“Turbocharge this present moment with your supercharged presence.”
“Yang tersisa pada akhirnya adalah kenangan saling mengasihi dengan orang yang kita kasihi. Oleh karena itu, buatlah banyak kenangan yang indah.”
Source: Things Left Behind: Hal-hal yang Kita Pelajari dari Mereka yang Telah Tiada
“Inspiration is a tool and a trap. If you're going to be inspired by anyone, be inspired by people who have been exactly where you are now.”
“Never think that you know everything and you do not have anything to learn from your people.”
“Stories tell us that life is meaningful, and at their best they show us how to go about finding that meaning for ourselves.”
Source: The God of Story: Discovering the Narrative of Scripture Through the Language of Storytelling
“As used by Paul in the first century, arsenokoitai likely means pederasty. Pederastic relationships, inherently abusive and exploitative, are not equivalent to committed, loving, and monogamous same-sex relationships today. To say that they are would be like saying sex trafficking of young girls is equivalent to marriage.”
Source: Walking the Bridgeless Canyon: Repairing the Breach Between the Church and the LGBT Community
“If I say to some kids roughhousing in church, "Don't kill anyone," they know what concern I am addressing. They know I'm exaggerating for emphasis and not speaking in general terms—that I'm not, for example, commenting on the morality of military service. Stripped of the rich context we share, the mere words, "Don't kill anyone" could easily be understood to mean don't kill anyone, anytime, ever.”
Source: A Letter to My Congregation: An Evangelical Pastor's Path to Embracing People Who Are Gay, Lesbian and Transgender in the Company of Jesus
“The rejection of all homosexual acts is rooted in a desire to uphold what is understood to be the meaning of the prohibitive Scriptures and the tradition of heterosexual marriage. It is an attempt to be careful to walk in faithfulness to God. The rejection of exclusionary practices aimed at gay and lesbian people is rooted in a desire to uphold Scripture by seeking to carefully understand its meaning in the original historical context and to apply Scripture's teaching carefully. It is an attempt to uphold Scripture's caution against religious zeal that unintentionally accepts harm of the neighbor or fails to love the neighbor well. Both positions are principled positions seeking to uphold important goods.”
Source: A Letter to My Congregation: An Evangelical Pastor's Path to Embracing People Who Are Gay, Lesbian and Transgender in the Company of Jesus
“Virtually every church tradition, by theology, interpretive strategies, or pastoral practice, makes accommodations for divorced people who seek to remarry. These accommodations permit divorced people to enter unions that are outside the rule laid down in the Bible. But we can't have it both ways. We can't apply a strict "biblical marriage" rule to gay people and not apply it to those who are divorced and remarried.”
Source: A Letter to My Congregation: An Evangelical Pastor's Path to Embracing People Who Are Gay, Lesbian and Transgender in the Company of Jesus
“Like when you see a celebrity in a cafe and instinctively burst out, "Oh, hi there!" before you realize that your brain has had time to tell you, "Hey, that's probably someone you know, say hi!" but not, "No wait, it's just that guy from the TV!" Because your brain likes to make you look like an idiot.”
Source: My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry