Death Extinguished By A Sea of Blessings

Christ has paid far more than we owed — as much more as a boundless ocean compared with a drop of water. Doubt not therefore, O man, when you see such a wealth of benefits; nor inquire how that spark of death and sin can be extinguished, when such a sea of blessings is let in upon it. 

— St. John Chrysostom, quoted by George Smeaton in The Apostles' Doctrine of the Atonement

HT Of First Importance

A Future in Which We Can Be Changed

Gracious God,
our sins are too heavy to carry,
too real to hide,
and too deep to undo.

Forgive what our lips tremble to name,
what our hearts can no longer bear,
and what has become for us
a consuming fire of judgment.

Set us free from a past that we cannot change;
open to us a future in which we can be changed;
and grant us grace to grow more and more in your likeness and image,
through Jesus Christ, the light of the world. Amen.

- from the Book of Common Worship

HT: Trevin Wax

A Stake in the Heart

"Jesus' death on the cross paid the debt of our sin and also drove a stake into the heart of its ability to produce brokenness. Jesus broke the Great Breaker. Jesus broke the back of sin so that it can only exert any of its slithery, divisive influence on us when we choose to go visit it in the hospital. "

--Michael Williams, How to Read the Bible through the Jesus Lens: A Guide to Christ-Focused Reading of Scripture (Zondervan, 2012), 199

Hat Tip: Dane Ortlund