- Psalm 32:5
- James 5:16
- Matthew 3:1-6
- Lamentations 3:17-22
“Christian ethics can never be a matter of mere avoidance of certain activity. It must also be characterized by enthusiastic (literally, filled with the divine), hopeful engagement and action. The willingness to settle down into merely present arrangements, to keep house, to maintain the status quo is a sin against Sunday. Our willingness to…not let go of the old and embrace the new, not put new wine into new wineskins, is not simply boring and uncreative, it is unfaithful.”
– Will Willimon
“Christian ethics in not primarily an individualistic, one-on-one-with-God brand of personal holiness; rather it has to do with living the life of the Spirit in Christian community and in the world.”
- Gordon Fee
“ In acts of mutual confession we release the power that heals. Our humanity is no longer denied, but transformed….Without the cross the Discipline of confession would be only psychologically therapeutic. But it is so much more. It involves and objective change in our relationship with God and a subjective change in us. It is a means of healing and transforming the inner spirit.”
- Richard Foster
“Scripture teaches us that we can’t move toward hope, peace transformation, and reconciliation without going through sorrow, mourning, regret, and lament.”
- Grace Ji-Sun Kim
“Lament says you belong to me, and I belong to you and will enter in with you…In lament, we find language that boldly comes before God and trusts [God] to show us [God’s] face. To cover us and guide us and ransom us. To fight our enemies and restore the barren places. In lament we acknowledge we are powerless to fix it.
Lament is subversive, always lifting from the breasts of the suffering; it’s always born in pain. Our tongues swollen with agony. It is the untamed cry of our hearts. The truth of our witness. We are not called to housebreak this truth or make it more palatable by neutering it and making it play nice and behave. The truth will not sit and fetch and stay, it demands to be unleashed. It is wild and dangerous.”
- Alia Joy
