301 results for tag: Quote for today

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 19, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning (John 1:1-2).  While many stories begin with the words ‘once upon a time’ John’s Christmas story, about eternity invading human time and space… begins with the words ‘in the beginning.’  Instead of telling us about ‘once upon a time’ the sense here is ‘once before time.’ John writes about ‘in the beginning’ – before time existed, before time began, before the creation of the world as we know it, and before God came into the world in the person of Jesus… He ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 17, 2023 - Quote for the Day:   “God, though what we call the Incarnation, came into our world in the person of Jesus.  Jesus came into our time-bound world from eternity.  The dilemma that the Incarnation presents for our human minds is that Jesus remained divine while becoming human.  He still inhabited boundless eternity, but he also inhabited the limitations of our world and what it means to be human.  He came into time.  He was born, lived, died on the cross and was resurrected.  He is now risen; He’s still in time as well as being outside of it.   The Book of Revelation is from ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 14, 2023 - Quote for the Day:   “How did this incredible and astounding story about God’s love incarnated for us become an orgy of eating, drinking, getting and grasping?  How did God’s love being born into our story become so devalued that many primarily understand its celebration as a time when they shop until they drop, spending money they do not have in a vain pursuit of buying love and proving their love to those they hold near and dear?... Sadly, a headlong pursuit of purchasing love for ourselves blurs and obscures the miracle, majesty and mystery of God’s love coming to this earth.  Here-today-and-go...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 12, 2023 - Quote for the Day:   “The Son of God was born into the world, not as a prince, but as a pauper.  So, to deck up the legendary scene of his nativity with precious hangings, pictures, glittering lamps and other ornamentation, is to destroy whatever valid symbolism it might otherwise have had.  Truly, we human beings have a wonderful facility for thus snatching fantasy from the jaws of truth. – Malcom Muggeridge Let us not think of Jesus as spiritual Prozac, designed to cure our depression by masking the symptoms but never offering a cure for the true problem.  May we not be seduced by the silly and ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 10, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  “Christmas is about God who, in the person of Jesus, came to us willing to confront the very worst of what it means to be human, and love us anyway.”  Originally published in: Letters to My Friends ------------------------------------- Help Us Help Others - Give Now

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 7, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  “She had never been with a man – not even the man she was going to marry.  As a bride-to-be, the teenage girl named Mary lived each day making plans, dreaming of the future and looking forward to her marriage.   Everything was ‘normal’ and her future seemed promising until an angel of the Lord appeared to her saying, she was ‘highly favored.’ … Having a child before she was married was not high on the list of things to which Mary aspired – giving birth to a child before marriage whose father was anyone other than Joseph, her fiancé, would be a disaster!” Originally published ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 5, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “… this season of the year reminds us that the future is not our enemy.  For Christians, the future is not a time to fear, it is not the place of death and defeat.  For as certainly as Jesus was born, he will come again.  Christ the Lord has come.  He has come to be one of us, born of the virgin Mary, born in humility and poverty.  He died on his Cross.  He rose from his tomb.  He is coming again!”  Originally published in: Spiritual Soup for the Hungry Soul, Volume 1 ------------------------------------- Help Us Help Others - Give Now

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

December 3, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  “That was God in that crib amidst the animal sounds and smells in Bethlehem, and that was God on that cross on the garbage dump just outside of Jerusalem.  God in a crib – God in human flesh – God in diapers – defenseless, crying and fighting for breath.  God on the cross, his flesh pierced and just as he was in his crib – defenseless and fighting for breath.  The crib and the cross, carved from the same wood – only God can make a tree.”  Originally published in: Letters to My Friends ------------------------------------- Help Us Help Others - Give Now

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 30, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “It is my contention – and you may choose to disagree – that legalistic religion has fabricated and invented eternal conscious torment as the way God will punish those who don’t measure up.  But in the next breath, after condemning people to eternal conscious torment, Christ-less religion will assure them, ‘But don’t forget, God loves you.’  Think about it:  Why is it so important for religion to believe that God loves its followers but wants those who are not members of their church to suffer? Why are so many churches within Christendom willing to extend one hand to ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 28, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “The teaching that God’s love is given to us, without strings attached, free of charge, goes against every human instinct.  All other religions – the Jewish old covenant, the Muslim code of law, the Buddhist eightfold path and the Hindu doctrine of karma all offer a way to earn God’s approval by human performance. Authentic, biblically based Christianity is unique in its teachings and beliefs that God’s love is given to us by faith alone, grace alone and Christ alone.” Originally published in: Spiritual Soup for the Hungry Soul, Volume 2 ----------------------------...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 26, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (John 1:17).  He didn’t come breathing fire.  He didn’t come filled with threats and condemnation.  He didn’t come so that we could receive lurid, detailed explanations of the eternal torture that surely awaits us if we don’t start obeying the law.  He didn’t come to reveal an angry and vindictive God.  Jesus came as a breath of fresh air.  He came, not to start another religion, but to begin a revolution that would eventually put religion out of business.”  Originally published in: Spiritual Soup for the Hungry Soul, Volume ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 23, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “When you begin reading a book, you don’t pick it up and start reading page 78, do you?  You know that there is no way you will be able to make sense of the plot, the story thread, the theme or the main characters if you just plunge into the story without understanding the background.  If you go to a movie, you try to arrive before it starts.  You don’t want to miss anything you will need to understand as the story unfolds. We all like to see movies from the very beginning, and we all know that it’s hopeless trying to read a 600-page book in about 15-20 minutes by starting to ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 21, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “Isn’t it ironic that legalism threatens humans with hell if they don’t measure up and perform, but in reality the hell it threatens is the hell it produces in the lives of its slaves?  Many live wretched lives in the hellish swamps of legalism, trapped by an obsession with good deeds they attempt to produce, threatened with continuing and intensified hell in the afterlife. Apart from Christ we cannot be freed.  I know, for I have been to religious hell and by God’s grace returned to tell you this story. I know many ‘good’ and sincere people, many of them dear friends, who are ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 19, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “Many North Americans seek religious meaning by continuing a cultural trend first exemplified in the freedom movement of the 1960s.  In many celebration (or praise and worship) churches the underlying assumption is that God enjoys receiving what we most enjoy giving, in terms of worship.  In such a religious culture the underlying premise seems to be that God embraces our agenda, rather than the other way around. Spiritual menus in many mega-church environments are based on predigested, feel-good, positive thinking, self-empowering messages based on self-esteem.  God’s will has become a cliché in ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 16, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “Some suggest that laws and behavior create morality.  I insist that true morality is a product of God – the fruit of Christ’s Spirit alive in us.  Morality does not induce God’s favor or motivate God to take action.  True morality is because of God.  God does not serve laws.  God’s laws came from God and are given by God.  God’s law boils down to love.  Such love is the product of God, rather than humanly-produced morality, as if we could prove that we are good enough for God to love us back.  Rather, we willingly love God and our neighbor as God’s ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 14, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  “The real issue that authentic Christians must face is the fact that much of Christendom has been infiltrated and even co-opted by legalism, and therefore has degenerated into just another religion.”  Originally published in: Bad News Religion ------------------------------------- Help Us Help Others - Give Now

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 12, 2023 - Quote for the Day:  If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. Issac Newton, 1676 “Hearing or observing someone giving credit to those who helped him/her in the past (or even the present!) is an incredibly beautiful and gratifying experience. I am forever grateful for the sacrifices made on my behalf, starting with parents and grandparents, who gave so much.  Simply being able to know I stand on the shoulders of many, in so many ways, is one of the enormous blessings for which I give thanks.  As Christ-followers, the Cross of Christ represents the ultimate sense in which we ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 9, 2023 - Quote for the Day:   “Robert Louis Stevenson once remarked, ‘How little we pay our way in life!’  He was speaking of the fact that we are all debtors to others, to a great host of people who have gone before, clearing the way, pioneering, building and producing.  We are indeed indebted to so many others, even those we never knew, because we pay very little of our own way in life. What do you have that you did not receive? – 1 Corinthians 4:7 Thus, as we give thanks, we remember that the blood that flows in our veins is that of those who gave and sacrificed that we might have what they never did.  An old ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 7, 2023 - Quote for the Day “Some churches include public testimonies in their services – really juicy personal stories told by someone who used to be really bad, but now that person has repented.  It’s called their testimony – and when it comes time for salacious testimonies some sit there in the church and think ‘God, I thank you I’ve never been that bad.’ I don’t mean to say that some church-goers are not genuinely delighted when God dramatically and miraculously, by his grace, transforms someone’s life.  Of course, I believe the reaction of real Christians, in whom Christ lives, is closer to ...

Reflections Along the Jesus Way

November 5, 2023 - Quote for the Day: “God loves us and invites us to accept and believe in Jesus, that we might be delivered from religious snobbery and pride, hatred, bigotry, murder, war, lust, greed and self-centeredness of every size, shape and description.  God loves everyone and invited all of us to be delivered from racism, including racists who don’t hesitate to condemn and denounce all who don’t agree with them as racists… Sadly, the human condition seems to include belittling and demeaning others, simply because they are different.  It seems natural and increasingly common today for people to despise those who are not ...