Story is the oldest, commonest, most beloved, and most effective form of communication because our life is essentially a story. That's why the Bible is the most realistic of religious books. We can easily ignore or argue away abstractions, but we bump up against concretely real people, things, and events in story, as in life.

The national anthem of hell is, "I Did It My Way."

Pride looks down, and no one can see God but by looking up.

We modern egalitarians are tempted to the primal sin of pride in the opposite way from the ancients. The old, aristocratic form of pride was the desire to be better than others. The new, democratic form is the desire not to have anyone better than yourself. It is just as spiritually deadly and does not even carry with it the false pleasure of gloating superiority.

Do you know any better way to make saints than to be one yourself?

All of history is a kind of broken marriage and God puts it back together again.

Only God is to be loved for His own sake. Everything else is to be loved for God's sake.