Quotes about Reconciliation

Hating those boys didn't do anything to the boys, just to me. So I pushed them and all my hate from my heart. Once I did that, God came back in.

Forgiveness is alchemy. To take something so base and ugly that you don't even want to think of it and turn it into something noble and fine. That is true alchemy. Remember that. It's not always easy, but if you can do that, you'll have a happy life.

We are chained to that which we do not forgive

Reconciliation means you bury the hatchet, not necessarily the issue.

Emphasize reconciliation, not resolution.

Sometimes the reason people have a problem accepting 'the gospel' is that they sense that the God lurking behind Jesus isn't safe, loving, or good. It doesn't make sense, it can't be reconciled, and so they say no.

And so, beginning with the early church, there is a long tradition of Christians who believe that God will ultimately restore everything and everybody, because Jesus says in Matthew 19 that there will be a "renewal of all things," Peter says in Acts 3 that Jesus will "restore everything," and Paul says in Colossians 1 that through Christ "God was pleased to . . . reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven.

Central to their trust that all would be reconciled was the belief that untold masses of people suffering forever doesn't bring God glory. Restoration brings God glory; eternal torment doesn't. Reconciliation brings God glory; endless anguish doesn't. Renewal and return cause God's greatness to shine through the universe; never-ending punishment doesn't.

This insistence that God will be united and reconciled with all people is a theme the writers and prophets return to again and again. They are very specific in their beliefs about who God is and what God is doing in the world, constantly affirming the simple fact that God does not fail.

She'd left God in the dust quite some time ago.

It had been so long, a full five months since he'd left. Since she had tossed him from the property. What would she say when she saw him? He feared she'd kick him from her land without giving him a chance to explain. Travis wiped his sweaty palms down the length of his thigh. She'd hear him out whether she wanted to or not. He'd tossed her over his shoulder once before, and he'd do it again. He loved her, and it was time she believed it.

You will achieve more in this world through acts of mercy than you will through acts of retribution.