“The journey God has set before us isn’t a freeway; we are constantly encountering forks and junctions and crossroads. Which way will we go when we meet them? Life is filled with decisions, and we can’t avoid them.”

“As a person finds God’s will for his or her life, matters of conscience can be handled with perception from the Holy Spirit.”

“This faith transforms the whirlwind of despair into a warm and reviving breeze of hope. The words of a motto which a generation ago were commonly found on the wall in the homes of devout persons need to be etched on our hearts: Fear knocked at the door. Faith answered. There was no one there.”

“Maybe the critics are right. Maybe there's no escaping our great political divide, an endless clash of armies, and any attempts to alter the rules of engagement are futile. Or maybe the trivialization of politics has reached a point of no return, so that most people see it as just one more diversion, a sport, with politicians our paunch-bellied gladiators and those who bother to pay attention just fans on the sidelines: We paint our faces red or blue and cheer our side and boo their side, and if it takes a late hit or cheap shot to beat the other team, so be it, for winning is all that matters. But I don't think so. They are out there, I think to myself, those ordinary citizens who have grown up in the midst of all the political and cultural battles, but who have found a way-in their own lives, at least- to make peace with their neighbors, and themselves. ...I imagine they are waiting for a politics with the maturity to balance idealism and realism, to distinguish between what can and cannot be compromised, to admit the possibility that the other side might sometimes have a point. They don't always understand the arguments between right and left, conservative and liberal, but they recognize the difference between dogma and common sense, responsibility and irresponsibility, between those things that last and those that are fleeting. They are out there, waiting for Republicans and Democrats to catch up with them.”

“Many people say “my life stinks”. Well, your life will stink if you spend today thinking about tomorrow.”

“There is something wrong when a brother or sister becomes alienated from the rest of their family, so there is something wrong when Christians refuse to have anything to do with their fellow Christians. God wants us to live this Christian life together.”

“off in strata of porous rock by the leathery half-plant, half-animal little makers

“You don’t think – not possibly – not as a mere hundredth chance – there might be things that are real though we can’t see them? … If there are souls, could there not be soul-houses?”

“If we recognize our talents and use them appropriately, and choose a field that uses those talents, we will rise to the top of our field.”

“Repetition or affirmation of orders to your subconscious mind is the only method of voluntary development of the emotion of faith.”

“I know God won't give me anything I can't handle. I just wish he didn't trust me so much.” 

“(Back during the Gold Rush you could go into a stream of water and pan out a little gold dust. But if you really wanted to make a strike and get down where the real gold was, you had to dig for it. In the same way you can skim along on the top of scriptures—but if you really want to find out what the Bible says, you’ll have to dig down into the Word of God.)”

“A wife's a worry, a non-wife's even worse.”

“Life did not stop, and one had to live.”

“At home, besides being Peter or Jane, we also bear a general character; husband or wife, brother or sister, chief, colleague or subordinate. Not among Friends. It is an affair of disentangled, or stripped, minds. Eros will have naked bodies; Friendship naked personalities.”