Secrets ain't a healthy thang, no matter how old they is. Sometimes the oldest secrets is the worst of all.

I'd seen for myself how God's power was released after a time of cleansing, and I remembered that in every great historical move of the Spirit I had studied, every revival had experienced times of confession and deep repentance. I could see why, too. The cleansing season had set me free—the devil had none of my secret resentments and sins to hold over me anymore.

Leaders need the courage to acknowledge when something isn't working.

If you will not have death unto sin, you shall have sin unto death. There is no alternative. If you do not die to sin, you shall die for sin. If you do not slay sin, sin will slay you.

You may have a wen or a cancer upon your person and not be able to cut it out lest you bleed to death; but surely it is no way tocure it, to engraft it and spread it over your whole body.

The essence of Christian faith has come to us in story form, the story of a God who will go to any lengths to get his family back. The Bible tells of flawed people -- people just like me -- who make shockingly bad choices and yet still find themselves pursued by God. As they receive grace and forgiveness, naturally they want to give it to others, and a thread of hope and transformation weaves its way throughout the Bible's accounts.

What we have to go through to commit sin distances us from God—we change in the very act of rebellion—and there is no guarantee we will ever come back. You ask me about forgiveness now, but will you even want it later, especially if it involves repentance?

I do not know if that theory is correct, but I do know that singling out one behavior as "sin" and emphasizing it over others provides a convenient way of dodging our own need for grace. High-minded moralism and shrill pronouncements of judgment may help fundraising, but they undermine a gospel of grace.

Jesus did not eliminate evil; he revealed a God willing, at immense cost, to forgive it and to heal its damage.

A human being is not someone who once in a while makes a mistake, and God is not someone who now and then forgives. No, human beings are sinners and God is love.

The solution to sin is not to impose an ever-stricter code of behavior. It is to know God.

The Bible schools us to pray with blistering honesty.