REJOICE WITH THOSE WHO REJOICE, MOURN WITH THOSE WHO MOURN

'Love never stands aloof from other people's joys or pains. Love identifies with them, sings with them and suffers with them. Love enters deeply into their experiences and their emotions, their laughter and their tears, and feels solidarity with them, whatever their mood.'

John Sott, The Message of Romans, p.333.

THE TROUBLES OF RICHES

'Riches cannot buy a cheerful spirit and a light heart. There are troubles in the getting of them, troubles in the keeping of them, troubles in the using of them, troubles in the disposing of them, troubles in the gathering of them, and troubles in the scattering of them.'

JC Ryle, Happiness, p.20.

TRUE HAPPINESS

'To be truly happy, a person's highest needs must be met and satisfied. The requirements of our wonderously created constition must all be met.'

JC Ryle, Happiness, p.14.

WE ALL LIVE UNDER A TOTALITARIAN REGIME

'Reading Luke's Gospel I see why Steiner is so terribly wrong when he says that only people living under totalitarian regimes can produce art worthy of the name. We all live under the totalitarian regime of the world's evil. And it's in the terms in which our own culture manifests it that we have to expresss our struggle against it, our longings for glimpses of good.'

Helen Garner, How to End a Story:Collected Diaries, p.419.

WHEN WE FINALLY GET TO BE OURSELVES

'"Won't it be nice when we die, Edie, and we can finally be ourselves?"'

Laurie Colwin, A Big Storm Knocked it Over, p.163.

THE BEGINNING OF GOD SETTING EVERYTHING RIGHT AGAIN

'..with the resurrection of Jesus God's new world has begun; in other words, his being raised from the dead is the start, the paradigm case, the foundation, the beginning, of that great setting-right which God will do for the whole cosmos at the end. The risen body of Jesus is the one bit of the physical universe that has already been "set right", Jesus is therefore the one through whom everything else will be "set right".'

Tom Wright, Acts for Everyone: Part 2 Chapters 13-28, p.93. 

THE HEAVENS DECLARE

'After the world had been created, man was placed in it as in a theatre, that he, beholding above him and beneath the wonderful works of God, might reverently adore their Author.'

John Calvin in Matthew Bingham, A Heart Aflame for God, p.236.

DON'T BE A FISH OUT OF WATER

'As a fish lives in the water as in its element, and dies when it is out, so a Christian lives in prayer as in his element, and his heart dies when he is out of it.'

William Bridge in Matthew Bingham, A Heart Aflame for God, p.167.

OUR PATIENT GOD

'To read the Bible well is to become acquainted with God's patience.'
Esau McCaulley, Lent, p.60.

THE LORD'S SUPPER: RITUAL & ENCOUNTER

'Christ doesn't just teach us about himself in the Eucharist; he comes to us and nourishes the weary believer. We can have both. Ritual is both a means of spiritual formation (we learn through repetition) and an encounter (God meets us in the act of worship and praise in the liturgy).'

Esau McCaulley, Lent, p.55.