God's grace and forgiveness, while free to the recipient, are always costly for the giver.

True citizens of the heavenly city are the best residents of the earthly city.

To stay away from Christianity because part of the Bible’s teaching is offensive to you assumes that if there is a God he wouldn’t have any views that upset you. Does that belief make sense? If you don’t trust the Bible enough to let it challenge and correct your thinking, how could you ever have a personal relationship with God? In any truly personal relationship, the other person has to be able to contradict you.

Faith is not opposed to reason, but it is sometimes opposed to feelings and appearances.

We are called not simply to communicate the gospel to nonbelievers; we must also intentionally celebrate the gospel before them.

While Christianity was able to agree with pagan writers that inordinate attachment to earthly goods can lead to unnecessary pain and grief, it also taught that the answer to this was not to love things less but to love God more than anything else. Only when our greatest love is God, a love that we cannot lose even in death, can we face all things with peace. Grief was not to be eliminated but seasoned and buoyed up with love and hope.

What you treasure will ultimately require you die for it, Jesus is the only treasure that died for you.