The secularization of Western culture was accompanied by the elevation of art to the position of a substitute religion to replace Christianity.

A Christian philosophy of literature begins with the same agenda of issues that any philosophy of literature addresses. Its distinctive feature is that it relates these issues to the Christian faith.

In Puritan thinking, the Christian life was a heroic venture, requiring a full quota of energy.

The Puritans' sense of priorities in life was one of their greatest strengths. Putting God first and valuing everything else in relation to God was a recurrent Puritan theme.

William Perkins said, “The end of a man’s calling is not to gather riches for himself…but to serve God in the serving of man, and in the seeking the good of all men.

No group of people has been more unjustly maligned in the twentieth century than the Puritans. As a result, we approach the Puritans with an enormous baggage of culturally ingrained prejudice.

For the Puritans, the God-centered life meant making the quest for spiritual and moral holiness the great business of life.

Stressing the God-centered life can lead to an otherworldly withdrawal from everyday earthly life.

The goal of Bible translation is: be transparent to the original text - to see as clearly as possible what the biblical authors actually wrote.

When you think about Puritanism, you must begin by getting rid of the slang term 'Puritanism' as applied to Victorian religious hypocrisy. This does not apply to seventeenth-century Puritanism.

Literature incarnates its meanings as concretely as possible. The knowledge that literature gives of a subject is the kind of knowledge that is obtained by (vicariously) living through an experience.

For books are more than books, they are the life, the very heart and core of ages past, the reason why men worked and died, the essence and quintessence of their lives.

I'm often wrong but never in doubt.

God answers prayer with certainty. Wish fulfillment is something else.

I'm not a rock star, I'm a soft person.

In this frightening, anxious time to be alive it can be liberating to remember that nothing lasts forever. That can focus and invigorate our hopes.

Hell is life drying up.

My priority will be making sure my family is happy and settled.

Laughter serves as a blocking agent. Like a bullet-proof vest, it may help protect you against the ravages of negative emotions that can assault you in disease.