life on planet earth on Betrayal

Each betrayal begins with trust.

Our destruction of nature is not just bad stewardship, or stupid economics, or a betrayal of family responsibility; it is the most horrid blasphemy. It is flinging God's gifts into His face, as if...

Part of the spirit dies a little each time it’s asked to carry more than its weight in terror, violence, and betrayal.

I used to advertise my loyalty and I don't believe there is a single person I loved that I didn't eventually betray.

If your voice is heard by more people because you've earned some kind of name and fame, your silence on an issue of urgent moral importance is even more of a betrayal. Privilege is obligation.

History is not the story of heroes entirely. It is often the story of cruelty and injustice and shortsightedness. There are monsters, there is evil, there is betrayal. That's why people should rea...

Long before morning I knew that what I was seeking to discover was a thing I'd always known. That all courage was a form of constancy. That it is always himself that the coward abandoned first. Af...

Religion is like a knife: you can either use it to cut bread, or stick in someone’s back.

Let me be on my guard when the world puts on a loving face, for it will, if possible, betray me as it did my Master, with a kiss.”

All our experience with history should teach us, when we look back, how badly human wisdom is betrayed when it relies on itself

The ultimate proof of total forgiveness takes place when we sincerely petition the Father to let those who have hurt us off the hook-even if they have hurt not only us, but also those close to us.

When Jesus holds up the cup and offers what is in it as the fluid of forgiveness, he is not talking to people with a short list of minor sins. He is talking to people who will turn him in, who will sc...

Lord of Hosts, We come before you today in a tone of solemnity. We recognize that while it was Judas who betrayed you for 30 pieces of silver, that we often betray you as well. We know what is right,...

To me one of the most terrifying scenes in all of literature is in Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman . Willy Loman is a traveling salesman who feels that he is largely a failure. His self-pity...

Leader: Save, O Lord, for the godly one is gone; for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man. People: Everyone utters lies to his neighbor; with flattering lips and a double heart ...

For some reason I have always had a tendency to be a hero worshiper…Unfortunately I carried this tendency into my life in the church. Even those I learned to love and admire let me down. From an early...

The idea of spiritual goats in a church has always been intriguing to me…They gave opinions to questions they were never asked and sought attention to soothe their feelings of neglect… Then, in every ...

There comes a time when silence is betrayal.

Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies. At the end all his disciples deserted him. On the Cross he was utterly alone, surrounded by evildoers and mockers. For this cause he had come, to bring ...

The pastor R.C. Sproul was studying in the Netherlands in the last 1960s and randomly struck up a conversation with a Dutch woman. The conversation was a common, enjoyable interaction, but when it was...

Feeling better…I also felt a sense of betrayal of my husband, even though I rationally knew that sustained grief could be morbid. Because grief may become a substitute for the dead one, giving up our ...

There are many ways to be a saint, and at times our fidelity may look like betrayal. We may have to become “saints of darkness.” We may have to be saints whose light seems to go out as we wander in th...

Pastor and leader of the 24/7 Prayer movement Pete Greig reflects on the initial moments of realizing his wife, only in her late twenties, needed to have surgery to repair a orange-sized tumor from he...

Twenty-five years ago, when I was just getting started, vulnerability was not a high value. Things have changed. But with a higher value on transparency, authenticity, and vulnerability in the church,...

During an especially difficult season planting a church, pastor Louie Giglio was filled with the raw emotions that often accompany the messy side of pastoral ministry. Without going into much detail, ...

To cheat oneself out of love is the most terrible deception; it is an eternal loss for which there is no reparation, either in time or in eternity.

Every violation of truth is not only a sort of suicide in the liar, but is a stab at the health of human society.

To gossip means to betray a confidence or to discuss unfavorable personal facts about another person with someone who is not part of the problem or its solution. Even if the information you discuss is...

When a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the table would crack and Death itself would start working backwards.

It’s important, then, to have our eyes open to this deception. How is it that so many modern promises sound true but in the end lead to our deception, or even our destruction? A long, long time ago, t...