Silence, he told us, was hugely undervalued in our American way of life as a way of being in communion with one another and with God. American Christians were conspicuously deficient. "Think of it as remedial silence." This would be three days for practicing silence. "These might be the quietest three days you will ever spend. Don't waste them."

I will not try to run my own life or the lives of others; that is God's business.

A good meditation, even when it is interrupted by occasional nodding, is much more beneficial than many outward religious exercises.

Finger-picking, in general, is a hypnotic thing. I feel like I'm more A.D.D. all the time, so the music has to be hypnotic.

I don't know how, but I know Who.

God holds my tomorrows, she thought. I will be content with whatever comes my way.

I've learned that sometimes I have to give up my right to know and simply believe that God's knowing is enough.

I've learned that sometimes I have to give up my right to know and simply believe that God's knowing is enough. Not that I don't want to question. Ach, I surely do. But in the three years since Benuel's death, I've learned that peace comes with that kind of givin' up . . . and, not to boast, but my faith has grown because of it, too.

If you lower the ambient noise of your life and listen expectantly for those whispers of God, your ears will hear them. And when you follow their lead, your world will be rocked.

Is the ambient noise level of my life low enough for me to hear the whispers of the Lord?

Occasionally, we go through times when we feel God is not speaking to us. While that may be so, most of the time He has simply changed His language, and He expects us to adjust with Him.

It is the most amazing time in the world to be alive in God — to hear his voice, to hear what he is saying, to see what he intends to do in the earth, and what his heart is like for the people. It is an amazing time.