Deborah Raney > Quotes

“I’ve been surrounded by love. I know now what the Bible means when it says that His grace is sufficient, that His peace passes understanding. It’s all so true.”
― Deborah Raney, Nearly

“It was beyond frustrating to have circumstances always dictating her life. When would she ever get to make a choice about how her life looked?”
― Deborah Raney, Finding Wings

“There's been too much hurt. Too much pain. I just want it to stop.”
― Deborah Raney, Home at Last

“Anna, ever since that night we got the call from Dr. Blakeman, I’ve been trying to make this pregnancy real in my mind. But it just seems impossible.” His words picked up steam. “I can’t picture you pregnant. I can’t imagine what we’ll tell people…what we will tell the child someday.” She didn’t miss the implications of that “we will.” “I don’t know if I can love this child, Anna. We’ll both be in our sixties before he’s grown. I’ll be almost seventy when he graduates from high school. I don’t mind telling you that terrifies me. Terrifies me.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“and”
― Deborah Raney, Above All Things

“She despised her nakedness beneath the thin hospital gown and tried to wave Paul out of the room. But he shushed her and stood firmly planted beside the table where she lay. He held her gaze, forcing her to look into his eyes. He smoothed her forehead with gentle hands, and she winced, not in pain but in humiliation. Paul closed her eyes gently with his fingers and let his large warm hands rest lightly on her forehead, covering her eyes with the palm of his hand as though he could take away her self-imposed shame by sparing her his scrutiny. She loved him all the more for the act.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“Anna, I hope I didn’t wake”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“I’m sorry I was late.” It took Herculean effort for him not to scoop her into his arms and crush her to himself. Instead he took her wounded head carefully between his large hands. With his thumbs, he wiped the tears away and gently stroked her hair away from her face. “Oh, Anna… Honey, I’m so sorry. I… I should have been there. I should never have let this happen. I should have been with you.” He heard anger rise in his own voice and stopped speaking lest she think his ire was directed at her. Wordlessly, he cradled her head, taking in every bruise, every bump, every mark that marred her beautiful skin. He searched her blue-gray eyes for assurance that she truly was going to be all right. Then he silently gave thanks that she was here in this place of healing, still alive, still his. And he cursed the monster who had done this to his wife.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“It is a miracle, Claire. Whether it was performed by God himself or by the hands of doctors He created and guided, I won’t call it anything”
― Deborah Raney, Nearly

“heaven was such a wonderful place, why did everybody cry whenever someone went there?”
― Deborah Raney, Nearly

“I’m sorry, Anna, but I…Anna, I just can’t picture a baby at the end of all this. I’m sorry. I just cannot.” His voice had risen, but now it was a whisper. “Especially not another man’s baby…especially not that.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“True confession: My dad wouldn’t leave for Haiti until I proved to him that I could change a tire. According to him, that’s like the one life skill you must know for human survival. That, and how to fry bacon.”
― Deborah Raney, Right Where We Belong

“It is my baby, and it seems that I’m the only one who can protect him. The only one who really loves him. If I let him go, he won’t belong to anyone. Shouldn’t he have at least one person in this world…one person in his life to whom he truly belongs?” She looked at Paul with pleading in her eyes, in her voice. “Don’t we all deserve to belong somewhere? I can’t just desert my baby now. What happened wasn’t his fault. He shouldn’t have to suffer—but he will anyway. He will, and I… I want to be the one to dry his tears and…and tell him how much God loves him…how much I love him…” She started to cry.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“blown”
― Deborah Raney, Almost Forever

“To ache so deeply now for Nana gave the older woman’s life profound meaning. It was a privilege to mourn such a loss because it meant you had loved and been loved.”
― Deborah Raney, Nearly

“Self. That was the problem. Always it came back to that. He’d trusted himself and forgotten to ask God to give him strength. He’d let down his guard.”
― Deborah Raney, The Clayburn Collection

“. . . that in the midst of heartache so deep it was a physical pain, she was finding a deeper joy and contentment in life than she’d ever known.”
― Deborah Raney, Beneath a Southern Sky

“He patted her belly lovingly—her stomach still firm and flat, belying the secret it cradled. “Anna, this little life is part of you. How can I not love it? If my dad could love me the way I know he did”—Paul meant Albert, the only father he’d ever known—“then I… I guess I can find it in myself to learn to love this child.”
― Deborah Raney, Because of the Rain

“How could she say anything other than “yes”? The only question she really had to answer was this: Was she going to do it begrudgingly or could she do it with a servant’s heart?”
― Deborah Raney, Above All Things

“The way he handled this would set the tone for how this whole thing would be treated by the team. He leveled a stare at his best post player. “Rafe, I don’t even want to know what you just”
― Deborah Raney, Above All Things

“created”
― Deborah Raney, Who Touches the Mountains

“Sometimes--well, maybe always--we just have to take it on faith that God knows what He's doing.”
― Deborah Raney, Home at Last

“No, that night, words were his weapon of choice. And they had inflicted far deeper wounds than his fists would in the months that followed.”
― Deborah Raney, Remember to Forget