#biblical

To illustrate how an individual can attain the goal of being submerged in physical reality while transforming it into holiness, we can use an analogy of a man who finds himself in a cold room. There are three ways that individual can maintain his body temperature: first, he can put on a warm coat; second, he can leave the room to go to a warmer environment; or third, he can light a fire. Similarly, if this individual finds himself in a "cold" environment, one which is detrimental to him, he can preserve his integrity through these three methods. First, he can put on a warm coat, which symbolizes strengthening himself inwardly so as not to be influenced by his surroundings. This however, is an incomplete victory, for if he were to relax his self-control he would capitulate. Second, he can leave the room, which implies separating himself from the negative influences surrounding him. Once again, this victory is only through removing himself from temptation and is, therefore, not permanent. He has not met the challenge by improving his surroundings. The third approach, lighting a fire, involves influencing the environment and raising it to a higher level. This is a complete triumph over one's surroundings for the dangers have not only been avoided, they have been entirely removed. ↗

— Chana Weisberg

#biblical-women #judaism #higher-living

She who does not make the world better for having lived in it has failed to be all that woman should be. ↗

— Karen Andreola

#beauty

...God's grace and forgiveness, while free to the recipient, are always costly for the giver.... From the earliest parts of the Bible, it was understood that God could not forgive without sacrifice. No one who is seriously wronged can "just forgive" the perpetrator.... But when you forgive, that means you absorb the loss and the debt. You bear it yourself. All forgiveness, then, is costly. ↗

— Timothy Keller

#forgiveness #forgiveness

Twelve dead?” I said. “Jesus. ↗

— Dennis Lehane

#biblical #brief #humour #i #inspirational

In fact, it's true throughout all of Scripture....Following Jesus isn't something you can do at night where no one notices. It's a twenty-four-hour-a-day commitment that will interfere with your life. That's not the small-print--that's a guarantee. ↗

— Kyle Idleman

#christianity #life

And I pray mark how he begins: he sets not up trophies to himself, but triumphs in his God-- "I will love thee, O Lord, my strength." As the love of God is the beginning of all our mercies, so love to God should be the end and effect of them all. As the stream leads us to the spring, so all the gifts of God must lead us to the giver of them. ↗

— Richard Steele

#love

In my qualified opinion as a Biblical scholar, there is 'massive' and overwhelming historical evidence that the New Testament manuscripts are in fact reliable." ~R. Alan Woods [2013] ↗

— R. Alan Woods

#evidence #historical #r-alan-woods #reliability #reliable

We live in a Jesus haunted culture that is Biblically illiterate, and so unfortunately at this point in time, almost anything can pass for knowledge of the historical Jesus from notions that he was a a Cynic sage to ideas that he was a Gnostic guru to fantasies that he didn't exist, to Dan Browne's Jesus of hysterical (rather than historical) fiction. ↗

— Ben Witherington III

#jesus #historical-fiction

Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life which He has given to you under the sun; for this is your reward"... Ecclesiastes 9:9 (NASB) ↗

— Anonymous

#biblical #ecclesiastes #enjoy-life #scripture #spiritual

Entreat me not to leave you, Or to turn back from following after you; For wherever you go, I will go; And wherever you lodge, I will lodge; Your people shall be my people, And your God, my God. 17 Where you die, I will die, And there will I be buried. The LORD do so to me, and more also, If anything but death parts you and me ↗

— Anonymous

#fidelity #love #death