When surrounded by the ashes of all that I once cherished, despite my best efforts I can find no room to be thankful. But standing there amidst endless ash I must remember that although the ashes surround me, God surrounds the ashes. And once that realization settles upon me, I am what I thought I could never be ... I am thankful for ashes.

The most critical time in any battle is not when I’m fatigued, it’s when I no longer care.

It is when I am cold, alone, bitterly forlorn and shuttered from all hope that you will see who I truly am. And my goal is that at those most precarious of moments, what you will see is Jesus holding you through my tears.

Once faith dies, the death of hope follows hard on its heels.

Hope is not some thin thing that is subject to the winds of fate, but it is crafted hard by the hands of God.

Hope is not some thin thing that is subject to the winds of fate. Rather, it is something crafted hard by the hands of God.

Where there is no hope, there is Christmas. And where there is no Christmas, there is no hope.

I ask, ‘Is the cup half-empty or half-full?’ And when I ask that question, I am amazed at how many people have no cup.

No person, collection of people, institution, government or organization of any kind can in any way promise to meet all of my needs for no person, collection of people, institution, government or organization possesses the array of resources necessary to do that. And so, I am left with the reality that either there is a God who can meet all of my needs, or I’ve been stranded in an existence that created me with needs that the existence itself cannot meet.