"One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him,
"Which is the first of all the commandments?"
Jesus replied, "The first is this:
Hear, O Israel!
The Lord our God is Lord alone!
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul,
with all your mind,
and with all your strength.
The second is this:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Mark 12
"Because of his affliction
he shall see the light in fullness
of days;
through his suffering, my servant shall justify many,
and their guilt he shall bear." Is. 53
"As Jesus was setting out on a journey, a man ran up,
knelt down before him, and asked him,
"Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Mk 10
"Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,
it would be better for him if a great millstone
were put around his neck
and he were thrown into the sea.
If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.
It is better for you to enter into life maimed
than with two hands to go into Gehenna,
into the unquenchable fire." Mark 9
"Indeed someone might say,
"You have faith and I have works."
Demonstrate your faith to me without works,
and I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works." James 2
"When I came to you, brothers, proclaiming the mystery of God,* I did not come with sublimity of words or of wisdom. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
I came to you in weakness* and fear and much trembling, and my message and my proclamation were not with persuasive (words of) wisdom,* but with a demonstration of spirit and power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God." I Cor. 2
The most important part of apologetics is the capacity to make Jesus loved. That is why I recommend Spufford’s book. His heart is in it. He said he wrote the book typing at a table in a Cambridge coffee shop. Other apologetic books I have recommended make logical arguments consistent with faith. None that I recommend connect as well emotionally as does this book.
"As a result of this,
many of his disciples returned to their former way of life
and no longer accompanied him.
Jesus then said to the Twelve, "Do you also want to leave?"
Simon Peter answered him, "Master, to whom shall we go?
You have the words of eternal life." John 6
We have come to believe
and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God."
Campbell is a great story teller and has an intuitive sense of her own spiritual needs. This book is about how a distorted perfectionism tries to undermine the life of sanctity and her own struggles with trying to make her life (an unfortunately the life of others) perfect.
"Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood
has eternal life,
and I will raise him on the last day.
For my flesh is true food,
and my blood is true drink.
Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood
remains in me and I in him." John 6