The relationship between the obedience of Gods people and the triumph of Gods cause is not a relationship of cause and effect but one of cross and resurrection.

The church seeks to help form people who can risk being peaceful in a violent world, risk being kind in a competitive world, risk being faithful in an age of cynicism, risk being gentle among those who admire the tough, risk love when it may not be returned, because we have the confidence that in Christ we have been reborn into a new reality.

The cross is not a detour or a hurdle on the way to the kingdom, nor is it even the way to the kingdom it is the kingdom come.