'joy' in Phillippians is a defiant 'Nevertheless!' that Paul sets like a full stop against the Philippians' anxiety.

To be a Christian and to pray are one and the same thing; it is a matter that cannot be left to our caprice. It is a need, a kind of breathing necessary to life.

That the zeal for God's honor is also a dangerous passion, that the Christian must bring with him the courage to swim against the tide instead of with it... accept a good deal of loneliness, will perhaps be nowhere so clear and palpable as in the church, where he would so much like things to be different. Yet he cannot and he will not refuse to take this risk and pay this price... he belongs where the reformation of the church is underway or will again be underway.

Sin is not confined to the evil things we do. It is the evil within us, the evil which we are.

With an ear open to your musical dialectic, one can be young and become old, can work and rest, be content and sad: in short, one can live.

When we speak of our virtues we are competitors, when we confess our sins we become brothers.

The gospel is not a truth among other truths. Rather, it sets a question mark against all truths.