God is the ultimate source of all power. All human power is therefore derived, limited, unstable and transient.
Interpretation
Human power is temporary and limited, while divine power is absolute and eternal.
This quote by Os Guinness highlights the idea that all forms of power held by humans are ultimately dependent on a higher divine authority. It suggests that human strength is fleeting and insufficient compared to the ultimate, unwavering power of God, reminding us to recognize the limitations of our own abilities and to seek a greater purpose beyond ourselves.
In practice
During a speech on spirituality, I might use this quote to emphasize the need for humility.
By our uncritical pursuit of relevance we have actually courted irrelevance; by our breathless chase after relevance without a matching committment to faithfulness, we have become not only unfaithful, but irrelevant; by our determined efforts to redefine outselves in ways that are more compelling to the modern world than are faithful to Christ, we have lost not only our identity but our authority and our relevance. Our crying need is to be faithful as well as relevant
The story of Christian reformation, revival, and renaissance underscores that the darkest hour is often just before the dawn, so we should always be people of hope and prayer, not gloom and defeatism. God the Holy Spirit can turn the situation around in five minutes.
In other words, we are never freer than when we become most ourselves, most human, most just, most excellent, and the like.
We betray our modern arrogance and forget the place of mystery in God's dealing with us.
The question the doubter does not ask is whether faith was really useless or simply not used. What would you think of a boy who gave up learning to ride a bicycle, complaining that he hurt himself because his bicycle stopped moving so he had no choice but to fall off? If he wanted to sit comfortably while remaining stationary, he should not have chosen a bicycle but a chair. Similarly faith must be put to use, or it will become useless.
Either we conform our desires to the truth or we conform the truth to our desires.
Every day People straighten up the hair, why not the heart?
No man dies for what he knows to be true. Men die for what they want to be true, for what some terror in their hearts tells them is not true.
The good of the people is the greatest law.
In dark ages people are best guided by religion, as in a pitch-black night a blind man is the best guide; he knows the roads and paths better than a man who can see. When daylight comes, however, it is foolish to use blind, old men as guides.
So long as the laws remain such as they are today, employ some discretion: loud opinion forces us to do so; but in privacy and silence let us compensate ourselves for that cruel chastity we are obliged to display in public.
Our real journey in life is interior.
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