God is equally near to everything and every place and is equally ready to give himself, so far as in him lies, and therefore a person shall know him … - Meister Eckhart

You should be like those who at all times watch and wait for their Lord’ (Luke 12:36). Truly, such vigilant people are alert and on the watch for their Lord for whom they wait; they look to see if he is not by chance concealed in what befalls them, however strange it may be to them.

Listening leads us more inside ourselves whereas seeing leads us more outside — the work of seeing itself, that is. And, therefore, we will be far more blessed with eternal life by the power of listening than by the power of sight. The act of listening allows me to hear the eternal Word spoken with me, whereas sight leads me astray, to what is outside myself. In listening, I suffer (or allow); in seeing, I work.

Sanctification is the best of all things, for it cleanses the soul, and illuminates the conscience, and kindles the heart, and wakens the spirit, and girds up the loins, and glorifies virtue and separates us from creatures, and unites us with God. The quickest means to bring us to perfection is suffering; none enjoy everlasting blessedness more than those who share with Christ the bitterest pangs. Nothing is sharper than suffering, nothing is sweeter than to have suffered. The surest foundation in which this perfection may rest is humility; whatever here crawls in the deepest abjectness, that the Spirit lifts to the very heights of God, for love brings suffering and suffering brings love.