To confess your sins to God is not to tell [God] anything [God] doesn't already know. Until you confess them, however, they are the abyss between you. When you confess them, they become the bridge.
Frederick BuechnerRead
To be wise is to be eternally curious.
Interpretation
Wisdom comes from an ongoing desire to learn and understand the world around us.
This quote by Frederick Buechner emphasizes that true wisdom is not a destination but a journey fueled by curiosity. Being wise involves continuously seeking knowledge and understanding, asking questions, and engaging with life in an open and inquisitive manner.
In practice
This quote can inspire students during a graduation speech.
To confess your sins to God is not to tell [God] anything [God] doesn't already know. Until you confess them, however, they are the abyss between you. When you confess them, they become the bridge.
By and large a good rule for finding out is this: the kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work a) that you need most to do and b) the world most needs to have done. If you really get a kick out of your work, you've presumably met requirement a), but if your work is writing TV deodorant commercials, the chances are you've missed requirement b).
When you remember me, it means you have carried something of who I am with you, that I have left some mark of who I am on who you are. It means that you can summon me back to your mind even though countless years and miles may stand between us. It means that if we meet again, you will know me. It means that even after I die, you can still see my face and hear my voice and speak to me in your heart.
We find by losing. We hold fast by letting go. We become something new by ceasing to be something old. This seems to be close to the heart of that mystery. I know no more now than I ever did about the far side of death as the last letting-go of all, but now I know that I do not need to know, and that I do not need to be afraid of not knowing. God knows. That is all that matters.
if you don't have doubts you're either kidding yourself or asleep. Doubts are the ants-in-the-pants of faith. They keep it alive and moving.
You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.
We know very little, and yet it is astonishing that we know so much, and still more astonishing that so little knowledge can give us so much power.
Far more than any other power, imagination is what sets human beings apart from every other species on earth.
Genius is always allowed some leeway, once the hammer has been pried from its hands and the blood has been cleaned up.
Ninety-nine percent of the people in the world are fools and the rest of us are in great danger of contagion.
Forgiveness is a selective remembering. It is a conscious choice to focus on someone's innocence instead of his or her mistakes...This serves *you*...Your body was not created to bear the burden of your overattachment to it, but was created as a container for the light of your spirit. It will more easily remember how to function perfectly when you remember the perfection in everyone.
My son, by all means desist from kicking the venerable and enlightened Vizier: for as a costly jewel retains its value even if hidden in a dung-hill, so old age and discretion are to be respected even in the vile persons of our subjects. Desist therefore, and tell us what you desire and propose.
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