“The greatest difficulty to overcome for those who seek the Kingdom has to do with discovering and embracing their true Kingdom identity.”
Source: Kingdom Fundamentals: What the Kingdom of God Means and What it Means for You | A Thorough and Biblical Exposition of the Kingdom of Heaven as Preached by Jesus
“[The ordinary, everyday quiet, calm sense of Presence/ Being/ Awareness in the stillness, in the Now, behind everything, IS "God" / Source / Infinite Intelligence / Omnipresence / Omniscience.]
I realized this sense of simply "being" is ordinary and easily overlooked.
What is extraordinary is the fact that "this" somehow knows every hair on my head and those of over seven billion of my fellow human beings.
"This" is undivided wholessness. [...]
"This" is the space in between your thoughts, and it is the source of your thoughts.
It is ever-present, timeless and formless. It is self-aware. It is whole, complete and indivisible.
This part of you is the same in me and everyone you have ever met and will ever meet.
"This" is the meeting place that kindred spirits refer to when they greet each other with the Sanskrit salutation and say, "Namaste". Said with meaning, the heart opens to the mutual message in this one, simple word: "I honor the place in you that is of love, of light, of truth and of peace. When you are in that place in you, and I am in that place in me, we are one."”
Source: The Awakened Way: Making the Shift to a Divinely Guided Life
“The gods are given even greater license to lie and deceive. Apparently, they do not have the same degree of responsibility to their relatives and allies as humans do. Effective acts of lying and deception seem to be admired as tokens of one god's at least temporary ascendancy over another god.”
Source: Lying and Poetry from Homer to Pindar: Falsehood and Deception in Archaic Greek Poetics
“Early Christian thinkers frequently employed the "deception of the devil" motif to explain God's activity in the defeat of evil. ...God fooled Satan into thinking Jesus was just another human being...”
Source: Deceiving the Devil: Atonement, Abuse, and Ransom
“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”
Source: NIV Study Bible, eBook
“The Virgin Mary is called the [Greek words] (the "book of the Word of life") by the Greek Church. The book of the Gospel, the book of Christ's origins and life, can be written and proclaimed because God has first written his living Word in the living book of the Virgin's being, which she has offered to her Lord in all its purity and humility—the whiteness of a chaste, empty page. If the name of Mary does not often appear in the pages of the Gospel as evident participant in the action, it is because she is the human ground of humility and obedience upon which every letter of Christ's life is written. She is the Theotokos, too, in the sense that she is the book that bears, and is inscribed with, the Word of God. She keeps her silence that he might resonate the more plainly within her.”
Source: Fire of Mercy, Heart of the Word: Meditations on the Gospel According to Saint Matthew, Vol. 1
“But scholars believe Matthew expanded on the work of his predecessor with the help of the Q source, a theoretical collection of the sayings of Jesus. His work reflects the sharp divide between Jewish Christians who accepted Jesus as the messiah and Jews who did not. The depiction of Jesus’ appearance before Pilate is similar to Mark’s, with one critical addition.”
Source: The Order
“A Christian when opts to beg emotionally to others, disappoints the Almighty God in atleast 3 ways:
1. By Denying the Power of God to Provide for their lives (2 Timothy 3:5, Titus 1:16)
2. By still being Immature to handle Life's crisis (1 Corinthians 13:11, James 1:2-4)
3. By setting a poor example of Faith and Trust on God (Psalm 78:40-42, Psalms 34:8,9)
The difference between Emotional pleading and asking a Fellow christian to Pray is that Former belittles our God who Provides (Jehovah Jireh) while the Latter Glorifies our God Who is Enough (El Shaddai).
- Santosh Thankachan”
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. 2 Timothy 1:7”
“What kind of lube do you want?"
"G-god, I don't KNOW," I stammer, blushing furiously. "Just pick one."
He smiles cheekily, eyes sparkling with mischief as I'm standing there, half naked and DYING.
'That little fuck is really enjoying this,' I think affectionately, as he chooses a jar with a saucy grin and bats his eyelashes at me.
"So, what did you find?"
He grins wickedly.
"Banana custard!"
"Absolutely NOT!" I shout, and he grins.
"Just kidding. Penis colada?--oops." He blushes, and I roar with laughter.
"Was that a Freudian slip, My Love?”
Source: The Scent Of Jasmine