Adapted from a letter of J.N.D. written to a husband whose wife had gone to be with the Lord, leaving him with four children.
I feel what a world of sorrow it is, and how real a share you have in that sorrow; but a world where, if sin and sorrow have entered in, grace has come in after them. Now love has risen above all the sin and sorrow, and, having entered into the worst of all it could bring on us, has given us a place out of it all. Into the place from which it flowed, the spirit of your dear wife has entered, and is with Him who entered into all that sorrow here that He might deliver us from it all. If you remain in the scenes of it down here, that very love has revealed itself by coming down into those scenes, that we might have it here. Jesus was a man of sorrows, and indeed none had sorrow like His. And His love is perfect sympathy as well as deliverance.
Look to this, dear brother, and you will find sympathy in your sorrow, and raising you out of it, not by destroying the feeling, but by coming into it, taking all human will out of that which causes regret and bitterness, and bringing His will into it, and Himself in love with us in it. His grace is sure, and in its path does not fail; nothing escapes or happens without it. This is a great comfort; first our will, subtle as it is, and meddling with the best affections, is broken and there is submission; then comes the sense of positive love. Any sense of failure even on our part, if such there be, is lost in the sense of the perfect love and ordering of God. He takes the place of the reasoning of our minds and all is peace. This is a wonderful thing, for after all, even as to our ways, we cannot answer Him nor account for one of a thousand. He does use all to set our hearts right, and gives softened peace like a river.