Quotes from Eugene Peterson

He tells the sun, 'Don't shine,' and it doesn't; he pulls the blinds on the stars.

God uses language to create and command us.

Don't curse God; and don't damn your leaders.

Psalm 127 shows a way to work that is neither sheer activity nor pure passivity. It doesn't glorify work as such, and it doesn't condemn work as such. It doesn't say, "God has a great work for you to do; go and do it." Nor does it say, "God has done everything; go fishing." If we want simple solutions in regard to work, we can become workaholics or dropouts. If we want to experience the fullness of work, we will do better to study Psalm 127.

Our work goes wrong when we lose touch with the God who works "his salvation in the midst of the earth." It goes wrong both when we work anxiously and when we don't work at all, when we become frantic and compulsive in our work (Babel) and when we become indolent and lethargic in our work (Thessalonica).

Somehow, though he moves right in front of me, I don't see him; quietly but surely he's active, and I miss it.

Do you see what we've got? An unshakable kingdom! And do you see how thankful we must be? Not only thankful, but brimming with worship, deeply reverent before God. For God is not an indifferent bystander. He's actively cleaning house, torching all that needs to burn, and he won't quit until it's all cleansed. God himself is Fire!

The kingdom is here. We are in it. The "sum of money" that we are left with is not something to be guarded, protected, and kept safe, but put to good use.

A beautiful discipline of the soul can become sappy, mindless counsel, if we divorce it from the biblical roots of honesty, grief, lament, and genuine celebration from which it originates. No! If we are to live praising lives, robust lives of affirmation, we must live truly, honestly, and courageously. We cannot take shortcuts to the act of praising. We cannot praise prematurely.

God loves you. He's on your side. He's coming after you. He's relentless.

Even though innocent, anything I say incriminates me; blameless as I am, my defense just makes me sound worse.

The practice of prayer, if it is going to amount to anything more than wish lists and complaints, requires a recovery of personal, relational, revelational language in both our listening and our speaking.