Conditional Loves

You'll never know how deep your faith is until you realize that the thing you want most in the world, the thing you've been asking and pleading and begging for, might not be granted to you. What are you to do, stop loving and believing and following God? This means that I never really loved Him, that my love was conditional upon getting my way. It wouldn't be so bad if I knew why He was withholding my heart's desire, but the not knowing, being kept in the dark is almost too much to bear. Of course, when the heart bleeds inside as though "almost to death", I'm reminded of Jesus at Gesthemene when He . . . even He . . . asked to be relieved of what it was He had to bear, and finally relented and accepted: "Not by my will, but Yours be done." In the end, no matter how difficult or painful, we must believe that God knows best. It doesn't stop the heart from breaking, however.