Lydia

“Sometimes even doing the right thing will leave you with scars. But beauty comes from ashes, too. And I know that to be true.”
― Natalie Lloyd

“Still she did not blench: maiden of Rohirrim, child of kings, slender but as a steel-blade, fair yet terrible. A swift stroke she dealt, skilled and deadly. The outstretched neck she clove asunder, and the hewn head fell like a stone. Backward she sprang as the huge head crashed to ruin, vast wings outspread crumpled on the earth; and with its fall the shadow passed away. A light fell about her, and her hair shone in the sunrise.”
― JRR Tolkien

“And then one babbles - "If only I could bear it, or the worst of it, or any of it, instead of her." But one can't tell how serious that bid is, for nothing is staked on it. If it suddenly became a real possibility, then, for the first time, we should discover how seriously we had meant it. But is it ever allowed?

It is allowed to One, we are told, and I find I can now believe again, that He has done vicariously whatever can be done. He replies to our babble, "You cannot and you dare not. I could and dared.”
― C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

“Now I'm not saying the act of going to church fixes everything. Just as simply looking at a restaurant menu won't give you nourishment. We've got to engage with what's offered if it's going to do us any good. But putting my heart in a place to receive truth certainly got me going in a different direction.”
― Lysa TerKeurst, The Best Yes: Making Wise Decisions in the Midst of Endless Demands