Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside.

You are the root, and only God knows that the flower will be.

I don't want my kids growing up with the image of God that I had -- Plato's white grandfatherly god -- because that god is not a very good father. When it comes down to it, you can't trust him with your kids.

I'm trying to get far away from [picturing God as] Gandalf or Santa Claus.

Mackenzie, you cannot produce trust, just as you cannot 'do' humility. It either is or is not. Trust is the fruit of a relationship in which you know you are loved. Because you do not know that I love you, you cannot trust me.

When you chose independence over relationship, you became a danger to one another. Others became objects to be manipulated or managed for your own happiness. Authority as you usually think of it, is merely the excues the strone ones use to make others conform to what they want.

Grace doesn't depend on suffering to exist, but where there is suffering you will find grace in many facets and colors.