Joline Atkins

“Let’s not be afraid to look at everything that has brought us to where we are now and trust that we will soon see in it the guiding hand of a loving God.”
― Henri J.M. Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith

“Our hearts and minds desire clarity. We like to have a clear picture of a situation, a clear view of how things fit together, and clear insight into our own and the world’s problems. But just as in nature colors and shapes mingle without clear-cut distinctions, human life doesn’t offer the clarity we are looking for. The borders between love and hate, evil and good, beauty and ugliness, heroism and cowardice, care and neglect, guilt and blamelessness are mostly vague, ambiguous, and hard to discern.”
― Henri J.M. Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith

“We can embrace our whole life story in the knowledge that we have been graced and made beautiful by the providence of our past history. All the wrong turns in the past, the detours, mistakes, moral lapses, everything that is irrevocably ugly or painful, melts and dissolves in the warm glow of accepted tenderness. As theologian Kevin O’Shea writes, “One rejoices in being unfrightened to be open to the healing presence, no matter what one might be or what one might have done.” —A Glimpse of Jesus”
― Brennan Manning, Dear Abba: Morning and Evening Prayer

“We are all failures—at least, all the best of us are. —J. M. BARRIE”
― John C. Maxwell, Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes into Stepping Stones for Success