The cross of Christ is the pledge to us that the deepest suffering may be the condition of the highest blessing; the sign, not of Gods displeasure, but of His widest and most compassionate face.
Our merciful Father has no pleasure in the sufferings of His children; He chastens them in love; He never inflicts a stroke He could safely spare; He inflicts it to purify as well as to punish, to caution as well as to cure, to improve as well as to chastise.
Not till I was shut up to prayer and to the study of Gods word by the loss of earthly joyssickness destroying the flavor of them alldid I begin to penetrate the mystery that is learned under the cross. And wondrous as it is, how simple is that mystery! To love Christ, and to know that I love Himthis is all.