visit to a local university campus, I happened to pick up the Borzoi College Reader published in 1966. I discovered the volume was a collection of short essays and stories, by distinguished and recognized authors, separated into sections designed to acquaint college students with important issues of their world, as well as introduce them to superb examples of writing and thinking.
One of the essays was titled ‘The Morning They Did It’ by E.B. White – first published in The New Yorker in 1950. White was a prolific writer who contributed a regular column for Harpers ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 3, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Many sources contribute to what we know and what we think we know about God. If you’re like me, you were taught what to think about God from sources you trusted as unimpeachable, like religious authorities and their churches. Sadly, in some cases we found out later we had been bamboozled. Don’t you just hate it when you have been bamboozled?
So when you want to know more about God, as that great line from the 1984 movie Ghostbusters plaintively asked, ‘Who you gonna’ call?’
After reviewing the spiritual adventures, detours and wild goose chases I have taken thus far in life, I have ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
August 1, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Should we do good things? Of course. Should we exhort and encourage one another to do the right things? Yes. Should we browbeat and threaten one another about the consequences of not doing the right things? No. Should we imply that doing right things gains us some standing with God that we would otherwise not have enjoyed? No. Do many in Christendom promise that our reward, our standing with God and God’s opinion of us will increase if we do more of the right things? Yes. Should they, according to the gospel? No.”
Originally published in:
Between Religious Rocks and Life’s Hard ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 30, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“As Luther studied the book of Romans, God enlightened him, and Martin Luther came to see that the Cross of Christ had set him free from trying to make himself worthy and acceptable to God. Luther came to see that Jesus made him worthy and acceptable, and that he, Martin Luther, was free to rest in the mercy, favor and grace of God – because of the work of Jesus on the Cross.
In the aftermath of religion, Martin Luther discovered Jesus, and as it turned out, so did tens of millions of others who followed him. Martin Luther and so many others, by God’s grace have discovered the good news ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 27, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Legalism infects every human being. We default to legalism. We resist grace, and, like iron filings to a magnet or moths to a light bulb we find ourselves fatally attracted to religious pills, potions and prescriptions. Legalism is a virus. It is a particular weakness of anyone who has been previously weakened by its relentless attacks – like an alcoholic or malaria survivor. Legalism leaves scar tissue.”
Originally published in:
Bad News Religion
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 25, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“The dressing room door opens, and Karen walks out. She is just as beautiful as she was when I waited for her to walk down the aisle on a summer day in England just over 41 years ago. But, now, the summer of 2010, she is wearing a hospital-provided blue smock. As our eyes meet, the technicians say they are ready.
We walk through a massive, one-foot-thick steel door into the radiation chamber. It’s a large room, about the size of a handball or squash court, dominated by the overwhelming presence of a Trilogy Linear Accelerator. The Trilogy is a state-of-the-art machine used by radiation oncolog...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 23, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Jesus threw huge parties when people came to listen to him teach and preach. On several occasions those who turned out to hear Jesus became hungry. So Jesus created, with a few fish and loaves of bread, a huge picnic for thousands of people (John 6:1-15). And of course, we read in the book of Revelation about the wedding supper of the Lamb, the splendid celebration thrown by the groom for his bride (Revelation 19:5-9).
…I believe that life lived in the presence of God is pure joy, not frugal obligation, not dour requirements, but joy without end. This is not to say we don’t ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 20, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Legalism is the ‘foundation’ of spiritual cosmetics. It compels us to put on an act to impress others who are themselves putting on an act to impress us. The act we put on may be good – the actions and behaviors may be good things to do, but we are doing them for the wrong reasons – and in the process we become spiritual imposters.”
Originally published in:
Bad News Religion
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 18, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“Grace is like water and rain, but it is also like the wind. We have no idea where wind comes from but there is no doubt that wind is also a metaphor of God’s grace – The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit (John 3:8)…The grace of God is like pollen carried by the wind, spreading life. The grace of God is like the wind filling our sails.”
Originally published in:
Wonders of His Grace
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Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 16, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“There’s an old story about the latest group of new arrivals in heaven who were huddled together in front of the pearly gates, waiting for St. Peter to greet them and welcome them inside. A few adventurous ones climbed up on the wrought iron fence, peering through, trying to see what heaven was really like.
Suddenly, those who were looking through the fence saw someone who they all remembered as a great sinner on earth. The new arrivals were scandalized. One person demanded, ‘What’s he doing here?’ Another new arrival said, ‘After all I went through to get here and after all my hard work, now ...
Reflections Along the Jesus Way
July 13, 2023 - Quote for the Day:
“The Bible does not guarantee that our lives in this flesh will consist of us skipping through some idyllic park, ice cream cones in hand. God’s plan for us is not centered on the here and now. This life is not all there is. There is more to life than what we see and understand and experience. God’s plan is primarily concerned with eternity, not the earthly days and daze of our lives.”
Originally published in:
Between Religious Rocks and Life’s Hard Places
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