Highlights

  • The “scandal of the kingdom” is God’s seemingly irrational outpouring of love and mercy on sinful humanity (Ephesians 2:4–7). (Location 353)
  • As I explored the reasons for these differences, I gradually found that in many of our Christian circles, we substituted the message of Christ with a message about Christ. (Location 380)
  • We shut this down when we turn his teaching into legalism. If we don’t understand how he taught, legalism will run rampant because we will interpret what he was saying as laws. This is a very common mistake, especially with the Sermon on the Mount and the Sermon on the Plain. (Location 567)
  • Culture is what people believe without thinking and act on without explanation or justification. (Location 594)
  • Sometimes the behaviors Jesus used in his teaching are misinterpreted as commands when they were only intended as examples to reverse a prevailing presumption. For example, when he said, “Give to everyone who asks of you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you” (Matthew 5:42, paraphrased), he was not stating a general command for every situation. (Location 615)
  • The result is that Jesus’ teachings are set aside because they are read as if he were giving a law. Instead, he is challenging our thinking by giving us an illustration of what a kingdom heart might do in that situation. (Location 621)
  • Notice the two aspects of receiving the secrets of the kingdom of the heavens: the ability to hold on to what we have received (capacity) and our willingness to hear the message (receptivity). (Location 685)
  • “Should we just give up on them?” And Jesus’ answer is, “No, we will give them what they can receive.” (Location 737)
  • The parables and paradoxes Jesus presented required processing time. They helped people warm up to ideas they might have initially resisted. He gave them something they could keep working on without getting into a confrontational struggle. (Location 747)

Chapter 3 Why Parables?

  • we are not going to understand God or his Word by being clever, intelligent, and scholarly, or even by studying very hard because the interaction of God with us through his Word is a personal matter. It depends on the condition of our hearts, our minds, and our lives. (Location 799)
  • An essential investment of our life with God is to take care of our minds by cultivating our thoughts. The unkempt mind becomes obsessive, and then the will works from those frenzied thoughts.‡ (Location 896)
  • When tempted, you have to say to yourself, There are some thoughts I will not think! (Location 898)