Commodification has led most people to view God as a device to be used rather than an all-powerful Creator to be revered. - Skye Jethani

Rather than pursuing our calling to present a vision of a world filled with God's power and love, the contemporary church merely presents the world as a two-dimensional facsimile of the consumer culture, albeit with a Jesus fish imprint.

The personification of institutions in our culture means the institutional church, rather than the flesh-and-blood people of God, has become the vehicle of God's mission in the world. This is salvation via institution, paradise via programs.

Whether by trials of circumstance or by disciplines of choice, we cannot escape our calling to suffer with Christ.