When obedience to God contradicts what I think will give me pleasure, let me ask myself if I love Him.
The only crown Jesus ever wore on earth was a crown of thorns.
God never denies us our hearts desire except to give us something better.
Things happen which would not happen without prayer. Let us not forget that.
God is God. Because he is God, He is worthy of my trust and obedience. I will find rest nowhere but in His holy will that is unspeakably beyond my largest notions of what he is up to.
One step at a time, over the years, as I sought to plumb the mystery of suffering (which cannot be plumbed), I began to see that there is a sense in which everything is a gift. Even my widowhood.