I know that the Bible is a special kind of book, but I find it as seductive as any other. If I am not careful, I can begin to mistake the words on the page for the realities they describe. I can begin to love the dried ink marks on the page more than I love the encounters that gave rise to them.

I think we d like life to be like a train..but it turns out to be a sailboat.

When someone asks us where we want to be in our lives, the last thing that occurs to us is to look down at our feet and say, 'Here, I guess, since this is where I am.'

To be in the mainline is to have a history and not simply to be an amalgam, a community church of who knows what that came from who knows where.

I became so attentive to the souls of other people that I was not as attentive as I might have been to my own.

It can be difficult to be an introvert in church, especially if you happen to be the pastor. Liking to be alone can be interpreted as a judgment on other people's company. Liking to be quiet can be construed as aloofness. There is so much emphasis on community in most congregations that anyone who does not participate risks being labeled a loner.

Every human interaction offers you the chance to make things better or to make things worse.