Fellowship is much, much more than food and fun and even more than reading and studying the Scriptures with another believer. Fellowship at times may involve blood, sweat, and tears as we stand side by side with our persecuted brothers and sisters.

It is much easier to trust in the sovereignty of God when it is the other person who is hurting. We need to be like Jesus, of whom it was said, "A bruised reed he will not break" (Matthew 12:20). Let us not be guilty of breaking a bruised reed (a heavy heart) by insensitive treatment of the heavy doctrine of the sovereignty of God.

He felt the long light body, warm against him, comforting against him, abolishing loneliness against him, magically, by a simple touching of flanks, of shoulders and of feet, making an alliance against death with him.

I was pretty well through with the subject. At one time or another I had probably considered it from most of its various angles, including the one that certain injuries or imperfections are a subject of merriment while remaining quite serious for the person possessing them.

You're feeling it now, fish, he said. And so, God knows, am I.

You want me to follow you on a journey, you have to come get me. The journey must begin where I am, not where you are or where you think I should be.

I was raised in a family where vulnerability was barely tolerated: no training wheels on our bicycles, no goggles in the pool, just get it done. And so I grew up not only with discomfort about my own vulnerability, I didn't care for it in other people either.

Most damage that others do us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or racial devotion.

For a tear is quickly dried, especially when shed for the misfortunes of others.

Doesn't matter whether it's a teen girl who's pregnant, hasn't told her parents, or an elderly couple dealing with one of them being diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Those are real people to me. Those are the people I dealt with every single day.

Bleed with us.

Oh, don't go on like that! cried the poor Queen, wringing her hands in despair. Consider what a great girl you are. Consider what a long way you've come today. Consider what o'clock it is. Consider anything, only don't cry! Alice could not help laughing at this, even in the midst of her tears. Can you keep from crying by considering things? she asked. That's that way it's done, the Queen said with great decision: nobody can do two things at once, you know.