PATHWAY OF PAIN

If my days were untroubled and my heart always light,
would I seek that fair land where there is no night?

If I never grew weary with the weight of my load,
would I search for God's peace at the end of the road?

If I never knew sickness and never felt pain,
would I search for a hand to help and sustain?

If I walked without sorrow and lived without loss,
would my soul seek solace at the foot of the cross?

If all I desired was mine day by day,
would I kneel before God and earnestly pray?

If God sent no winter to freeze me with fear,
would I yearn for the warmth of Spring every year?

I ask myself these and the answer is plain,
if my life were pleasure and I never knew pain

I'd seek God less often and need Him much less,
for God is sought more often in times of distress.

And no one knows God or sees Him as plain
as those who have met Him on the "Pathway of Pain."

-------Helen Steiner Rice

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