Pastor John,
What a wonderful feeling in the room tonight as we all were reading Chapter 9 together. I love the simplicity and truth of these statements from your book, below:
“What God did have in mind was to sacrifice His own dear Son, who had been by His side from the beginning, for God was not subject to the law He gave to man.”
Talking of the disciples after Jesus died, “There was not an ounce of faith left in them that Jesus was the Messiah.”
Footnote 7: It really touched me that you started this footnote out with, “A dear friend…”
It was very humbling to read the paragraph with excerpts from Isaiah 53. , And then at the end, you summed up the Jews’ thoughts, “…it was absurd [to them] to suggest that a crucified man would be Israel’s Messiah.”
About envy, you wrote, “But envy is always ashamed of itself, and it hides behind causes that appear noble.”
The whole paragraph you wrote about Galatians 4:17, and then you summed it up with, “Hope of supreme earthly glory overwhelmed the Gentiles’ faith in Paul and his gospel.”
And then the above leads into my favorite quote that Michael also mentioned, “But what makes any truth hard to understand is a heart dulled by what it thinks it knows.”
Thank you for all the work you have put into this, into us! I love the precious truths you have taught us and are still teaching us. It is beautiful, healing food in my soul, and I love learning, loving, and eating it all up with us all in one accord.
Donna