“The road I’ve travelled is pockmarked by disastrous victories and magnificent defeats, soul-diminishing successes and life-enhancing failures. Seasons of fidelity and betrayal, periods of consolation and desolation, zeal and apathy are not unknown to me.

And there have been times . . .
When the felt presence of God was more real to me than the chair I am sitting on;
When the Word ricocheted like lightening in every corner of my soul;
When a storm of desire carried me to places I had never visited.

And then there have been other times . . .
When I identified with the words of Mae West: “I used to be Snow White - but I drifted;”
When the Word was as stale as old ice cream and as bland as tame sausage;
When the fire in my belly flickered and died;
When I mistook dried-up enthusiasm for gray-haired wisdom;
When I dismissed youthful idealism as mere naivete;
When I preferred cheap slivers of glass to the pearl of great price.”
Brennan Manning.