Quotes from Gary L. Thomas

You are imitating Jesus Christ and taking on the nature of a servant, which is your calling as a Christian.

God is radically for people. He wants everyone to come to a knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:4). As his followers, we also must be for everyone, even if we oppose what they're doing. If we must live and work with toxic people, our call is to make sure their toxicity doesn't become ours. We don't treat them as they treat us. We don't offer evil in exchange for evil. We love. We serve. We guard our hearts so that we are not poisoned by their bad example.

BUILDING A SACRED HISTORY TOGETHER TEACHES US TO BE PERSISTENT IN DOING GOOD, EVEN WHEN WE WANT TO DO SOMETHING ELSE.

Would I rather live a life of comfort and remain immature in Christ, or am I willing to be seasoned with suffering if by doing so I am conformed to the image of Christ?

Our souls are wired for what we will never enjoy until Eden is restored in the new heaven and earth. We are built with a distant memory of Eden."8

Repentance, contrary to popular misconception, is not a heroic first step I make toward Christ, nor is it a feeling-sorry-for my sins. It is the divine gift of being turned toward truth. William Willimon

No man can be everything. A successful long-distance cyclist can't be a bodybuilder. Though there are exceptions, dedicating one's time to becoming exceptional at one thing usually means not being exceptional at a whole lot of other things. Since no man can be everything, one of the best gifts to give is acceptance-'You don't have to be anything other than what you are.

Knowing why we are married and should stay married is crucial. The key question is this: Will we approach marriage from a God-centered view or a self-centered view? In a self-centered view, we will maintain our marriage as long as our earthly comforts, desires, and expectations are met. In a God-centered view, we preserve our marriage because it brings glory to God and points a sinful world to a reconciling Creator.

More than seeing marriage as a mutual comfort, we must see it as a word picture of the most important news humans have ever received — that there is a divine relationship between God and his people.

Soft people who frequently complain about the smallest annoyances, who give in to laziness and excess, who expect others to work so that they can rest, who collapse into passive entertainment instead of active exercise — these are souls custom-made to become all but irrelevant in kingdom warfare. They are no threat to anyone — least of all to Satan.

Neurologists tell us a startling truth that has major implications for spiritual formation: Our choices and experience shape our brain, both literally and physiologically. What we choose cognitively helps make us into who we are.

If you fail to cherish your wife in the difficult times, the damage done by those difficulties will be twice as bad and take three times as long to heal.

harmony, joy, and peace will never grace a home ruled by expectations instead of by the cross.

Married life, offered in service to God, is such a good and rewarding life. Let's give ourselves fully to it; let's keep building our "marital house" until we die, pursuing each other, forgiving each other, loving each other, and growing together through the years. If we do this, we will, like Anne, be richly blessed with a lifelong love.

I bought into the lie," she said, "that because Darin has a strong, masculine personality he must be the manipulator and I must be the victim. God showed me that it was really more the other way around. By withholding affection, respect, and communication, I often played the role of the manipulator.

If you're trying to find your primary refuge in your husband, if you've centered your hope on him, if your security depends on his approval, and if you will do almost anything to gain his acceptance, then you've just given to a man what rightfully belongs to God alone.

To grow in the midst of difficulties, we must rip open the bags of grain and seeds and pour them out wherever we see fertile ground.

Ultimately, it's a matter of spiritual nutrition. Many Christians have never been taught how to "feed" themselves spiritually. They live on a starvation diet and then are surprised that they always seem so "hungry.

We never slept together until our wedding night, so the honeymoon was a rather intoxicating experience, but once the honeymoon was over, reality immediately set in like a dense Seattle fog.

Good speech quells chaos and produces joy and life; bad speech produces chaos and leads to despair and death." (Dan Allender & Tremper Longman)

IF WE LEARNED TO FLOAT IN SORROW RATHER THAN THRASH ABOUT LIKE A DROWNING EMOTIONAL VICTIM, WE MIGHT FIND THAT IT CAN BE USED TO SET US FREE.

Don't pass over this thought, because it's crucial: Isaiah 40:29 assumes that God will call us to various tasks for which we lack enough power on our own.

He planted marriage among humans as yet another signpost pointing to his own eternal, spiritual existence.

Don't run from the struggles of marriage. Embrace them. Grow in them. Draw nearer to God because of them. Through them you will reflect more of the spirit of Jesus Christ. And thank God he has placed you in a situation where your spirit can be perfected.