In February 2005, The Gates shipped. It crossed the threshold from personal project to shared cultural good. And yet, at another scale, The Gates never set sail at all. For billions of people, The Gates came and went without notice, moving no horizons and generating no new cultural artifacts.

12 Why We Can’t Change the World

Grace is not a shortcut around our effort; it is the divine blessing on efforts that are undertaken in dependence and trust on God.

like earthquakes, revolutions are much better at destroying than building.

Mark, while just as aware of Jesus’ Jewish heritage, seems much more engaged with the cultural heritage of Rome.

William Goldman, describing how this huge cultural industry produces its blockbuster, world-changing hits: “Nobody knows anything.” After mobilizing countless focus groups, deploying marketing budgets in the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, gauging audience interest and the “bankability” of stars and story lines, no one in Hollywood can

swords whose only purpose was to take life will have no place in a creation where there is no war or death. They will have to be turned into plowshares (Is 2:4). Spears will have to become pruning hooks. The myriad cultural dead ends of history will be finally forgotten and truly dead.

ACTS 29

THE DISCIPLINES OF POWER: STEWARDSHIP