Submitting self to God is the only real freedom-because the deepest slavery is self-dependence, self-reliance. When you live your life believing that everything (family, finances, relationships, career) depends primarily on you, you're enslaved to your strengths and weaknesses. You're trying to be your own savior. Freedom comes when we start trusting in God's abilities and wisdom instead of our own. Real life begins when we transfer our trust from our own efforts to the efforts of Christ.

The bad news that we are all guilty is met with the best news that God loves and forgives guilty people.

Spiritual growth is marked by a growing realization of just how much grace you need.

Hollywood is not known as a culture of grace. Dog-eat-dog is more like it. People love you one day and hate you the next. Personal value is very much attached to box office revenues and the unpredictable and often cruel winds of fashion.

If you feel compelled to respond every time you're criticized it reveals just how much you've built your identity on being right.

The gospel is good news to those who know they don't measure up. It's offensive to those who think they do.

Nothing makes me want to obey more than knowing that God unconditionally loves me and forgives me even when I disobey.