“My central message here is when you bring more positive experiences into your life, your hurts will diminish in importance. In fact, this is the first step to taking responsibility for how you feel and beginning to forgive. If I rent out more and more space in my mind to appreciating my children or the loveliness of a rainy day, there is as a result less space and time for dwelling on the hurts.â€
–Dr. Fred Luskin, Forgive for Good
“The enemy specializes in taking advantage of any refusal to forgive.”
–Beth Moore, Praying God’s Word Day by Day
“A good marriage is the union of two forgivers.”
–Ruth Graham
“God’s faithfulness is not incapacitated by human circumstances–even human failings.”
–Pastor Ed Allen, sermon, August 5, 2007.
“When people die, they are forgiven and welcomed home. Then God will help them figure out how to clean up the disgusting messes they have made. God has skills and ideas on how to do this.”
–Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually), p. 29
“I’ve found that when you give up on using your mind to solve a problem–which your mind is holding on to like a dog with a chew toy–writing it down helps turn off the terrible alertness. When you’re not siphoned into the black hole of worried control and playing fretful Savior, turning the problem over to God or the elves in the glove compartment harnesses something in the universe that is bigger than you, and that just might work.”
–Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually), p. 27
“Sometimes, when you’re lucky, you get to a point where you’re sick of a problem, or worn down by tinkering with it, or clutching it. And letting it go, maybe writing it down and sending it away, buys you some time and space, so maybe freedom and humor sneak in–which is probably what you were praying for all along.”
–Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually), p. 32
“We live in the constant astonishment that God uses broken people to minister to broken people.”
–Carol Kent, A New Kind of Normal, p. 220.
“Forgiving is a choice that brings healing–probably more to the giver than to the recipient. When we forgive, we do not change the circumstances or injustices of the past. What we change is the future–for ourselves and for the ones we have forgiven. It is the most freeing choice we can make.”
–Carol Kent, A New Kind of Normal
“I finally figured out that I had a choice: I could suffer a great deal, or not, or for a long time. Or I could have the combo platter: suffer, breathe, pray, play, cry, and try to help people. There was meaning in pain; it taught you how to survive with a modicum of grace when you did not get what you wanted.”
–Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually):Â Thoughts on Faith
“It really is easier to experience spiritual connection when your life is in the process of coming apart. When things break up and fences fall over, desperation and powerlessness slink in, which turns out to be good: humility and sweetness often arrive in your garden not long after.”
–Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually):Â Thoughts on Faith