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for us what he will do to those who refuse to keep his commands. He says he will “punish them with a rod”, and he will “scourge them on account of their guilt”. Then God, being God, immediately adds, “I will not take my love from him, nor will I ever betray my faithfulness.” We want to look for the places where we betray our faithfulness. “O God, I will love you forever and ever, but not in this.” And so I take back my love on this occasion, in this seeming obstacle, in this friendly little event that I mistake for a foe. What are the foes within that want to entice us to take back our love? Perhaps our moodiness, our mood swings. Today I love God with all my heart, and then tomorrow I am feeling depressed, discouraged; I am tempted, which is the common lot of all men. Our dear Lord was discouraged in the Garden of Gethsemane. He had to do something about it. No one was ever so tempted to discouragement as he who sweat blood over it. He had that great temptation of saying: “What’s the use? All this suffering for men, some of whom will not respond.” He was often tempted to sadness, but we never see him depressed. He always went forward in his love, never taking it back. Finally, we can take back our love by failing to make it grow every day. The seemingly untoward circumstances from without, or the sometimes miasmic fumes within us, are dealt with
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