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21 " Spending too much time in one's individual silo can produce pride, isolation, and a stagnated ministry. "
― James MacDonald , Christ-Centered Biblical Counseling: Changing Lives with God's Changeless Truth
22 " Most of the church landscape in my lifetime has been heavily invested in trying to do something for Jerry or Sherri or some other icon of unchurchness. The problem is that they have been only about themselves from the moment they could wail for their mothers, and the decision to give them at church what they can find in any self-help book appears now as a choice to abandon the One in whose honor the church gathers. What they need is to be set free from themselves with finality and to be lost in the awesome wonder of the manifest presence of God. It was never God’s desire that He would sit on the sideline and watch us frantically devise impressive ways to reach people or simply hold the line on orthodoxy as though faithfulness can exist in a vacuum apart from fruitfulness. God is the Matter of first importance! Can you say that about your current weekly encounter with church? "
― James MacDonald , Vertical Church: What Every Heart Longs For. What Every Church Can Be.
23 " Let God Himself be the main attraction at church again, and let us be tireless in our insistence that church is for God, about God, through God, and to the glory of His great Son. "
24 " Church leaders raised on rationalism lead ministries where the supernatural, the Vertical, is suppressed and where God Himself is at best an observer and certainly seldom, if ever, and obvious participant in church. "
25 " In a society where rationality has ruled so long, the church frequently fails to see that in forsaking the weekly pursuit of the transcendent, we have given up the only ground that was uniquely ours in this world. In attempting to make the church something that can attract and add value to secular mind-sets, we have turned our backs on our one true proposition - transcendence. "
26 " When we shift from personal purity to personal happiness, we lose biblical hope because we are not focusing on God's agenda, we are focusing on our own. God's agenda is guaranteed on our agenda is not. "
27 " If counseling is to be restored to the church, affection must be restored to reflection. If counseling is to be restored to the church, delight in God must be restored to doctrines about God. Savoring Christ must be restored to seeing Christ. Tender contrition must be restored to tough conviction. Communication with God must be restored to contending for God. "
28 " Reality is God-centered and all human beings are worshipers, whether or not they are conscious of this reality and its implications. "
29 " One of the most frequent sins of omission is the failure to get adequate rest. "
30 " A soul that is happy in the things of God can overcome tremendous obstacles. "
31 " You can't teach a person to love something. But you can get him to feel the heat of your love for something. "
32 " At the end of life, each of us must answer the question, Whose story captured my soul? "
33 " If all you are doing is spending time with the struggling members of your church and you are not building proactively into your church's culture, and you are being shortsighted and limiting the effectiveness of your ministry. "
34 " In healthy churches, the pastors life, not just his words, sets the tone for the church. "
35 " We must evaluate every person, place, product, perspective, position, or pleasure we have looked to in place of the promises of God, and turn away from those things accordingly. "
36 " Any counseling that does not pursue spiritual formation through an intimate relationship with Jesus by faith as one of its chief goals is not worthy to be called BIBLICAL counseling. "
37 " When it comes to biblical counseling, friendship is central to the counseling relationship because it is a key aspect of the Gospel. Paul's words display it; Jesus' actions approve it. In Jesus Christ, friendship has its ultimate – that is, it's paradigmatic – display. He sacrificially gave Himself for the good of those he befriended – people who were awkward and troubled types, people who did not offer Him anything particularly desirable in return. "
― James MacDonald , Authentic: Developing the Disciplines of a Sincere Faith
38 " So often, it's others around us who can see where God wants to grow us even before we see it ourselves. "
39 " Small groups are the place to push past Bible knowledge and on to life application so that we can see people's lives transform more and more into the image of Christ. "
40 " If our counseling is truly Christ-centered, then the topic of forgiveness will inevitably come up in the journey toward growth and change. "