Quotes about Substance

The fullness of joy is to behold God in everything. God is the ground, the substance, the teaching, the teacher, the purpose, and the reward for which every soul labors.

And when Paul discusses the restoration of the image, it is clear that we should infer from his words that man is made to conform to God, not by an inflowing of substance, but by the grace and power of the Spirit. For he says that by "beholding Christ's glory, we are being transformed into his very image… as through the Spirit of the Lord" [II Cor. 3:18], who surely works in us without rendering us consubstantial with God.

That this world's general sickness doth not lie In any humour, or one certain part; But as thou sawest it rotten at the heart, Thou seest a hectic fever hath got hold Of the whole substance, not to be controlled, And that thou hast but one way, not to admit The world's infection, to be none of it.

Faith is not a leap in the dark. Faith is not a "hope so." Faith is substance and evidence - substance for a scientific mind, and evidence for a legal mind.

Faith is the substance of whatever it is that we hope for. The important thing is that we teach that faith is connected to good works and responsibility.

Modern spirituality has no hell, no doctrine, no substance. It is about feeling.

Addiction is bondage to the rule of a substance, activity, or state of mind, which then becomes the center of life, defending itself from the truth so that even bad consequences don't bring repentance, and leading to further estrangement from God.

Religion is best when it points beyond itself, like Isaiah or John the Baptist. It is worst when it gives you just enough of the forms to inoculate you against the substance, when it substitutes rituals for reality, the container for the contents, the wineskins for the ecstatic wine.

A master drives you toward the substance so that you will stop defending and protecting the forms.

We are all spiritually powerless, however, and not just those physically addicted to a substance, which is why I address this book to everyone. Alcoholics just have their powerlessness visible for all to see. The rest of us disguise it in different ways, and overcompensate for our more hidden and subtle addictions and attachments, especially our addiction to our way of thinking.

Stinking thinking" is the universal addiction. Substance addictions like alcohol and drugs are merely the most visible form of addiction, but actually we are all addicted to our own habitual way of doing anything, our own defenses, and most especially, our patterned way of thinking, or how we process our reality.

We are all spiritually powerless, however, and not just those physically addicted to a substance, which is why I address this book to everyone.