The excess, the pride from which all sins sprout, isn’t what you do or don’t do. It’s the motive from which you take action.

Friends build relationships rooted in self-sacrifice, courage, loyalty, trust, and belief. It is irrational and un-provable. But it is observable and true.

The world is upended. Forever changed—still spinning. Where it will stop, nobody knows.

And we were—and are—raised with Him “in the likeness of His resurrection.” Christ lives! And because He lives, you live, I live.

The question now in God’s mind is, How can I prove to my people that salvation and justification have changed them fundamentally, transformed them at their core?

The governance of shame is meted out in ruthless self-criticism, condemnation, ranting, raving, self-cursing, and condescension.

We, who were once dark and lost, are now bearers of His light and life.

Will I be responsible for today, given the great resourcefulness of my talents and ingenuity, or will I rely upon the indwelling resource of Jesus Christ?

There is no great leap. This is a reasonable degree of faith.

I hung onto a fragile concept of God by the thinnest of margins. Had I been more impulsive, I would have jettisoned Him, the doctrine about Him, all those associated with Him

When I think of January, or in this case, February, I think of starting over, resolutions, and new beginnings. But as I consider this, I realize I begin again frequently, sometimes multiple times each day, and not just in January.

Your new heart sings the same song, and dances to the same step, as your Heavenly Father’s heart does. 

Grace is the good news that God is not aloof. Grace is the encouraging declaration that He is present and engaged. Grace is the pursuit of God to encounter me face-to-face. 

Jesus’ one command was, “You shall love the Lord your God. This is the great and foremost commandment.”

Jesus issued several imperatives. But when the religious leaders asked him to pinpoint a command, he isolated the most important truth in the Bible: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.

If the Galatians so clearly understood that they could not be justified by the law, i.e. with human effort, why were they persisting to live according to the Mosaic Law and religious law?

Anyone that doesn’t look right, walk right, speak right, act right, live right, dress right, sing right—oy vey! Anyone or anything that doesn’t fit, we are prone to manage with rules and standards of performance that we believe will make God happier, because if we can manage behavior, we will be happier (we think). Certainly the same must be true of God, we reason.

The reason Paul is so peeved is that the Galatian Christians had departed from sound theology, i.e. the sufficiency of Christ, and were attempting to amalgamate human effort and divine provision. 

The first “know” is a process. The second “know” conveys a knowing that is entirely completed and fully understood.