But we all suffer. For we all... - Nicholas Wolterstorff - Quotes.Pub

But we all suffer. For we all prize and love; and in this present existence of ours, prizing and loving yield suffering. Love in our world is suffering love. Some do not suffer much, though, for they do not love much. Suffering is for the loving. This, said Jesus, is the command of the Holy One: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." In commanding us to love, God invites us to suffer.

Love Quotes / God Quotes Lament for a Son Quotes Suffering Quotes

Nicholas Wolterstorff Quotes

Each death is as unique as each life.

IT’S so WRONG, so profoundly wrong, for a child to die before its parents. It’s hard enough to bury our parents. But that we expect. Our parents belong to our past, our children belong to our future. We do not visualize our future without them. How can I bury my son, my future, one of the next in line? He was meant to bury me!

A friend said, “Remember, he’s in good hands.” I was deeply moved. But that reality does not put Eric back in my hands now. That’s my grief. For that grief, what consolation can there be other than having him back?

But the pain of the no more outweighs the gratitude of the once was. Will it always be so? I didn’t know how much I loved him until he was gone. Is love like that?

Don’t say it’s not really so bad. Because it is. Death is awful, demonic. If you think your task as comforter is to tell me that really, all things considered, it’s not so bad, you do not sit with me in my grief but place yourself off in the distance away from me. Over there, you are of no help.

The very freedom and expressiveness we find missing in life we find present in art.

We strain to hear. But instead of hearing an answer we catch sight of God himself scraped and torn. Through our tears we see the tears of God.

The tears of God are the meaning of history.

In the valley of suffering, despair and bitterness are brewed. But there also character is made. The valley of suffering is the vale of soul-making.

I Shall Look At The World Through Tears. Perhaps I Shall See Things That, Dry-Eyed, I Could Not See.

THE TEARS ... streamed down, and I let them flow as freely as they would, making of them a pillow for my heart. On them it rested."-AUGUSTINE,Confessions IX, i z

Lament for a Son Quotes

Killing off the other party is one way of achieving universal intersubjective agreement.

Sometimes the reason offered for seeking aesthetic excellence in the music of the church is that thereby one pleases God. I think that is true. But not because we know what music God enjoys-- though I suspect it must be music which is unified, rich, and intense! Rather, because it is in the joy of his people that God finds delight.

Art Quotes Music Quotes / Art in Action: Toward a Christian Aesthetic Quotes Pleasing to god Quotes

the Reformed Christian has never believed that America is a Christian nation and that, accordingly, our social institutions and formations, though blemished here and there, are fundamentally in accord with God's will. But neither has she agreed with those Christians who hold that our social institutions and formations are fundamentally corrupt and that the duty of the Christian is to withdraw. Normative discrimination is what she has always regarded as the appropriate stance, coupled with the attempt, once the discrimination has been made, to change what is wrong when that proves possible, to keep discontent alive when change proves not possible, and always to be grateful for what is good. In short, to act redemptively. While praying the prayer, "Thy kingdom come," to join God's cause of struggling against all that resists and falls short of God's will and longing for creation, thus to acknowledge the rightful, and ultimately effective, rule of Jesus Christ over every square inch of creation.

Educating for Shalom: Essays on Christian Higher Education Quotes

Choice is always performed against a background of habit.

Until Justice and Peace Embrace: The Kuyper Lectures for 1981 Delivered at the Free University of Am Quotes

Technology does make possible advance toward shalom; progress in mastery of the world can bring shalom nearer. But the limits of technology must also be acknowledged; technology is entirely incapable of bringing about shalom between ourselves and God, and it is only scarcely capable of bringing about the love of self and neighbour.

Faith Quotes Technology Quotes / Until Justice and Peace Embrace: The Kuyper Lectures for 1981 Delivered at the Free University of Am Quotes

Why are the photographs of him as a little boy so incredibly hard to look at? Something is over. Now instead of those shiny moments being things we can share together in delighted memories, I, the survivor, have to bear them alone. So it is with all the memories of him. They all lead into blackness. All I can do is remember him, I cannot experience him. Nothing new can happen between us.

Child death Quotes Grief Quotes Lament for a Son Quotes Loss of child Quotes

Faith is a footbridge that you don't know will hold you up over the chasm until you're forced to walk out onto it.

Faith Quotes / Lament for a Son Quotes

Many are the scholars who make it their professional occupation to occupy themselves in this towering edifice of culture, exploring its nook and crannies, developing their responses, making their contributions here and there, and helping to hand it on to succeeding generations. For some the temptation proves irresistible to go yet farther and make this the concern of their lives, letting society go its own sorry way while they lock themselves away in this abiding, socially transcendent cultural stronghold, acquiescing in society while pursuing Bildung. As Rotterdam burns, they study Sanskrit verb forms.

Ivory tower Quotes Scholarship Quotes Society Quotes Until Justice and Peace Embrace: The Kuyper Lectures for 1981 Delivered at the Free University of Am Quotes

How is faith to endure, O God, when you allow all this scraping and tearing on us? You have allowed rivers of blood to flow, mountains of suffering to pile up, sobs to become humanity's song--all without lifting a finger that we could see. You have allowed bonds of love beyond number to be painfully snapped. If you have not abandoned us, explain yourself.We strain to hear. But instead of hearing an answer we catch sight of God himself scraped and torn. Through our tears we see the tears of God.

Faith Quotes / Lament for a Son Quotes

God is not only the God of the sufferers but the God who suffers. ... It is said of God that no one can behold his face and live. I always thought this meant that no one could see his splendor and live. A friend said perhaps it meant that no one could see his sorrow and live. Or perhaps his sorrow is splendor. ... Instead of explaining our suffering God shares it.

Faith Quotes / Lament for a Son Quotes

Will my eyes adjust to this darkness? Will I find you in the dark – not in the streaks of light which remain, but in the darkness? Has anyone ever found you there? Did they love what they saw? Did they see love? And are there songs for singing when the light has gone dim? Or in the dark, is it best to wait in silence?Noon has darkened. As fast as they could say, ‘He’s dead,’ the light dimmed. And where are you in the darkness? I learned to spy you in the light. Here in this darkness, I cannot find you. If I had never looked for you, or looked but never found, I would not feel this pain of your absence. Or is not your absence in which I dwell, but your elusive troubling presence?It’s the neverness that is so painful. Never again to be here with us – never to sit with us at the table…. All the rest of our lives we must live without him. Only our death can stop the pain of his death.

Child death Quotes Death of a child Quotes Grief Quotes Lament for a Son Quotes

And what of regrets? I shall live with them. I shall accept my regrets as part of my life, to be numbered among my self-inflicted wounds. But I will not endlessly gaze at them. I shall allow the memories to prod me into doing better with those still living. And I shall allow them to sharpen the vision and intensify the hope for that Great Day coming when we can all throw ourselves into each other's arms and say, "I'm sorry.

Forgiveness Quotes Inspirational Quotes Regret Quotes / Lament for a Son Quotes

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