Ben Palpant > Quotes

“To be terrified and yet unafraid seems a great paradox of worship, but when one has tasted it, the notion of an eternity spent terrifyingly unafraid like that is remarkably appetizing.”
― Ben Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: A Drink in the Desert

“Yes, we are raw. Yes, we are in the dark belly of a whale. Yes, we ache. Who can be Jesus' "little sunbeam" at such a time? Would Jesus even want such a thing? He is after much more than happiness in our lives. He is after a sustaining joy and he will give us that joy by giving us himself, whether through the small gifts of life that bring us gladness or through the dark night of suffering. Sweeping affliction under the rug of our heart, therefore, is simple denial, an act of cowardice, and act of ungratefulness. We must dare to look it square in the eyes.”
― Ben Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: A Drink in the Desert

“His story is colored by the murder of a brother, the rape of a sister, the betrayal of a friend, the pounding of nails into flesh and bone, and the darkening of the sky. A world of what-ifs and could-have-beens, peopled by has-beens and might-have-beens. It is a world soaked in fear and drenched by the blood of a million martyrs. A world of men burned at the stake and babes slaughtered at their mother’s breasts. A dark history with pain oozing into all its hidden corners. At the center of history is a death. Christ’s death, the decisive point of history. Christianity is perhaps the most morbid religion of the world. Perpetually meditating upon death with little crosses hung around their necks, Christian disciples sing their way to martyrdom. Anticipating death and calling it gain, Christians are evangelists of the grotesque. The very hope of the Gospel rests directly upon our ability to imagine a world in which suffering serves as the soil from which resurrection springs.”
― Ben T. Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: a drink in the desert

“Christ leads us into the wilderness of suffering to engage us there. When he meets us in the wilderness, he is manna, he is water from a broken rock. But he is also the one who wants us to potently feel our lack so that we cling to him. The Apostle Paul expressed as much when he wrote, we are 'sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.' God is the one who leads us into the desert and who makes us feel exposed and frail there. He is the one who turns the wilderness into a womb from which his children are born into gladness. And, like Hagar, we cry, 'You are the God who sees.”
― Ben Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: A Drink in the Desert

“They say
you get what you pay for.
Sometimes. But
what about bread of life?
What about a cup
of living water?
Could it be?
We paid nothing.
This is the sacrament of love!”
― Ben Palpant, Sojourner Songs: Poems

“Anticipating death and calling it gain, Christians are evangelists of the grotesque. The very hope of the Gospel rests directly upon our ability to imagine a world in which suffering serves as the soil from which resurrection springs.”
― Ben Palpant

“I am part of his story. I am the epiphany of God. I am a character whose life events have a purpose for me and for the story. Every even has a purpose in the author's larger design, even the bark of a dog, the death of a baby bird, or a small black coffin for a stillborn child. He knows the falling of a sparrow and he knew the collapse of a mind. God does not look at our suffering from afar. It is an intimate event to him. He is the author of every detail, speaking the suffering as it occurs.”
― Ben Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: A Drink in the Desert

“God does not look at our suffering from afar. It is an intimate event to him. He is the author of every detail, speaking the suffering as it occurs.”
― Ben T. Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: a drink in the desert

“I lay curled in a fetal position one night, listening to my wife’s voice. In the evenings, she just talked, speaking light into my darkness by reading verses to me. I needed a touchstone and she knew it, so she kept gently pointing toward Christ. She set aside her fears to speak into my own.”
― Ben T. Palpant, A Small Cup of Light: a drink in the desert

“Like Hagar, I would choose to flee my troubles, but Christ asks me, 'Where have you come from and where are you going?' Like Hagar, I only know what I am fleeing. I remain unable to make sense of God's providence, authority, love, or promises in the snapshot of my trial. Only in the larger story do these things become clear. So I sit in the sand, beneath the starless sky, and wait for my change to come.”
― Ben Palpant

“I Have Held Time's Shell”

I have held time's shell
to my ear and heard
the deep, endless, reverberations
of God's voice,
wave upon wave.

But now I stand
at this intersection,
bombarded
by horns and heralds,
herded
by small demands,
propelled
by petty problems,
distracted
by advertisements shouting toothpaste promises,

trying to remember
what it felt like
to hear the tide
of God's voice rolling
wave upon wave.”
― Ben Palpant, Sojourner Songs: Poems