I am your friend, and my love for you goes deep.
There is nothing I can give you which you have not got;
but there is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it,
you can take.
No heaven can come to us, unless our hearts
Find rest in today. Take Heaven!
No peace lies in the future which is not hidden
in this tiny little moment. Take Peace!
The gloom of the world is but a shadow.
Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy.
There is Radiance and Glory in the darkness,
Could we but see, and to see we have only to look.
I beseech you to look.
Life is so generous a giver, but we,
judging its gifts by their covering,
cast them away as ugly, or heavy, or hard.
Remove the covering and you will find beneath it
a living splendour, woven of love, by wisdom, with power.
Welcome it, touch it, and you will touch the
Angel's hand that brings it to you.
Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty,
believe me, that angels hand is there; the gift is there.
And the wonder of an overshadowing presence.
Our joys too: be not content with them as joys.
They too conceal diviner gifts.
Life is so full of meaning and purpose,
so full of beauty - beneath its covering -
that you will find Earth but cloaks your Heaven.
Courage then to take it: that is all!
But courage you have; and the knowledge that we
Are pilgrims together.
Wending through unknown country, home.
And so, at this time, I greet you.
Not quite as the world sends greetings,
but with profound esteem, and with the prayer
that for you now and forever
The day breaks and the shadows flee away.