The gospel is fiction when judged by the empire, but the empire is fiction when judged by the gospel. Walter Brueggemann More Quotes by Walter Brueggemann More Quotes From Walter Brueggemann The Gospel is a very dangerous idea. We have to see how much of that dangerous idea we can perform in our own lives. There is nothing innocuous or safe about the Gospel. Jesus did not get crucified because he was a nice man. Walter Brueggemann nice men jesus Compassion constitutes a radical form of criticism, for it announces that the hurt is to be taken seriously, that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal and natural, but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for humanness. Walter Brueggemann compassion taken hurt Sabbath, in the first instance, is not about worship. It is about work stoppage. It is about withdrawal from the anxiety system of Pharaoh, the refusal to let one’s life be defined by production and consumption and the endless pursuit of private well-being. Walter Brueggemann pharaohs withdrawal anxiety We pray because our life comes from God and we yield it back in prayer. Prayer is a great antidote to the illusion that we are self-made. Walter Brueggemann yield self prayer Imagination is a danger thus every totalitarian regime is frightened of the artist. It is the vocation of the prophet to keep alive the ministry of imagination to keep on conjouring and proposing alternative futures to the single one the king wants to urge as the only thinkable one. Walter Brueggemann artist imagination kings The task of prophetic ministry is to nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture around us. Walter Brueggemann ministry tasks perception The power of the future lies not in the hands of those who believe in scarcity but of those who trust God's abundance. Walter Brueggemann believe lying hands The deep places in our lives - places of resistance and embrace - are reached only by stories, by images, metaphors and phrases that line out the world differently, apart from our fear and hurt. Walter Brueggemann phrases hurt stories Those who participate in [sabbath] break the anxiety cycle. They are invited to awareness that life does not consist in frantic production and consumption that reduces everyone else to threat and competition. Walter Brueggemann anxiety competition doe The church meets to imagine what our lives can be like if the gospel were true. Walter Brueggemann our-lives imagine church People notice peacemakers because they dress funny. We know how the people who make war dress - in uniforms and medals, or in computers and clipboards, or in absoluteness, severity, greed, and cynicism. But the peacemaker is dressed in righteousness, justice, and faithfulness - dressed for the work that is to be done. Walter Brueggemann faith love peace When serious people of good faith disagree, they've got to go back into the narratives and come at it again. One of the problems in the church is that people are not willing to do that. People have arrived at a place where they think they have got the answer. Walter Brueggemann church people thinking Hope does not need to silence the rumblings of crisis to be hope. Walter Brueggemann silence doe needs The world for which you have been so carefully prepared is being taken away from you, by the grace of God. Walter Brueggemann taken grace world We now know that human transformation does not happen through didacticism or through excessive certitude, but through the playful entertainment of another scripting of reality that may subvert the old given text and its interpretation and lead to the embrace of an alternative text and its redescription of reality. Walter Brueggemann alternatives doe reality On the other hand, hope is subversive, for it limits the grandiose pretension of the present, daring to announce that the present to which we have all made commitments is now called into question. Walter Brueggemann limits hands commitment Sabbath is not simply the pause that refreshes. It is the pause that transforms. Walter Brueggemann pauses sabbath We do not live by what is possessed but by what is promised. Walter Brueggemann possessed live-by Those who sign on and depart the system of anxious scarcity become the historymakers in the neighborhood. Walter Brueggemann scarcity anxious neighborhood And when we take ourselves too seriously, we are grim about the brothers and sisters, especially the dissenting ones, and there will be no health in us and no healing humor. Walter Brueggemann theologian brother healing
