Quotes About Christianity

Repentance, rebirth, and conversion were exchanged for cheap grace, and the integrity of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus faded. People join the church in droves, but Christian disciples were hard to come by. Christianity had an identity crisis. It's the same old story of the forbidden fruit--it's the beautiful things that get us. It's the things that seem good, but are not quite of God, that steer us off the course of holiness into destructiveness.

I began to wonder if anyone still believed Jesus meant thos things He said. I thought if we just stopped and asked 'what if He really meant it?' it could turn the world upside down. It is a shame christians have become so normal.

You may have lost hope in Christianity or Christendom or all the institutions, but you have not lost hope in the church. This is the church." At that moment, we decided to stop complaining about the church we saw, and we set our hearts on becoming the church we dreamed of.

The danger is that we can begin to read the Bible through the eyes of America rather than read America through the eyes of the Bible. We just want Jesus to be a good American.

began in a garden, but it ends in a city — a beautiful restored city the Scriptures describe as the New Jerusalem, coming on earth as it is in heaven. Christianity is not just about going up when we die; it's about bringing God's kingdom down, all the way to the dirt in our gardens.

If we remove the cross, we are in danger of promoting a very cheap grace. Perhaps it should make us uncomfortable.

Christianity can be built around isolating ourselves from evildoers and sinners, creating a community of religious piety and moral purity. That's the Christianity I grew up with. Christianity can also be built around joining with the broken sinners and evildoers of our world crying out to God, groaning for grace. That's the Christianity I have fallen in love with. In

I'm not ready to walk on water, but I'm also not ready to let the televangelists and prosperity preachers hijack the supernatural stuff from the rest of us. Imagine what would happen if the prayer movement and social justice movement converged, and we had Christians who prayed like they depend on God and lived like God depended on them?

The death penalty did not flourish in America in spite of Christians but because of us. So

I remember hearing a story about Clarence Jordan, a pecan farmer and theologian down in Georgia. He was speaking to a wealthy congregation that had an enormous gold cross. He asked how much they had paid for it. They explained that it was a gift from a wealthy donor and told him how much it was. When he heard how much it cost, he said, "Wow! Ya'll got ripped off. Christians used to be able to get a cross for free!" Brilliant.

It was a shame Christians had become so normal.

I felt so thirsty for God, so embarrassed by Christianity, and so ready for something more.

Second-century Bible scholar Origen of Alexandria wrote, "We do not arm ourselves against any nation; we do not learn the art of war; because, through Jesus Christ, we have become the children of peace.

As I've heard my old mentor Tony Campolo say, "If we were to set out to establish a religion in polar opposition to the Beatitudes Jesus taught, it would look strikingly similar to the pop Christianity that has taken over the airwaves of North America.

It is an altar call to the world, an invitation to see a new kind of Christianity and to hear the confession of a church on its knees asking your forgiveness for the mess we have helped create. And it is an "alter" call to the church, to alter our vision from the patterns of this world and create new ways of living.

The world is thirsty. All creation is groaning. Christianity as it is has not satisfied the souls of those who hunger for another way of life.

I had become a "believer," but I had no idea what it means to be a follower. People had taught me what Christians believe, but no one had told me how Christians live.

Some Christians take so few risks it's no wonder folks have a hard time believing in Heaven. Most of us live in such fear of death that it's as if no one really believes in resurrection anymore.

Over and over, the dying and the lepers would whisper the mystical word namaste in my ear. We really don't have a word like it in English (or even much of a Western conception of it). They explained to me that namaste means "I honor the Holy One who lives in you." I knew I could see God in their eyes. Was it possible that I was becoming a Christian, that in my eyes they could catch a glimpse of the image of my Lover?

Imagine what would happen if the prayer movement and social justice movement converged, and we had Christians who prayed like they depend on God and lived like God depended on them? Hallelujah.

This is prophetic work, and Christians are called to be the prophets of a new and better world, not just the chaplains of empire and defenders of the status quo.

I'm not as concerned with figuring out every minute theological question as much as I am reading the simple words of Jesus and trying to live my life as if he meant them.

But if you ask the average person how Christians live, they are struck silent.

If God's kingdom looks radical, it is only an indictment on the sort of Christianity we have settled for. Sharing our food with the hungry, opening our homes to the homeless, reconciling with our enemies--these are what Christianity has always been.