“Sometimes the best way to bring good news to the poor is to bring actual good news to the poor. It appears a good way to bring relief to the oppressed is to bring real relief to the oppressed. It's almost like Jesus meant what He said. When you're desperate, usually the best news you can receive is food, water, shelter. These provisions communicate God's presence infinitely more than a tract or Christian performance in the local park. They convey, "God loves you so dearly, He sent people to your rescue.”

“But God's idea of a fast is less about what we're against and more about what we are for. (...) When we hear "fast," we put on a yoke of self-denial. When God said "fast," He meant to take off the yoke of oppression. The Isaiah 58 God is not about the mechanics of abstinence; it is a fast from self-obsession, greed, apathy, and elitism. When it becomes more about me than the marginalized I've been charged to serve, I become the confused voice in this passage: "Why have I fasted and you have not seen it?”

“They try to assign Him the power and public sway He always resisted; people want to make a starlet out of Jesus. But He insisted His power was activated in the margins. Jesus didn't redeem the world on the throne but through the cross. I don't want to consume the redemption Jesus made possible then spurn the methods by which He achieved it. Jesus' kingdom continues in the same manner it was launched; through humility, subversion, love, sacrifice; through calling empty religion to reform and behaving like we believe the meek will indeed inherit the earth. We cannot carry the gospel to the poor and lowly while emulating the practices of the rich and powerful.”

“...when the exhaustive exegesis of God's Word doesn't create people transformed into the image of Jesus, we have missed the forest for the trees.”

“We've invented a thousand shades of gray, devising a comfortable Christian existence we can all live with—super awesome, except the Bible doesn't support it. According to Scripture, no real disciple serves God while addicted to the dollar. There is no sheep/goat hybrid. There is no middle road. There is no true believer who hates his brother. Grayed-down discipleship is an easier sell, but it created pretend Christians, obsessing over Scriptures we like while conspicuously ignoring the rest. Until God asks for everything and we answer, "It's yours," we don't yet have ears to hear or eyes to see.”

“I suspect God is more glorified in a humble room of earnest worshipers than a massive production designed to sound "relevant" to the listeners but no longer relevant to God. When the worship of God turns into a "worship experience," we have derailed as the body of Christ.”

“We’re seeking — imperfectly at every turn, no doubt — an incarnational theology, a theology that brings radical good news of great joy for all the people, good news that God loves the world and didn’t send Jesus to condemn it but to save it, good news that God’s wrath is not merely punitive but restorative, good news that the fire of God’s holiness is not bent on eternal torment but always works to purify and refine, good news that where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.”