Quotes from Gary Thomas

We bring nothing to God, and He gives us everything.

Having children made me confront my true fears and trust in God many times over in a much more intensified manner.

We learn to love imperfect people by serving them out of reverence for a perfect God...

Fear is intensified by passionate love. The more I care about someone, the more I'm concerned about their welfare. The less we have to lose, in one sense, the easier it is to be "brave."

Long-term marital intimacy requires accepting this truth: to stop giving yourself to your spouse is to spiritually divorce them.

Discerning someone's character, true values, and suitability for marriage is hard work. It takes time, counsel, and a healthy dose of objective self-doubt and skepticism. Identifying someone as "God's chosen" or Plato's "soul mate" is comparatively easy. You "feel" it in your gut. It seems right. You can't imagine anyone else. You must have found the one!

The mark of a spiritual man or woman is a listening heart, not a lecturing tongue.

You won't hear a character's friend say this in a romantic comedy. Taylor Swift won't sing this, Eminem won't rap it, and Suzanne Collins won't write it, but it's true: just because you're "in love" with someone doesn't mean you should seriously consider marrying them.

If there is one thing young engaged couples need to hear, it's that a good marriage is not something you find; it's something you work for. It takes struggle. You must crucify your selfishness. You must at times confront and at other times confess. The practice of forgiveness is essential. This is undeniably hard work. But eventually it pays off. Eventually, it creates a relationship of beauty, trust, and mutual support.

It's better to admit your weaknesses and make provision for them than to pretend you're something you're not and suffer the consequences when your true character surfaces. Caring about not hurting girls or tempting boys you've not yet dated trains you toward compassion. And compassion will serve you very well in marriage.

That's what's so difficult about Jesus' call to love others. On one level, it's easy to love God, because God doesn't smell. God doesn't have bad breath. God doesn't reward kindness with evil. God doesn't make berating comments. Loving God is easy, in this sense. But Jesus really let us have it when he attached our love for God with our love for other people.

I'm going to ask you to do something that may feel even more painful: when you get close to becoming engaged, put any public announcement on delay for a few weeks and spend several sessions talking through all these issues again with someone else present.