Rereading some of these writers, one is tempted to say that if anyone needed help to struggle against some of the unfortunate things they committed to paper, it was not Paul, but some of his twentieth-century interpreters.

It all becomes so complicated, people grumble—when what they really mean is, "I am so used to reading this passage one way that I find it hard to switch and consider other options.

The shallow social and political alternatives bequeathed to contemporary western society by the Enlightenment and its aftermath, in which every issue stands either to left or to the right on some hypothetical spectrum, and every political question can be answered in terms of 'for' or 'against' — this trivialized world of thought cannot cope with the complexities of real life either in the first or the twenty-first century.

either you obey rules imposed from the outside, or you discover the deepest longings of your own heart and try to go with them. Most of us wobble about between the two, obeying at least some of the rules either because we think God wants us to or because of social convention, but reverting to pursuing our own dreams, our own fulfillment, when given the chance.

Only those who have tried to understand and expound the Bible, and especially Paul as a man of his own day, only those who have happily escaped the dangers which threaten us on these two sides (exposition and application), are entitled to cast the first stone.

In every situation and circumstance of your life, God is always doing a thousand different things that you cannot see and you do not know.

Morality is always derivative. It stems from one's worldview.

A mind capable of forming an argument against God's existence constitutes evidence for his existence. That is, a conscious being with the ability to reason, weigh evidence, and argue logically must come from a source that has at least the same level of cognitive ability.

Reductionism is like a kid who argues that whatever does not fit into his toy box is not a toy.

Materialists thereby deny the reality of mind (while they use their minds to advance materialism), determinists deny the reality of human choice (while they choose determinism), and relativists deny the fact of right and wrong (while they judge you if you disagree).

For when moral convictions are reduced to arbitrary preferences, then they can no longer be debated rationally.

It is becoming clear that much of what used to be considered common sense is not common at all. Instead it is a product of the West's distinctively Christian heritage. Today it can no longer be simply assumed. It has to be intentionally articulated and defended.