Prodigal: Sometimes we just need the right focus to start our day.

Me: Yes, I need help with that sometimes.

Prodigal: I think we all do.

This is from the book Prophetic Voices in Contemporary Theology by Karl Barth, Rudolf Bultmann, Paul Tillich, Reinhold Niebuhr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

The Christian is “justus et peccator,” both sinner and righteous”; that history fulfills and negates the Kingdom of God; that grace is continuous with, and in contradiction to, nature; that Christ is what we ought to be and also what we cannot be; that the power of God is in us and that the power of God is against us in judgment and mercy; that all those affirmations which are but varied forms of one central paradox of the relation of the Gospel to history must be applied to the experiences of life from top to bottom. There is no area of life where “grace” does not impinge. There are no complex relations of social justice to which the love of Kingdom of God is not relevant. There are on the other hand no areas or experiences where historical insecurity and anxiety are completely transcended, except in principle. There are indeed moment of prayer and, perhaps ecstatic achievements of agape in which men are caught up in the “seventh heaven”; but these moments are merely an “earnest” of the fulfillment of life and must not be claimed as a possession. There is, finally, the transcendence of man over history and sin by faith. But that is also an “earnest”; and is corrupted like the manna in the wilderness when stored up as a secure possession.

Philippians 2:13

for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Jennifer Van Allen

www.theprodigalpig.com

www.faithincounseling.org