Relocating To Elfland

I often ponder the problem of evil in God’s world, the dark mystery of His wisdom in using sin and grace to manifest His glory (especially in the cross, and in the final judgment of all things). A thought came today that the horrible miseries and evils of the present age occasion some of the sweetest fellowship known to man. My best friendships have been forged in fires of suffering, in seasons when I had to bear a burden my friend could no longer bear alone, or when he did so for me. If laughter melds heart to heart, so do tears. Will, perhaps, some of the richness of the life to come be that we have wept together on earth, that we have known each other thus? Could it be that terrestrial love burns hottest in the commonness of struggle, and that the joy of celestial rest together will rise in part from this? What blades of love may spring in that world from seeds that died in this one, and did not remain alone? What love of God is known to us in His unfathomable entering and bearing our curse? Can we ever stop laughing at the horizons of love our God has opened through the malice of our Serpent foe?