They are fruit and transport: ripening melons, prairie schooners journeying under full sail.

Traversing a slow page, to come upon a lode of the pure shining metal is to exult inwardly for greedy hours.

True hospitality is marked by an open response to the dignity of each and every person. Henri Nouwen has described it as receiving the stranger on his own terms, and asserts that it can be offered only by those who 'have found the center of their lives in their own hearts'.

This is a God who is not identified with the help of a dictionary but through a relationship.

Prayer is not asking for what you think you want, but asking to be changed in ways you can't imagine.

Like faith, marriage is a mystery. The person you're committed to spending your life with is known and yet unknown, at the same time remarkably intimate and necessarily other. The classic seven-year itch may not be a case of familiarity breeding ennui and contempt, but the shock of having someone you thought you knew all too well suddenly seem a stranger. When that happens, you are compelled to either recommit to the relationship or get the hell out. There are many such times in a marriage.

Over and over again mediocrity is promoted because real worth isn't to be found.