"To think that we grasp the fullness of life is to say that by holding a mere drop of water in our hands we are able to understand the immensity of the ocean."

"If I choose to take the pen from God and write the story of my life without Him, I better have plenty of erasers and a whole lot of white-out. Better yet, I should invest in a good shredder."

"Easter is a time when God turned the inevitability of death into the invincibility of life."

"What would behoove me to instantly declare God not to be God unless He followed my script in some tediously exacting manner? I must confess that I am less likely to believe that it’s a matter of some narcissistic demand that I freely pen my own script. Rather, I think it’s fear that I’m too inadequate to follow God’s."

"The father who has selflessly poured himself into the life of his children may leave no other monument than that of his children. But as for a life well lived, no other monument is necessary."

"Do I dare believe such an absurdly outrageous story that a man would die, lay lifeless in some tomb for three days and then somehow live again? Yet, if I dare to consider it, is that not exactly what I so desperately desire for this lifeless life of mine? And is Easter God’s tenderly outrageous way of telling me that that is exactly what I can have?"

"Despite my incessant desperation, I simply cannot paint the perfect picture within which I would wish to live out my life. And because I cannot, God picked up the brush of love, positioned the canvas of history and painted a manger."

"Why in the world have we never found what we’re really looking for? Because what we need is often the very thing we won’t accept. And sadly, in turning away the God we need, we need to understand that we have chosen to live without everything we need."

"It’s not so much about writing the story of Christmas itself, as ingenious as it is. In reality, it’s much more about writing the story of Christmas into the story of life so that it will become the story of life."

"We’ve yet to comprehend the impervious reality that to gain ‘life’ we have to do the most scandalous thing imaginable, and that is to work ‘against’ the whole of our humanity and give everything away. And yet to give everything away is to work ‘with’ the whole of God’s character."