This book is the sequel to Me Before You, which I read and enjoyed last month, but I didn't really like it. Had it been an independent book, I would have bailed on it for content and boredom, but I felt compelled to slog through because I'd read the first book.
Glory Over Everything, written by Kathleen Grissom
The sequel to The Kitchen House, which I read several months ago, this book is still about the hard topic of slavery, but didn't seem as heavy as the first book. Heads up that an adulterous relationship is one of the main parts of the story line. That's usually a deal-breaker for me, but, given the plot, I went ahead and finished the book.
p. 82, Your signature is the same as giving your word, and keeping your word is the mark of a man's character. In the end, it is the most valuable thing a man possesses.
A Hand to Guide Me: Legends and Leaders Celebrate the People Who Shaped Their Lives, written and collected by Denzel Washington
Washington starts and ends this book with his own story and thoughts, but it's filled with more than seventy short essays from a wide variety of people, each talking about who was instrumental in their lives. Although you could spend big chunks of time reading it through, the short essays make it ideal for when you only have a few minutes at a time to spare over the course of your day.
p. 270, If you've achieved anything in this life, if you've overcome any kind of obstacles, odds are you've had some help, and we'll do well to acknowledge that help and pass it on.
The Light at Tern Rock, written by Julia L. Sauer and illustrated by George Schreiber
This was my fourth time reading this book (read it to Teebs this time) and I still love its lessons about thinking past ourselves and choosing a good attitude while making sacrifices for the good of others.
One in a Million: Journey to Your Promised Land, written by Priscilla Shirer
A friend passed this book along to me and it said many things that lined up perfectly with my personal Bible reading, topics discusses in counseling appointments, and what Beep and I are talking about in our Skyble study. Living a comfortable life versus intimately knowing the God who created and loves me. Trying to fix the difficult seasons of life versus yielding to them. Doing what God asks, even when it's uncomfortable or scary or inconvenient. Running this race of life to win instead of simply to survive. Oasis of complacency, an acceptance of the current status of things being good enough and a preference for comfortable familiarity over unfamiliar better things that are actually what God has for us.
p.32, The question is not whether a good God could possibly be so restrictive as to confine our path of redemption to one available option. The better question, after all that we've done to resist and reject Him, is why He chose to open the one path He did.
p. 89, Are you bitter because of the hand you've been dealt? Sometimes He'll allow us to come face-to-face with an experience that could potentially breed bitterness, just so we can see His ability to work miracles in the way we feel. He wants us to know that our natural slide into bitterness and anger can be caught by the rescuing hand of His grace, then transformed into a state of mind, mood, and motivation that could only come from the Lord Himself.
p. 112, That's the pattern of complaining - always intensifying, always escalating. It starts with a few minor, incidental frustrations, then builds over time into a wildfire, whipped into flame by every available draft of oxygen. Everything becomes a new subject for its scorn - Exhibits X, Y, and Z in an ever-growing list of grievances.
p. 115, The spirit of complaint is born out of an unwillingness to trust God with today.
p. 159, If we let our intimacy with God diminish into mere details and to-do lists - if the focus becomes more on the "turning, setting, and going" than on the One who's calling us onto the path - we'll soon find ourselves alone and out ahead of God. (The"turning, setting, and going" part is in reference to Hebrews 12:1-2.)
p. 182, There comes a time when the best advice anyone can give you is to just get over it. While each of us needs time to heal, we can't allow healthy mourning to become unhealthy sulking. < snip > And at some point, like the children of Israel, we too must choose not to participate in mournful acts anymore. This doesn't mean our hearts are no longer saddened or that tears no longer fall from our eyes. It just means we've stopped acting in a way that keeps us focused on what we've lost or left behind.
p. 183, Yes, you can mourn and move on with your head up, my friend, because whatever you've had to release has only served to empty your hands for what He is about to give you.
p. 198, Jesus knew what you and I must learn: not every good thing is a God thing, and nothing is worth doing if it's not what God wants us to do.
p.200, It takes faith, knowing your personal, family, or community situation the way you do, to start walking in patient confidence that God hasn't conceded defeat in your life. It takes faith to look at an obstacle that is deeper and meaner than any courage you can conjure up yet be absolutely assured that God's power is more than enough to move it out of the way.
