Things That Make Sense To Me Today

From Kennon Callahan's book, Twelve Keys to An Effective Church:

"The watershed question for many people in many congregations is: Do you believe that your best years are behind you, or do you believe that your best years are yet before you?... Effective, sucessful churces live in the confidence of God's promise that some of their best years are yet to come. In Revelation 21:5 these words are found, "And he who sat upon the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new.' " This does not mean that the future will become progressively better and better. Rather, it means that amidst the pain, suffering and tragedies that lie before us in our future, God goes before us to make all things new - inviting us to that future that he has both promised and preared for us. God is not simpl in the past. God is in the present and the future leading and drawing us toward newness of life.

Hope is stronger than memory. Slavation is stronger than sin. Forgivness is stronger than bitterness. Reconciliation is stronger than hatred. Resurrection is stornger than crucifxion. Light is stronger than darkness... Hope is stronger than memory."

From a NY Times article on the lawsuits about the Ten Commandments being posted in federal courthouses:
(yeah yeah, you need a password, blah blah blah)

"Professor Laycock, who filed a brief on behalf of the Baptist Joint Committee against the display in the Texas case, Van Orden v. Perry, No. 03-1500, disparaged as "sham litigation" the effort to depict the Commandments as anything other than profoundly religious. To defend the Commandments as a historical or legal document is "to desacralize a sacred text, to rip it out of context and distort its meaning and significance," he said. "It ought to be unconvincing to people outside the religious tradition and insulting to those within it."

I feel like there was a third thing earlier... I guess that was before I was hungry for dinner.