Quotes about Transcendence

Jesus astonishes his contemporaries by his capacity to see and act beyond conventional assumptions.

Do ye not comprehend that we are worms, Born to bring forth the angelic butterfly That flieth unto judgment without screen?

And yet the Christian gospel is more than a transcendent reality, more than "going to heaven when I die, to shout salvation as I fly." It is also an immanent reality—a powerful liberating presence among the poor right now in their midst, "building them up where they are torn down and propping them up on every leaning side." The gospel is found wherever poor people struggle for justice, fighting for their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

As I got closer to it, it got brighter and brighter. It wasn't like any light I could describe to you. It was beautiful.

In a society where rationality has ruled so long, the church frequently fails to see that in forsaking the weekly pursuit of the transcendent, we have given up the only ground that was uniquely ours in this world. In attempting to make the church something that can attract and add value to secular mind-sets, we have turned our backs on our one true proposition - transcendence.

God forgive the church of Jesus Christ for trading its birthright access to the transcendent for the pot of stew that is horizontal helpfulness. How shortsighted and human centered. The outcome of this disaster is that we have created a Creator in our own image who weeps, cares, and longs to help, but in the end we doubt He can because we have made Him so much like ourselves. In making God our buddy, we find Him nice for cuddling but not much help when the hurricane comes.

I experience transcendence when something infinite reminds me I am finite.

God's holiness … puts everything and everyone in their rightful place.

In our humanness we can't handle all His holiness; so God, in mercy, raises the veil and dwells in mystery.

An overemphasis upon imminence in preaching has banished transcendence and tended to a theology of God being technically present as an observer but effectively absent as a participant. When

We must not think of God as highest in an ascending order of beings starting with the single cell, then the fish, then the bird, then the animal, then man and angels and cherubs and God.… This would be to grant God eminence or even preeminence but that is not enough. We must grant God transcendence in the fullest meaning of that word. He's wholly other. He breaks all the categories of being and knowing.24

Transcendence is a healthy dose of insignificance to a race whose root sin is pride. Transcendence cuts us all down to our proper proportion before an awesome God. That you and I are not significant is a wonderful, freeing discovery, and that's what church is for.