Quotes about Understanding

We do not really know what it means to be human unless we know God. And, in turn, we do not really know God except through our own broken and rejoicing humanity.

To take the Scriptures seriously is not to take them literally. Literalism is invariably the lowest and least level of meaning. Most

Higher stages always empathetically include the lower, or they are not higher stages!

Until you meet a benevolent God and a benevolent universe, until you realize that the foundation of all is love, you will not be at home in this world.

Even with all the best intentions in the world, given our different temperaments, backgrounds, and the way we process our data and information, we are going to step on one another's toes. Two people with absolutely good will can deeply hurt one another. Good people hurt one another because we all come at reality in different ways. That's why, for Jesus, the only way to achieve union is through forgiveness, not through making sin impossible.

Wisdom happily lives with mystery, doubt, and "unknowing," and in such living, ironically resolves that very mystery to some degree.

God can help you get what you want, which is still a self-centered desire, instead of God's much better role—which is to help you know what you really desire (Luke 11:13; Matthew 7:11).

Human sympathy is the best and easiest way to open the heart space and to make us live inside our own bodies. God never intended most human beings to become philosophers or theologians, but God does want all humans to represent the very Sympathy and Empathy of God. And it's okay if it takes a while to get there. Our central message again bears repeating: God loves things by becoming them. We love God by continuing the same pattern.

The biblical revelation is about awakening, not accomplishing. It is about realization and not performance principles.

I wondered if God might have an easier time using animals to communicate who God is, since they do not seem as willful and devious as we are.

To stay on the surface of anything is invariably to miss its message—even the surface meaning of our sinfulness.

I believe, necessary for both joy and truth in this world.