Straying Sheep

Chapter 20 of If God Is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil, by Randy Alcorn, brought this to mind:
 "What if, in order for us to truly desire evil to be destroyed completely, wiped out and become totally non-existent, we have to experience it first?"  Are we not like this in virtually every area?
We desire junk food.  Junk food is devastating to our bodies, but we want it.  My particular downfall is ice cream.  I crave it even in winter.  Michael finds it humorous that someone who is as cold-natured as I am would want ice cream of all things in the midst of winter.  If  I eat it in winter, I suffer more than normal consequences.  I go into freeze out mode and cannot get warm.  My husband places an electric blanket over me and sets it on high to get me warm again.  Sometimes he has to add a quilt.  It takes a while.  Why do I put myself through it?  Because I really want that taste in my mouth.  I don't want the extra weight it can bring, or the blood sugar problems, or the tooth decay, etc., but I want that taste!!
We are all like this in one area or another (or if you are like me, many more than one), but then we tend to wonder where the problems come from.  We are simply and stupidly amazing!  No wonder God says we are like sheep going astray. 
God is not just our God, He is our Father.  He wants the very best for us.  So, if we have to suffer in order to no longer desire to suffer....
When our daughter was a little over a year old, she kept going over to the oven wanting to touch the door.  They didn't have the cool-touch doors they have now.  If you had something in that oven, the door got HOT.  I would tell her over and over not to touch it, but she kept going back to that door.  I would say, "No, no!  HOT!"  And take her hand away just to have her return a minute later.  Finally, I decided that if she had to learn the hard way, then I would be in control so that she didn't really get hurt.  She went to the oven door, looked at me, smiled and started reaching for it.  I ran to her, took her hand and quickly touched it to the door and removed it immediately.  Her eyes became very wide as she cried out, "HOT!"  I hugged her, hating that I had had to do that, but grateful that she wasn't hurt and with tears told her, "Yes, it is hot, just like Mommy told you."  She never touched the oven door again.  That was a very difficult thing for me to do, but I baked a loaf of bread every day at that time.  What if I had to go to the bathroom, or answer the door or telephone and didn't see her go to the oven?  She might have burned herself badly, so great was her desire to touch.  What I did would probably be declared mean, cruel, even evil, but I did it out of love.  Allowing her to feel the heat without getting injured kept her safe from the oven from that moment on.
Mr. Alcorn sums this up beautifully in the final paragraphs of the chapter, pg. 205 "God promises that the eternal ending will break forth in such glorious happiness that all present suffering will pale in comparison.  All who know Jesus will have a happy ending. We just haven't seen it yet."
These bodies of ours may go through temporary torment, pain, heartbreak, etc., but if we know Jesus as Savior, we will be given them back - perfected for us when this one wears out  or is taken from us. It will never suffer in any way ever again.  We will experience adventure, excitement and all that is good, without ever again having to suffer the negative  and we will appreciate the fact for have had to suffer here and now.  Like our little daughter, we would have continued longing for the excitement of the heat otherwise.
Have a blessed day!