If you're looking for a place with no change, try a soda machine.

Real courage embraces the twin realities of current difficulty and ultimate triumph.

Rather than seeking total control, relinquish it. You can't run the world, but you can entrust it to God. This is the message behind Paul's admonition to "rejoice in the Lord." Peace is within reach, not for lack of problems, but because of the presence of a sovereign Lord. Rather than rehearse the chaos of the world, rejoice in the Lord's sovereignty, as Paul did. Sovereignty gives the saint the inside track to peace. Others see the problems of the world and wring their hands. We see the problems of the world and bend our knees.

The most powerful life is the most simple life. The most powerful life is the life that knows where it's going, that knows where the source of strength is; it is the life that stays free of clutter and happenstance and hurriedness.

Someday I want to go back and maybe write another book on those seven sayings. I just think they are kind of like a table of contents to the Christian hope. They invite us to go into all the aspects of the heart of Jesus. Everything about them from the drama, the setting, the passion around them - I think the seven sayings of the cross are powerful.

No one can pray and worry at the same time. When we worry, we aren't praying. When we pray, we aren't worrying.

There is a rawness and a wonder to life. Pursue it. Hunt for it. Sell out to get it. Don't listen to the whines of those who have settled for a second-rate life and want you to do the same so they won't feel guilty. Your goal is not to live long; it's to live.