Faith does not need to push the river because faith is able to trust that there is a river. The river is flowing. We are in it.

Religious belief has made me comfortable with ambiguity.

Because I am a part of the Big Picture, I do matter and substantially so. Because I am only a part, however, I am rightly situated off to stage right—and happily so. What freedom there is in such truth! We are inherently important and included, yet not burdened with manufacturing or sustaining that private importance. Our dignity is given by God, and we are freed from ourselves!

To give, and not demand that others receive . . . that is the crossover point to maturity. . .

In the second half of life, people have less power to infatuate you. But they also have much less power to control you or hurt you.

Jesus praised faith and trust – even more than love. It takes a foundational trust to fall, or to fail, and not to fall apart.

You cannot be naïve about evil. You cannot be naïve to the reality that there are human beings and human situations which have totally identified with the dark side of reality. They are malicious. Realism teaches you to put up appropriate boundaries so that people can't do any more evil than possible. But that doesn't mean you do evil back to them.