The hard work of sowing seed in what looks like perfectly empty earth has a time of harvest. All suffering, pain, emptiness, disappointment is seed: sow it in God and He will, finally, bring a crop of joy from it.

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Pity can be nearsighted and condescending; shared suffering can be dignifying and life-changing.

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Waiting means going about our assigned tasks, confident that God will provide the meaning and the conclusions.

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The life of faith isn't meant for tourists. It's meant for pilgrims.

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The gospel is never about everybody else; it is always about you, about me. The gospel is never truth in general; it's always a truth in specific. The gospel is never a commentary on ideas or cultures or conditions; it's always about actual persons, actual pains, actual troubles, actual sin; you, me; who you are and what you've done; who I am and what I've done.

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The only opportunity you will ever have to live by faith is in the circumstances you are provided this very day: this house you live in, this family you find yourself in, this job you have been given, the weather conditions that prevail at the ...moment.

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Worship does not satisfy our hunger for God; it whets our appetite.

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Wisdom is the art of living skillfully in whatever actual conditions we find ourselves.

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Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God.

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The silence that makes it possible to hear God speak also makes it possible for us to hear the world's words for what they really are - tinny and unconvincing lies

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