Richard Beck Quotes

#1. This is how worship is connected to our ability to love. When we give our ultimate allegiance to any of the principalities and powers, large or small, we find ourselves perennially at war with anyone who places these things at risk. Idolatry breeds perpetual vigilance and violence.

Richard Beck

#2. Basically, when you lose track of the Devil you lose track of Jesus and the kingdom of God.

Richard Beck

#3. When Jesus talks about conflict with "principalities and powers," he's talking about conflict with legal and political authorities.

Richard Beck

#4. These two experiences of scarcity - not having enough and not being enough - affect our ability to love each other, fully, joyfully, and sacrificially.

Richard Beck

#5. Whenever you hear someone say that they love God more than human beings watch out, because that person is about to hurt somebody.

Richard Beck

#6. The idea here is that we are less wicked than we are weak. As sarx - as mortal animals - we are playthings of the devil, who uses the fear of death to push and pull our survival instincts (our fleshly, sarx-driven passions) to keep us as "slaves to sin.

Richard Beck

#7. In sum, when Paul writes in Ephesians 6 that our battle is against the principalities and powers, he's not just talking about demon possession, he's also talking about our struggle with political powers.

Richard Beck

#8. Satan might not be a personalized agent, but I do believe there are moral forces that transcend individuals, forces that have a real causal effect on moral decision-making.

Richard Beck

#9. Being a parent is joyful, but it's also haunted by the specter of loss.

Richard Beck