Donna VanLiere

If we're open to it, God can use even the smallest thing to change our lives... to change us. It might be a laughing child, car brakes that need fixing, a sale on pot roast, a cloudless sky, a trip to the woods to cut down a Christmas tree, a school teacher, a Dunhill Billiard pipe...or even a pair of shoes. Some people will never believe. They may feel that such things are too trivial, too simple, or too insignificant to forever change a life. But I believe. And I always will.

Why do you believe in God?" the woman asked me in the busy corridor. I don't remember the answer I gave. It was probably too long and rattled in her ears. I wish I could go back and answer her again. "Because HE believes in me," I would say. Isn't that enough?

I know the well of my maternal incompetence is deep but I am determined to siphon up a calm and breathing hope for him.

Some things may never change but other things can be so completely different that they make the things that don't change bearable.

Everybody wants to know why we're here, so we search for that answer. We want to know who we belong to so we search for those people and all the while God is whispering, 'Here I am.

Christmas isn't a parade or concert but a piece of home you keep in your heart wherever you go.