If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it. -God to Cain (Gen 4:7)
Be killing sin or sin be killing you.
Then [Christian] was glad, and for these reasons:
1. because he realized that someone who feared God was in [the valley of the shadow of death], as well as himself.
2. he realized that God was with him, in that dark and dismal state, though he could not perceive Him.
“The hill, though high, I choose to ascend,
The difficulty will not me offend;
For I perceive the way to life lies here.
Come, take heart, let’s neither faint nor fear;
Better, though difficult, the right way to go,
Than wrong, though easy, where the end is woe.”
Or what about some bad news? It’s easy to treat bad news as a disaster. But faith recognises that it’s part of my Father’s plan to make me more like his Son.
-Enjoying God
“If you love your soul, there is danger of its being destroyed. Therefore you may not love it, since you do not want it to be destroyed. But in not wanting it to be destroyed you love it.”
-St. Augustine
#ParadoxOfSelfDenial