Sublime

view. For instance, in the mid-1700s David Hume wrote a lot about the “natural benevolence” of human beings. And a century later, even Charles Darwin himself attributed an “instinct of sympathy” to our species. But

There are two ways to be your own Savior and Lord. One is by breaking all the moral laws and setting your own course, and one is by keeping all the moral laws and being very, very good.

The main message of Jesus, I believed, is that mercy trumps justice every time.

Rather, the rigorous application of the law in the way we have observed, as a defence against Gentiles and hence as a reinforcement of national boundaries and aspirations, had become, in Jesus’ view, a symptom of the problem rather than part of the solution. The kingdom of the one true god was at last coming into being, and it would be characterize

It is the “although [x] not [y] but [z]” that makes justification central to Paul. It bears this form and plays this song; to put it simply, although [x] God is righteous, this righteousness does not [y] leave God to abandon us but [z] becomes sin for us so that God might minister to us (2 Cor. 5:21).