1. In normal human relationships, when reconciliation is necessary, we place the burden on the person who did wrong, who disrupted the relationship.
  2. A “good death” and “good life” are not accomplished through personal striving but are grasped by faith in the promises of God.
  3. Your justification isn’t a matter of “Jesus plus” anything.
  4. Human solutions to problems, important as they are, are inadequate to meet our deepest needs
  5. We know that death does not have the last word in Christ.
  6. This is an excerpt from “Finding God in the Darkness: Hopeful Reflections from the Pits of Depression, Despair, and Disappointment” by Bradley Gray (1517 Publishing, 2023).
  7. The only place to begin a discussion of human/creaturely identity is with our relationship to the God whose breath filled dust, brought us to life, sustains us and gives us a hopeful future.
  8. Grace comes for every foolish, self-absorbed sinner, for every “Nabal,” and announces that there is one who has already taken it upon himself to shoulder all of our wrongdoing, paying the price for it through the sacrifice of himself.
  9. Everything in Scripture is God revealing himself to his people, you and me.
  10. The Parable of the Lost Sheep bursts through the confines of convention and demands that we embrace the messiness of life and the unpredictable ways in which God's grace and forgiveness operates.
  11. When we forget that we live by promise, that's when the danger tends to creep in. Because failing to embrace promise means we usually fall back into notions of luck, or even worse--into works.