I would like to dedicate this book to you, the reader. Though the words and images printed on the page are the same for everyone, it is my hope and prayer that the Spirit of God would speak directly to your unique heart - that He would minister to your individual life in a loving, dynamic, and vibrantly new way. May this book be to you as that well-worn baseball glove, or as that trusty hairbrush: homely and personal to your hand, being shaped and fitted to your own specific needs.

I have penned the proceeding words in a fervent and arduous love for God's people. It is my belief that the Lord has both called me to write, and has also, in all faithfulness, shared with me the words and ideas that He wishes to communicate to His own children. He has pressed His holy hand upon the satin-cloth walls of my heart, and imposed His own mind and desires into my reins. In writing, I needed only to view the imprints shown upon the fabric sheets of my heart's walls, and report the shape made by His desirous hand.

Before I began this work, it seemed as though there had been conceived in me a heavenly working from God: one that had many tossings and turnings in my heart. His words and parabolic images were tumbling within me all the day long, and even in the nighttime they burned within my teeth and bones as a celestial fire. I ached for its delivery, and through God's prompting, that finally came to bear when I pressed my pen to the paper.

I could seemingly feel what God felt, and I could see what He saw. And, if only in part, I thought with His mind, and I loved with His heart. My Savior dwelt in my very heart, (as He does unto this day), and I did not need to look very far for His own fountains of love and care. I could feel His own sorrows, and I knew His own desires, and, when looking upon His own children with longing, I cried with His own tears.

What follows on these pages is what I believe to be the best representation, in words and images, to what I have seen and felt. I am a writer, and not an author. For an author implies an entirely original creation, as one with authority. Yet I, as perhaps a sportswriter reporting an event or game that he has seen, do also report the imprints and impressions that I have seen and felt God make upon my heart and mind.

It is my hopeful prayer and my earnest desire that you would be uplifted from despair and lovingly drawn to God through this book. I truly hope that He would share with you the fullness that is in Jesus Christ, and that you would know the breadth, and length, and depth, and height of His love, which passes all knowledge. Amen.