The best things we’ll ever say

HOPE MATTERS

A couple of my favorite authors on relationships in the 1990s were John Trent and Gary Smalley. One book they co-authored still stands out to me, and not just because it survived our newlywed bookshelf purge: “The Blessing.”

When I first read “The Blessing,” Daniele and I were newly married. Nearly 30 years later, in 2018, John Trent became one of my professors during my doctoral studies. One day over lunch with him, I discussed a strained relationship with a person close to me. His biblically rooted advice provided clarity, with themes related to his best-known work on relationships. What he had written years earlier became deeply personal and timely.