Legalism is looking to something besides Jesus Christ in order to be acceptable and clean before God.

We must not settle for an informed mind without an engaged heart.

The Cross is not simply a lovely example of sacrificial love. Throwing your life away needlessly is not admirable — it is wrong. Jesus’ death was only a good example if it was more than an example, if it was something absolutely necessary to rescue us. And it was. Why did Jesus have to die in order to forgive us? There was a debt to be paid — God himself paid it. There was a penalty to be born — God himself bore it. Forgiveness is always a form of costly suffering.

Christians don't believe that goodness gets you to heaven. Christians believe it's exhausting to rely on your own goodness to please God.

This is the humbling truth that lies at the heart of Christianity. We love to be our own saviors. Our hearts love to manufacture glory for themselves. So we find messages of self-salvation extremely attractive, whether they are religious (Keep these rules and you earn eternal blessing) or secular (Grab hold of these things and you’ll experience blessing now).

You are more sinful than you could dare imagine and you are more loved and accepted than you could ever dare hope.

Because of the Cross, God can be both just towards sin and yet mercifully justifying to sinners.