God can only be of service to me and I to him, not in the past, nor in the future, but only right now in this moment.

God can only be of service to me and I to him, not in the past, nor in the future, but only right now in this moment.

My point is that the social forces liberals like to point to are real - I absolutely agree - but, at the same time, a good grounding from a family can make a huge difference.

For people in neighborhoods where violence is prevalent, violence becomes a way of dealing and coping with their lives. No matter how wrong it is, violence doesn't necessarily mean they're bad people.

Change is not always a good thing. What I need is not change from one thing to another but transformation from who I am into who I was meant to become. Only when God's transforming power touches me can I begin to live the simpler, freer, fresher, more creative, more patient, more passionate, more sacrificial, riskier, rawer, more real, more love-driven life God intended for me all along. That transformation is what awaits all who dare to enter the story of God. As Paul wrote, 'Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think' (Romans 12:2)

The true nature of man left to himself without restraint is not nobility but savagery.

Violence can behave like a disease. That insight gives a different frame of reference that is designed to take the judgment out of it, to take the good-versus-bad-people view out of it.