I don't like Paradise, as they probably don't have obsessions there.
The rubber hits the road when we try to show grace to a person most unlike us, even someone morally offensive.
We in the church have humility and contrition to offer the world, not a formula for success. Almost alone in our success-oriented society, we admit that we have failed, are failing, and always will fail.
Eugene Peterson points out that "the root meaning in Hebrew of salvation is to be broad, to become spacious, to enlarge. It carries the sense of deliverance from an existence that has become compressed, confined and cramped. " God wants to set free, to make it possible for us to live open and loving lives with God and our neighbors. "I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free," wrote the psalmist.
We tend to think, 'Life should be fair because God is fair. ' But God is not life. And if I confuse God with the physical reality of life- by expecting constant good health for example- then I set myself up for crashing disappointment.
The world says you gain your life by getting more and more and more and more, but Jesus says, 'No, that leads to death. You get it back by giving it away and when you give it away you get it back. '
Unless we love natural goods - sex, alcohol, food, money, success, power - in the way God intended, we become their slaves, as any addict can attest.
Time is lost when we have not lived a full human life, time unenriched by experience, creative endeavor, enjoyment, and suffering.
Filmmaking is such a collaborative piece of art that you can't look to one person - you couldn't look to me, you couldn't say, 'Because Vin's in it, it's this or that. . . ' It's really all of us coming together for that period of time to try and make magic.
The hardest diet I was ever on was the one when I was fat. You can only wear fat clothes, you don't feel good, your sex life gets damaged, you don't have energy for anything. It's horrible.
For me, one of the most important things I look for in an actor is whether we can converse. Do we have a similar ability to discuss a character?