Quotes from Gregory A. Boyd

Our fundamental sin is that we place ourselves in the position of God and divide the world between what we judge to be good and what we judge to be evil. And this judgment is the primary thing that keeps us from doing the central thing God created and saved us to do, namely, love like he loves.

God is light and in him there is no darkness" (1 John 1:5). Indeed, God's "eyes are too pure to behold evil" (Hab. 1:13). How are these verses consistent with the view that everything— including all the evil that people have experienced throughout history—is part of God's sovereign will? Some

Let us say once again that the doctrine of the Trinity does not divide God up into "thirds." Because God is Spirit, God is unquantifiable and indivisible. Any other view of God is really pagan, anthropomorphic, and materialistic. Hence

The following chart summarizes the findings. Problem Solution: Stage 1 Solution: Stage 2 Formless void Forming place (days 1-3) Filling void (days 4-6) Darkness Day 1: light/separate darkness Day 4: lights The deep Day 2: heavens/separate waters Day 5: birds/fish Formless earth Day 3: earth/vegetation Day 6: animals/humans Genesis

The sinner . . . while retaining the ability to imagine, has forfeited the basis on which to imagine God."[

We can acknowledge that while all good things in creation come from God (James 1:17), all evil in creation comes from wills other than that of God. God allows evil to take place because he desires humans to have the potential to love, and for this they must be free. But in no sense does he will their evil. 3.

Why did God even bother to create minds that naturally gauge their level of confidence in a belief on the evidence and arguments for and against it if he's only pleased with minds that can make themselves more certain than the evidence and arguments for it warrant? I just don't get it!

the greatest miracle of omnipotence was in creating beings who had the potential to resist it.2 2.

expresses how the Creator solves the problems he needs to solve in order to bring creation out of chaos. Therefore, we have every reason to suppose that the succession of days was not meant to refer to a chronological succession but to a logical, thematic, and literary succession. In

Genesis 1 and the scientific evidence. The literary framework interpretation can easily be reconciled with any contemporary scientific theory of origin one chooses to embrace. Yet at the same time, reconciliation is not necessary. Genesis 1 has no bearing on science, for it is strictly interested in theology, not science. Responding

The dependability of the world which makes it possible for rational, morally responsible creatures to live works against us in certain circumstances.

The very fact that what God creates is less than Himself introduces limitations and imperfections into the picture.

Any created thing must, for example, possess a limited set of characteristics which rules out the possibility of it possessing other characteristics incompatible with these.

The picture of God that I embraced could get me to feel shame for my sinful deeds, but it could not empower me to rise above them.

Every shortcoming, every sin, every struggle in the believer's life in one way or another can be traced to the influence of the flesh on our way of seeing and experiencing ourselves in our world—our experienced self-identity. The

God could not possibly love us more than he actually does, and we could not matter more to God than we actually do.

2. Faith and pride. If people think that sanctification adds anything to their justification, there is room for them to become spiritually prideful. At the very least, they can begin to congratulate themselves that they are less in need of God's sheer grace than they once were and no doubt less in need than other believers now are.

If we have the potential to oppress or slay millions, it's because we also have the potential to liberate and love millions.

Jesus came to establish the kingdom of God as a radical alternative to all versions of the kingdom of the world, whether they declare themselves to be "under God" or not.

Wondering whether Christianity is real is not the same as wondering whether Christianity is true. If you question the truth of Christianity, you can do something tangible about it. You can read books, take a class, or talk to someone about it. But what can you do when you're already convinced it's true but don't experience it as real?

The evangelical church in America has, to a large extent, been co-opted by an American, religious version of the kingdom of the world. We have come to trust the power of the sword more than the power of the cross. We have become intoxicated with the Constantinian, nationalistic, violent mindset of imperialistic Christendom.5

Laws, enforced by the sword, control behavior but cannot change hearts.

the self-serving, doubt-quenching, certainty-seeking faith that these folks are choosing to pursue is not faith as it's taught in Scripture....the faith that God's people are called to embrace is one that encourages people to wrestle with God, to not be afraid of questions, and to act faithfully in the face of uncertainty.

When followers of Jesus aren't careful to clearly distinguish the Kingdom from their own nation, we easily end up Christianizing aspects of our national culture we ought to be revolting against.