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The image that comes to my mind is of a small child walking with a parent. The child may wander, neglectful of where the parent is, and suddenly look and find that the parent is not where the child thought the parent was. But the parent knows exactly where the child is and remains close by. I am the child and God is the parent. My personal discipline is to chasten my feeling of abandonment.

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Brian, good illustration!

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Like.

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Excellent, brother. I believe we all go through times like this. I've had chemo and immunotherapy off and on the last three and half years. Went into remission and then it came back. I'm in treatments again and doing better, but I'm not done. We all have experienced or will experience the dark night. It is not the same for everyone, but in 40 years of being a pastor, preacher, fire/rescue chaplain, and hospital chaplain I've heard a lot of stories. Again, thanks for this.

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Thank you for this. Peace in Christ!

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Re: “The famous poem Footprints in the Sand by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow…”

What is your source to assert that Longfellow wrote this? He did write a different, unrelated poem, Footsteps of the Soul. https://poemanalysis.com/henry-wadsworth-longfellow/footsteps-of-angels/

For the controversy about who wrote Footprints in the Sand, see https://www.npr.org/2008/06/10/91356803/who-made-the-footprints

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I thought this post was excellent. Reminded me of the look on my granddaughter’s face when we were reading the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Father Christmas said “Aslan is on the move”. Also made me think of Jonathan Gibson’s children’s book “The Moon is Always Round”. Thank you.

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You're the only other person I know who recalls Robo Story. :)

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Greatest promise to us—that God is always with us, even when we often experience his absence!

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Yes, I relate very much. And knowing that God, in Jesus, has been through this sort of thing as well is enormously comforting.

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