God created people to be in union with him and his purposes for creation. . . . But the union between God and humanity was broken when Adam and Eve turned away from God and God’s purposes for life. We, like them, have done the same. No matter how hard we try, there is nothing we can do to restore our union with God. That is the bad news. But the good news is that God does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. God became a man and lived in our skin, so to speak, to accomplish once again the union between God and humanity that was lost by Adam. . . . So spirituality is not a self-generated achievement but a gift given to us by God. This gift sets us free to see life in a new way and to live life as God intended, in union with the purposes of the Creator and Redeemer of the world.
-Robert Webber, The Divine Embrace: Recovering the Passionate Spiritual Life (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2006), 18.