But the question to precede all others, which finally determines the course of our lives is What do I really want? Was it to love what God commands, in the words of the collect, and to desire what He promises? Did I want what I wanted, or did I want what He wanted, no matter what it might cost?

In whatever God does in the course of our lives, he gives us, through the experience, some power to help others.

A prayerful heart and an obedient heart will learn, very slowly and not without sorrow, to stake everything on God Himself.

Sometimes God's refusals are His mercies.

Waiting on God requires the willingness to bear uncertainty, to carry within oneself the unanswered question, lifting the heart to God about it whenever it intrudes upon one's thoughts.

To be a follower of the Crucified means, sooner or later, a personal encounter with the cross. And the cross always entails loss.

A little quiet reflection will remind me that yes to God always leads in the end to joy.