Following are words that probably aren’t going to encourage you to rush and send me a thank you email, but that’s okay. They arrived together in one of my devotions this morning, and they sort of made me wiggle a bit in my seat and scratch my head. Hmm. What challenge ahead of me today? Or where are my eyes blind to the opportunity at grace I am missing?

“It is no great matter to associate with the good and gentle; for this is a naturally pleasing to all, and everyone willingly enjoyeth peace, and loveth those best that agree with him. But to be able to live peaceably with hard and perverse persons, or with the disorderly, or with such as go contrary to us, is a great grace, and a most commendable thing.”
… Thomas a Kempis (1380-1471), Of the Imitation of Christ, II.iii. [1418]