Surrender to the pain. Then learn to surrender to the good. It’s there and more is on the way. Love God. Love Family. Love what you do. Love people, and learn to let them love you. And always keep on loving yourself.
No matter how good it gets, the best is yet to come.
— Melody Beattie, Beyond Codependency:Â And Getting Better All the Time, p. 245
Intimacy with God is the purpose of our lives. It’s why God created us. Not simply to believe in him, though that is a good beginning. Not only to obey him, though that is a higher life still. God created us for intimate fellowship with himself, and in doing so he established the goal of our existence — to know him, love him, and live our lives in an intimate relationship with him. Jesus says that eternal life is to know God (John 17:3). Not just “know about” like you know about the ozone layer or Ulysses S. Grant. He means know as two people know each other, know as Jesus knows the Father — intimately.
— John Eldredge, Walking with God, p. 12
There was no point in telling somebody not to cry, she had always thought; indeed there were times when you should do exactly the opposite, when you should urge people to cry, to start the healing that sometimes only tears can bring.
— Alexander McCall Smith, The Good Husband of Zebra Drive, p. 211
When your partner is making changes that you don’t know how to handle, don’t fall into the lie of “It’s okay. It doesn’t bother me.” Quick dismissals push the other person away and leave her guessing what your true feelings are. It’s better to express the truth: “I’m feeling threatened” or “I’m confused.” Being truthful maintains the connection.
Recognize that listening to your partner is not the same as surrendering to his opinion. Giving in to your partner may get you through a rocky moment, but it is not necessarily what your partner wants. Acknowledging his heartfelt feelings doesn’t mean you have to agree with them. The challenge is to reveal without capitulating or rebelling. . . .
The need to assert differences brings many couples to the brink, but once a couple can discuss what’s underneath those differences — what fuels different aspects of themselves — they learn profound truths about their partner. They discover the extent of the other person’s convictions, the strengths of their commitments, and the impact their own behavior has on them. Not only is it then possible to get through the immediate challenge, but they are able to understand each other in a deeper, more intimate way, which leaves them poised for still greater depths of understanding.
— Ellyn Bader, PhD, and Peter T. Pearson, PhD, Tell Me No Lies:Â How to Stop Lying to Your Partner — and Yourself — in the 4 Stages of Marriage, p. 123-124
You cannot change others. More people suffer from trying to change others than from any other sickness. And it is impossible.
What you can do is influence others. But there is a trick. Since you cannot get them to change, you must change yourself so that their destructive patterns no longer work on you. Change your way of dealing with them; they may be motivated to change if their old ways no longer work.
Another dynamic that happens when you let go of others is that you begin to get healthy, and they may notice and envy your health. They may want some of what you have.
One more thing. You need the wisdom to know what is you and what is not you. Pray for the wisdom to know the difference between what you have the power to change and what you do not.
— Dr. Henry Cloud & Dr. John Townsend, Boundaries, p. 89
We generally cannot change the actions and thoughts of other people or what happened in our own past. What we can change is ourselves. Forgiveness is one way to change ourselves and in that way change our relationships with our lovers. As we change, we go from anger and self-pity to understanding and goodwill. Becoming a more forgiving person helps us to change our focus from our wounds to the present and future possibilities for happiness in our marriage.
— Dr. Fred Luskin, Forgive for Love, p. 169
God means His children to look to Him for the fulfillment of their human needs. The great, pulsing Father-Mother-Lover-Savior heart of God holds all that the human heart — even the single human heart — can desire.
— Margaret Clarkson, So You’re Single, p. 125
It was the Place of Hope. It was the place where, after His resurrection and just before His ascension, He would speak to His disciples one last time. On that occasion, with the authority of a man who had just conquered death, Jesus would say, “Soon you will receive power, power to be My witnesses.”
He would promise them not the power to avoid trouble, but the power to live the only life worth living. He would promise them the same power that was keeping Him on course while His own worst nightmare came true. He knew these words would strike a chord, that they would thrill His disciples and fill them with hope.
“Soon you will have that power,” Jesus would say. “You will be able to remain faithful to Me no matter what happens in your life. If your spouse leaves you, you will be empowered to reveal My character. If your son is in jail, you will be able to go on loving him. That is your hope till I return. Never lose it!”
— Larry Crabb, Shattered Dreams:Â God’s Unexpected Pathway to Joy, p. 42
God does not just happen to love, nor is it true that he chooses to be love to certain individuals, as if he could just as easily have chosen not to love them. Rather, it is impossible for God to be God and to act in an unloving way towards anyone. If God is love, then all God’s actions must be compatible with his love. This means that his holiness is loving, his justice is loving, and his wrath is loving. . . . Consequently, any account of hell must see hell as a manifestation of divine love and mercy even if it is a severe side of that mercy. . . . How could God be love if he draws a line at death and says, “Beyond this point I will look for the lost sheep no more; and even if they try to return, I shall turn them away.” It seems to me that such a God would not be behaving in a loving way. In conclusion, I suggest that the problem is not that the universalist sentimentalizes God’s love and forgets his wrath but, rather, that the traditional theologians underestimate God’s love and unhelpfully disconnect it from his justice.
— Gregory MacDonald, The Evangelical Universalist, p. 104
When love is good and right, I believe, it’s the way God loves us — beyond all reason — and it not only blesses the lives of the lovers themselves but everyone around them. May we all experience such love in our lives, and may we recognize it and treasure it every second.
— Jill Conner Browne, The Sweet Potato Queens’ Field Guide to Men, p. 238