If you wish to strengthen your confidence in God still more, often recall the loving way in which He has acted toward you, and how mercifully He has tried to bring you out of your sinful life, to break your attachment to the things of earth and draw you to His love.

Before you go out into the world, wash your face in the clear crystal of praise. Bury each yesterday in the fine linen and spices of thankfulness.

Thanksgiving is a time of quiet reflection; an annual reminder that God has, again, been ever so faithful. The solid and simple things of life are brought into clear focus.

Sin is a thing of time, but mercy is from everlasting. Transgression is but of yesterday, but mercy was ever of old. Before you and I sought the Lord, the Lord sought us.

Love falls to earth, rises from the ground, pools around the afflicted. Love pulls people back to their feet. Bodies and souls are fed. Bones and lives heal. New blades of grass grow from charred soil. The sun rises.

Hallelujah that in spite of it all, there is love, there is singing, nature, laughing, mercy.

But where do we even start on the daily walk of restoration and awakening? We start where we are.

There is so much mercy around us and in us, so much available to us if we just have the eyes and intention to see it.

I'm not sure I even recognize the ever-presence of mercy anymore, the divine and the human; the messy, crippled, transforming, heartbreaking, lovely, devastating presence of mercy. But I have come to believe that I am starving to death for it, and my world is, too.

Today is a new day. Today is a day for you to begin creating a joyous, fulfilling life.

Each day is a start of a new adventure, and I eagerly look forward to today.

In how many ways have we been unfaithful to Christ, and to the light and privileges which God has entrusted to us! How refreshing, then, how unspeakably blessed, to lift our eyes above this scene of ruin, and behold One who is faithful—faithful in all things, faithful at all times.