Christians get very angry toward other Christians who sin differently than they do.

We admit that we will never reach our ideal in this life, a distinctive the church claims that most other human institutions try to deny.

Any discussion of how pain and suffering fit into God's scheme ultimately leads back to the cross.

As I look around on Sunday morning at the people populating the pews, I see the risk that God has assumed. For whatever reason, God now reveals himself in the world not through a pillar of smoke and fire, not even through the physical body of his Son in Galilee, but through the mongrel collection that comprises my local church and every other such gathering in God’s name. (p. 68, Church: Why Bother?)

Imperfection is the prerequisite for grace. Light only gets in through the cracks.

Repentance, not proper behavior or even holiness, is the doorway to grace. And the opposite of sin is grace, not virtue.

We human beings instinctively regard the seen world as the "real" world and the unseen world as the "unreal" world, but the Bible calls for almost the opposite.