“The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart…even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains…an uprooted small corner of evil”.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

"We can know, for instance, that because God is self-existent, His love had no beginning; because He is eternal, His love can have no end; because He is infinite, it has no limit; because He is holy, it is the quintessence of all spotless purity; because He is immense, His love is an incomprehensibly vast, bottomless, shoreless sea before which we kneel in joyful silence and from which the loftiest eloquence retreats confused and abashed."

A.W. Tozer

Westminster Confession of Faith (WLC 160)

What is required of those that hear the Word preached?
Answer: It is required of those that hear the Word preached, that they attend upon it with diligence, preparation, and prayer; examine: What they hear by the Scriptures; receive the truth with faith, love, meekness, and readiness of mind, as the Word of God; meditate, and confer of it; hide it in their hearts, and bring forth the fruit of it in their lives.

“In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets. Now that Charles is dead, I shall never again see Ronald’s [Tolkien’s] reaction to a specifically Charles joke. Far from having more of Ronald, having him “to myself” now that Charles is away, I have less of Ronald…In this, Friendship exhibits a glorious “nearness by resemblance” to heaven itself where the very multitude of the blessed (which no man can number) increases the fruition which each of us has of God. For every soul, seeing Him in her own way, doubtless communicates that unique vision to all the rest. That, says an old author, is why the Seraphim in Isaiah’s vision are crying “Holy, Holy, Holy” to one another (Isaiah 6:3). The more we thus share the Heavenly Bread between us, the more we shall have.”

C.S. Lewis

O MY SAVIOUR,

Help me.
    I am so slow to learn,
      so prone to forget,
      so weak to climb;
I am in the foothills when I should be
    on the heights;
I am pained by my graceless heart,
  my prayerless days,
  my poverty of love,
  my sloth in the heavenly race,
  my sullied conscience,
  my wasted hours,
  my unspent opportunities.
I am blind while light shines around me:
  take the scales from my eyes,
  grind to dust the evil heart of unbelief.
Make it my chiefest joy to study thee,
  meditate on thee,
  gaze on thee,
  sit like Mary at thy feet,
  lean like John on thy breast,
  appeal like Peter to thy love,
  count like Paul all things dung.
Give me increase and progress in grace
    so that there may be
  more decision in my character,
  more vigour in my purposes,
  more elevation in my life,
  more fervour in my devotion,
  more constancy in my zeal.
As I have a position in the world,
  keep me from making the world my position;
May I never seek in the creature
  what can be found only in the Creator;
Let not faith cease from seeking thee
until it vanishes into sight.
  Ride forth in me, thou King of kings
    and Lord of lords,
  that I may live victoriously,
    and in victory attain my end.

The Valley of Vision