Quotes from Jan Karon

As far as I could tell, Mount Sherman had no ego, no desire to create its own destiny. It was surrendered, as all of nature is surrendered. The wilderness gives us that example continually.

t is a lonely washin' that hasn't a man's shirt in it.

We are not necessarily doubting," said C. S. Lewis, "that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.

I believe there's somebody like him in every pew—asking a simple question, needing a simple answer.

For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind," he read aloud from Paul's second letter to Timothy.

is asked of us in our time,' the writer said, 'is that we break open our blocked caves and find each other. Nothing less will heal the anguished spirit, nor release the heart to act in love.

The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions—the little soon forgotten charities of a kiss or smile, a kind look, a heartfelt compliment, and the countless infinitesimals of pleasurable and genial feelings.' Samuel Taylor Coleridge

couldn't imagine that God would be interested in me.' 'He's more than interested in you. It's a pretty radical notion, but he actually made us for himself, for his pleasure. He wants to hear from you anytime, about anything. Try to know that.

Father, you do not have to be a villain to act one in a play . . .

In the Thirty-second Psalm, He says, 'I will instruct you, Dooley, and teach you in the way which you should go. I will guide you with my eye.

What God has given us," Taylor had written, "is all we need; we require nothing more. It is not a question of large supplies—it is a question of the presence of the Lord.

I jumped right to the heart of the matter and preached the taproot of sin, which is found in the middle of the word, itself—I! I want this, I want that, and I want it right now. I want to run things, I want to call the shots, I want be in charge. . .

He was miserably disappointed in his own everlasting inability to get up and go, to take strong action and seize control, and do all the things that other people seemed able to do, and which the world admired so much.

His sermon had been preached 24/7 on the floor of The Local for more than three and a half decades.

God will use this loss for good. I promise.

Love God, be strong, be safe, be happy.

Acknowledge, we humbly beseech You, a sheep of Your own fold, a lamb of Your own flock. . . . Receive her into the arms of Your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints. . . .

May our sleep be deep and soft,' " he whispered, " 'so our work be fresh and hard.

This would be his first morning without caffeine.

Thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks!' Ã¢â'¬Â Hope exclaimed, quoting Shakespeare.

She was thinking about the future too, though most times it appeared in her mind as a complete blank. 'That's the way the future should appear,' Olivia once said. 'We're asked not to fret about the future and to take no thought for tomorrow. We must try to live in the present or we shall miss it entirely.' Living in the present was exactly what she'd been trying to do.

A really companionable and indispensable dog is an accident of nature. You can't get it by breeding for it and you can't buy it with money. It just happens along.

E. B. White said: 'A really companionable and indispensable dog is an accident of nature. You can't get it by breeding for it and you can't buy it with money. It just happens along.

Me, either, pal. I'd rather reach in a cow's rear end any day than have to deal with a horse's behind." "Harry Nelson is being transferred to Birmingham," Father Tim said mildly, having saved this pièce de résistance for the right moment.