Life is just a little opportunity for you during a few years to say, "I love you, too."
Interpretation
Life is a brief moment to express our love for others.
This quote by Henri Nouwen highlights the ephemeral nature of life and the importance of expressing love. It suggests that our time on Earth is limited, and thus, we should seize the opportunity to share our love with others while we can, emphasizing that love is a fundamental aspect of our existence.
In practice
Using this quote at a wedding toast to emphasize the importance of love in marriage.
The Christian leader of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self. God loves us, not because of what we do or accomplish, but because God has created and redeemed us in love.
The immense joy in welcoming back the lost son hides in the immense sorrow that has gone before....our brokenness may appear beautiful, but our brokenness has no other beauty but the beauty that comes from the compassion that surrounds it.
Suffering invites us to place our hurts in larger hands. In Christ we see God suffering β for us. And calling us to share in Godβs suffering love for a hurting world. The small and even overpowering pains of our lives are intimately connected with the greater pains of Christ. Our daily sorrows are anchored in a greater sorrow and therefore a larger hope.
To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, welcome, to accept.
Waiting is a dry desert between where we are and where we want to be. (Finding My Way Home)
Becoming the beloved is pulling the truth revealed to me from above down into the ordinariness of what I am, in fact, thinking of, talking about and doing from hour to hour.
No. No games. He wanted her and didn't care who knew it. He definitely and absolutely wanted her, longed for her, wanted to do more things than there were names for with her.
She fitted into my biggest arm-chair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing arm-chairs tight about the hips that season
Hallow the body as a temple to comeliness and sanctify the heart as a sacrifice to love; love recompenses the adorers.
More than anything, I felt the unfairness of it, the inarguable injustice of loving someone who might have loved you back but can't due to deadness, and then I leaned forward, my forehead against the back of Takumi's headrest, and I cried, whimpering, and I didn't even feel sadness so much as pain.
Were all the letters sun, I could not see one.
In springtime, the only pretty ring time Birds sing, hey ding A-ding, a-ding Sweet lovers love the springβ
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