Dangerous Wonder

So I'm re-reading this book, Dangerous Wonder, and I thought I'd put up some stuff from it that has stuck out to me.

"Sometimes I think the people to feel saddest for are people who once knew what profoundness was, but who lost or became numb to the sensation of wonder." (Douglas Copeland)

"We live in a time when faith is thin, because our aching for what is above and beyond us has been anesthetized and our capacity for wonder reduced to clever tricks." (Alan Jones)

"We did not want to stop hearing God's voice. Indeed, God kept on speaking. But our lives became louder. The increasing crescendo of our possessions, the ear-piercing noise of busyness, and the soul-smothering volume of our endless activity drowned out the still, small voice of God."

"I was full of joy and fear at the same time because I knew that if I listened to this Jesus and followed Him - if I, like the disciples, left my fishing or my tax collecting - He would lead me into treacherous territory, where every day would be an experience of danger and wonder at the same time: an adventure of dangerous wonder."

"Jesus was a dangerous man - dangerous to the power structure, dangerous to the church, dangerous to the crowds of people who followed Him. Shouldn't the followers of Christ also be dangerous? Shouldn't everyone be awed and dazzled by Christians? Shouldn't Christians be known by the fire in their souls, the wild-eyed gratitude in their faces, the twinkle in their eyes, and a holy mischief in their demeanors? Shouldn't Christianity be considered dangerous - unpredictable, threatening to the status quo, living outside the lines, uncontrollable, fearless, wild, beyond categorization or definition? Shouldn't those who call themselves Christians be filled with awe, astonishment, and amazement?"

"Risk, as we have seen, is indispensable to any significant life, nowhere more clearly than in the life of the spirit. The goal of faith is not to create a set of immutable, rationalized, precisely defined and defendable beliefs to preserve forever. It is to recover a relationship with God." (Dan Taylor)

"The greatest enemy of Christianity may be people who say they believe in Jesus but who are no longer astonished and amazed. Jesus Christ came to save us from listlessness as well as lostness; He came to save us from flat souls as well as corrupted souls. He came to save us from dullness. Our culture is awash in immorality and drowning in dullness. We have forgotten how to dance, how to sing, and how to laugh. We have allowed technology to beat our imaginations into submission and have become tourists rather than travelers. Television dominates our time, alters our values, numbs us to life in all of its wildness. We have been stunned by mediocrity."

"Curiosity requires courage. You must be willing to ask questions even when they threaten everyone around you. Faith is more than believing; it is an act of courage, a bold grasping of God's truth. Faith is a wrestling match with God, an intense struggle with truth in an attempt to squeeze every bit of knowledge out of it. Curiosity is the shape of our hunger for God. We question God without apology, we march into the presence of God bringing our armfuls of questions - without fear - because God is not afraid of them. People are afraid. Institutions are afraid. God is not afraid."

"Our questions may chase everyone else away, but they attract Jesus. We may be stuck with our questions, but we are also stuck with Jesus. If our questions leave us alone with Jesus, then lonely isn't a bad place to be."