“A certain kind of life always goes back to high school, a fact often overlooked by otherwise insightful biographers. Grown-up life is just a continuation of high school, a fact overlooked by everyone else” (Evangellyfish, p. 159).
Two Orientations
“Man was made to tend the garden, while woman was made to tend the man” (For a Glory and a Covering, p. 91).
Which Rarely Happens in Nature
“His long fingers were splayed, hands together, fingertip to fingertip, as though a spider were sideways on a mirror, doing push-ups in an agitated manner” (Evangellyfish, p. 157).
Two Kinds of Equality
“Christian equality can be described as equity, or even-handedness. Egalitarianism, in contrast, demands sameness, or equality of outcome. These two visions of equality are about as comparable as dry and wet. Think of it in terms of ten teenage boys trying to dunk a basketball: equity means that they all face the same ten-foot standard, …
Not Too Gooby
“Stacey was trying to figure out a way to communicate something along the lines of ‘my hero’ without sounding too gooby. She like Keith about as much as Keith liked Mindy, and knew she was a little behind Mindy in a race that Mindy wasn’t even in, and so she had to play it cool. …
Sanctified Ambition
“Jesus does not say that we are to rip out the chief seats in the synagogues, but rather how to relate to them. He does not teach us to get rid of seats of honor at banquets — He teaches us how to get into them. He does not say that it is wrong to …
Tattoos Say So Much
“This part of town had their crazy pastors too, but they mainly operated out of storefronts with names like Knee Deep in Glory Gospel Center. And some of their pastors had tattoos, but these were tattoos that said, ‘I was in the Navy once, before I met Jesus,’ instead of the uptown ecclesiastical version that …
Very Much Like Him
“For about three centuries, we have been taught (by the devil, or someone very much like him) that grime is more ‘authentic’ than being clean, being disheveled is more real than being put together, and so on. Like most lies of this nature, the destructive impact of it falls most heavily on women . . …
Retail Detritus
“Three miles down that stretch of freeway, he downshifted and pulled off the highway on the next exit ramp he came to, turned right at the light, and headed off down a strip occupoed by mobile-home dealers, tattoo parlors, and numerous stores full of retail detritus” (Evangellyfish, p. 150).
A True Gift
“One of the best ways for a man to love a woman is to love her children” (For a Glory and a Covering, p. 82).