Jesus Christ as only an example will crush you. You'll never be able to live up to it. But Jesus Christ as the Lamb will save you.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the difference between viewing Jesus as an unattainable standard versus as a source of grace and salvation.
Timothy Keller's quote highlights two contrasting perceptions of Jesus Christ: one as a perfect example whose morally unattainable life can lead to despair, and the other as the forgiving Lamb who offers grace and salvation. By recognizing Jesus primarily in the latter role, believers can find hope and solace rather than being crushed by the weight of perfectionism.
In practice
During a sermon discussing faith and grace, one could use this quote to illustrate how to approach the concept of perfection.
Falling in love in a Christian way is to say,'I am excited about your future and I want to be part of getting you there. I'm signing up for the journey with you. Would you sign up for the journey to my true self with me? It's going to be hard but I want to get there.
Only in Jesus Christ do we see how the untamable, infinite God can become a baby and a loving Savior. On the cross we see how both the love and the holiness of God can be fulfilled at once.
All human problems are ultimately symptoms, and our separation from God is the cause.
While your character flaws may have created mild problems for other people, they will create major problems for your spouse and your marriage.
To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.
God's Kingdom is "present in its beginnings, but still future in its fullness. This guards us from an under-realized eschatology (expecting no change now) and an over-realized eschatology (expecting all change now). In this stage, we embrace the reality that while we're not yet what we will be, we're also no longer what we used to be.
The great man, Genghis Khan, only knew how to shoot eagles with an arrow. The past is past. To see real heroes, look around you.
Metaphor is the only possible language available to religion because it alone is honest about Mystery.
This planet has β or rather had β a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much all of the time.
So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness of one's fatherland is to wish evil to one's neighbors. The citizen of the universe would be the man who wishes his country never to be either greater or smaller, richer or poorer.
I find rebellion packaged by a major corporation a little hard to take seriously.
I knew that the world around you is only uninteresting if you can't see what is really going on. The place you come from is always the most exotic place you'll ever encounter because it is the only place where you recognise how many secrets and mysteries there are in people's lives
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