"God is elevated over all of life. God is God. We are but a part of his creation and dependent on him. He is its center. We are its periphery. He is infinite. In our humanity, we are but fading and finite. Between Creator and creation is a boundary. There is no place for pantheism in a biblical worldview. All spiritualities that begin within the self, building on the self as their religious source, are false. The self cannot reach out, in, or up and find God in a redemptive way. All of these cultural spiritualities have assumed that the boundary set between Creator and creature, between the holy God and sinners, can be crossed from our side and crossed naturally and easily. It cannot. Only God, the infinite Creator and the one who is utterly holy, can cross these boundaries." (David Wells, God in the Whirlwind)
"From that day on, half of my servants worked on construction, and half held the spears, shields, bows, and coats of mail. And the leaders stood behind the whole house of Judah, who were building on the wall. Those who carried burdens were loaded in such a way that each labored on the work with one hand and held his weapon with the other. And each of the builders had his sword strapped at his side while he built. The man who sounded the trumpet was beside me." (Nehemiah 4:16-18 ESV) The great London preacher, Charles Spurgeon, published a monthly magazine called The Sword and The Trowel; A record of combat with sin and of labour for the Lord. It was published from 1865 to 1892. The cover of the journal had a drawing taken from Nehemiah 4, which included both a trowel (representing the work) and a sword (representing the fight). The sword was necessary to protect what the men with trowels were building. These citizen-soldier-builders would successfully complete the wall aroun...
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