Across time and generations, books carry the thoughts and feelings, the essence, of the human spirit.

I once heard a theologian remark that in the Gospels people approached Jesus with a question 183 times whereas he replied with a direct answer only three times. Instead, he responded with a different question, a story, or some other indirection. Evidently Jesus wants us to work out answers on our own, using the principles that he taught and lived.

I would far rather convey grace than explain it.

Whoever desires to remain faithful to Jesus must communicate faith as he did, not by compelling assent but by presenting it as a true answer to basic thirst. Rather than looking back nostalgically on a time when Christians wielded more power, I suggest another approach: that we regard ourselves as subversives operating within the broader culture.

Power can do everything but the most important thing: it cannot control love.

The Old Testament anticipates [Jesus] all the way through.

Grace is everywhere, like lenses that go unnoticed because you are looking through them.