Because we believe that somewhere in the nest of paradigms contained in the phrase "missional church" lies nothing less that the future viability of Western Christianity.
The reasons and purposes for habits are always lies that are added only after some people begin to attack these habits and to ask for reasons and purposes. At this point the conservatives of all ages are thoroughly dishonest: they add lies.
Pessimism is not in being tired of evil but in being tired of good. Despair does not lie in being weary of suffering, but in being weary of joy. It is when for some reason or other good things in a society no longer work that the society begins to decline; when its food does not feed, when its cures do not cure, when its blessings refuse to bless.
My Friend: Art thou abroad on this stormy night on thy journey of love, my friend? The sky groans like one in despair. I have no sleep tonight. Ever and again I open my door and look out on the darkness, my friend! I can see nothing before me. I wonder where lies thy path! By what dim shore of the ink-black river, by what far edge of the frowning forest, through what mazy depth of gloom art thou threading thy course to come to me, my friend?
The whole trouble lies in that people think that there are conditions excluding the necessity of love in their intercourse with man, but such conditions do not exist. Things may be treated without love; one may chop wood, make bricks, forge iron without love, but one can no more deal with people without love than one can handle bees without care.
The difference between a baby and adult is that a baby believes in everything while the adult doubts everything. Babies also only tell the truth until they learn what a lie is.
When he takes the knife to the canvass the servants find him lying dead with a knife through is heart and "withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage." and the portrait "in all the wonders of his exquisite youth and beauty." p 349
When we were the political slaves of King George, and wanted to be free, we called the maxim that "all men are created equal" a self evident truth; but now when we have grown fat, and have lost all dread of being slaves ourselves, we have become so greedy to be masters that we call the same maxim "a self evident lie" The fourth of July has not quite dwindled away; it is still a great day-for burning fire-crackers!!!
Terrorists and their allies believe the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the American Bill of Rights and every charter of liberty ever written are lies to be burned and destroyed and forgotten.
You can act truthfully or you can lie. You can reveal things about yourself or you can hide. Therefore, the audience recognizes something about themselves or they don't -- You hope they don't leave the theatre thinking that was nice...now where's the cab?'
They are scared that the BBC or CNN may call them radicals, so they remain soft instead. The problem lies there, with the Muslim leaders, not the Muslim masses.
For the Christian there can be no social or political panaceas, no easy escapes from personal responsibility achieved by collectivising guilt or virtue. The true ends of temporal life lie beyond it, and, though the tyrannical State may diminish virtue, the benevolent State cannot procure it.
The answers to our problems don't lie beyond our reach. They exist in our laboratories and universities; in our fields and our factories; in the imaginations of our entrepreneurs and the pride of the hardest-working people on Earth. Those qualities that have made America the greatest force of progress and prosperity in human history we still possess in ample measure.