James G.

“A heart motivated by self-interest looks at the world as a “give a little, take a lot” proposition. People with hearts motivated by self-interest put their own agenda, safety, status, and gratification ahead of that of those affected by their thoughts and actions.”
― Kenneth H. Blanchard, Lead Like Jesus: Lessons from the Greatest Leadership Role Model of All Time

“Coming from circumstances of privilege and opportunity does not guarantee success as God defines it, nor does being raised in circumstances of abuse and poverty consign someone to failure. In any circumstance, at any time, anyone can choose to follow Jesus. In that moment, the external circumstances pale in comparison to the inner resources that knowing and following Jesus provides.”
― Kenneth H. Blanchard, Lead Like Jesus: Lessons from the Greatest Leadership Role Model of All Time

“Another problem emerges in the eighteenth century and is still with us powerfully today. I have written about this in Evil and the Justice of God. When much European culture in the eighteenth century was embracing Deism and then Epicureanism, a radical split emerged between personal sin, which stopped people going to heaven, and actual evil in the world, including human wrongdoing, violence, war, and so on, but also what has been called “natural evil,” earthquakes, tsunamis, and the rest. “Atonement theologies” then addressed the former (how can our sins be forgiven so we can go to heaven?), while the latter was called the “problem of evil,” to be addressed quite separately from any meaning given to the cross of Jesus by philosophical arguments designed to explain or even justify God’s providence. The two became radically divided from one another, and questions about the meaning of Jesus’s death were related to the former rather than the latter. The revolution that began on Good Friday—whose first fruit was the socially as well as theologically explosive event of the resurrection—seemed to be pushed to one side.”
― N.T. Wright, The Day the Revolution Began: Reconsidering the Meaning of Jesus's Crucifixion

“In particular, they seem to have interpreted Jesus’s crucifixion within a much bigger—and perhaps more dangerous—story than simply the question of whether people go to “heaven” or “hell.” That question, in fact—to the astonishment of many people—is not what the New Testament is about. The New Testament, with the story of Jesus’s crucifixion at its center, is about God’s kingdom coming on earth as in heaven. This is, after all, what Jesus taught his followers to pray.”
― N.T. Wright, The Day the Revolution Began: Reconsidering the Meaning of Jesus's Crucifixion