Holiness is not for wimps and the cross is not negotiable, sweetheart, it's a requirement.
Interpretation
Holiness requires strength and commitment, not weakness or compromise.
This quote emphasizes that achieving holiness and faithfulness to the teachings of the cross requires a strong will and unwavering dedication. It conveys that one cannot approach spiritual growth with timidity or a willingness to negotiate principles; instead, one must embrace the challenges and sacrifices involved in living a truly devout life.
In practice
In a sermon about commitment to faith, this quote could remind the audience of the strength required in their spiritual journey.
I am not like a pebble on the beach - a grain of sand on the seashore or just one of millions of human beings past, present and future. No, I am a unique human being loved by God as if I were an only child - the only fruit of his creative powers.
I must not permit the evil capabilities of human nature to sour my faith in the tremendous good that is possible despite the frailty of that nature.
The sinner who suddenly realizes God's love for him and then looks at his rejection of that love feels a loss similar to the death of a loved one. A deep void is created in the soul and a loneliness akin to the agony of death.
Our memories are our own, and we cannot blame anything or anyone in the past for any pain dwelling there. If we open the door to them or keep hashing over past incidents in our minds, we have only ourselves to blame.
Man can and does rationalize his sins. He finds reasons for all his weakness, invents excuses that first calm and then deaden his conscience. He blames God, society, education, and environment for his wrong doing.
Love has been defined, analyzed, explained and excused. It has been the cause of wars, feuds, heroism, martyrdom, inordinate passion, and beautiful friendships. It pulls two people of opposite temperaments together into a married state and permits them to live happily. It makes friends understand each other without the necessity of words.
For the mob is always impressed by appearances and by results, and the world is composed of the mob.
A man's conscience and his judgment is the same thing; and as the judgment, so also the conscience, may be erroneous.
To the indefinite, uncertain mind of the American radical the most contradictory ideas and methods are possible. The result is a sad chaos in the radical movement, a sort of intellectual hash, which has neither taste nor character.
Made as we were in the image of God we scarcely find it strange to take again our God as our All. God was our original habitat and our hearts cannot but feel at home when they enter again that ancient and beautiful abode.
The male orientation of classical Athens was inseparable from its genius. Athens became great not despite but because of its misogyny.
Anytime you see white men suppose to fight each other an you not white, well you know you got trouble, because they blah-blah loud about Democrat or Republican an they huffing an puff about democracy someplace else but relentless, see, the deal come down evil on somebody don have no shirt an tie, somebody don live in no whiteman house no whiteman country.
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