To be grateful for the good things that happen in our lives is easy, but to be grateful for all of our lives—the good as well as the bad, the moments of joy as well as the moments of sorrow, the successes as well as the failures, the rewards as well as the rejections—that requires hard spiritual work. Still, we are only truly grateful people when we can say "thank you" to all that has ...

Spending an evening at a shelter for homeless women was not my idea, but when a friend asked, I was perfectly willing to tag along.

Although the winter was still young, the cold was harsh. I nearly ran from the comfort of our car to the warmth of the church annex that had, for years, opened its doors as a refuge from the night.

The director, Christy, efficiently assigned tasks—to set the floor ...

Fire swept through Southern California from the north of Los Angeles to the Mexican border during October, 2007. Five hundred thousand acres were burned up, a half-million people displaced from their communities, and 2,000 homes destroyed in the blazes.

But in Rancho Bernardo, in a Presbyterian church in which 60 families lost their homes, worshipers met to give thanks. One reporter noted, "They gave ...