If you have to run away from something that used to be an idol, you're actually still enslaved by it. It's still controlling you.

After creation God said, 'It is finished'-and he rested. After redemption Jesus said, 'It is finished'-and we can rest.

When love of one's people becomes an absolute, it turns into racism. When love of equality turns into a supreme thing, it can result in hatred and violence toward anyone who has led a privileged life. It is the settled tendency of human societies to turn good political causes into counterfeit gods.

If you're avoiding sin and living morally so that God will have to bless you and save you, then you may be looking to Jesus as a teacher, model, and helper, but ironically you are avoiding him as Savior. You are trusting in your own goodness rather than in Jesus for your standing with God.

The only love that won’t disappoint you is one that can’t change, that can’t be lost, that is not based on the ups and downs of life or of how well you live. It is something that not even death can take away from you. God’s love is the only thing like that.

The gospel has two parts. It has the part that says you're a sinner, and it has the part that says you're loved and accepted.

Suffering is the stripping of our hope in finite things, therefore we do not put our ultimate hope in anything finite.