If the depths of everyone's sin was made public, we would all be much more gracious to each other.

The people who tend to be the most gracious are those who know how badly they need grace

When you don't have anything to lose, you discover something wonderful: you're free to take great risks without fear or reservation.

I've got three kids. I worry about them but the gospel freed me and freed my wife. We are not trying to make our kids think that we're super spiritual or we've got it all together. They see mom and dad being real people. What they hear dad talking about at home is not different from what they see from dad [at church]. That won't guarantee that they'll avoid the whole PK, MK thing. But we are hopefully not contributing to what normally produces that crisis, which is pretending.

When it comes to engaging and influencing culture, too many Christians think too highly of political activism.

The more I focused on my need to get better the worse I actually got - the more neurotic and self-conscious and self-absorbed I became.

You see, the secret of the gospel is that we become more spiritually mature when we focus less on what we need to do for God and focus more on all that God has already done for us. The irony of the gospel is that we actually perform better as we grow in our understanding that our relationship with God is based on Christ's performance for us, not our performance for him.