Food for thought

Considering how steep it was, the descent down into the valley seemed surprisingly easy, but perhaps that was because Much-Afraid desired with her whole will to make it in a way that would satisfy and please the Shepherd.  The awful glimpse down into the abyss of an existence without him had so staggered and appalled her heart that she felt she could never be quite the same again.  However, it had opened her eyes to the fact that right down in the depths of her own heart she really had but one passionate desire, not for the things which the Shepherd had promised, but for himself.  All she wanted was to be allowed to follow him forever.

Other desires might clamor strongly and fiercely nearer the surface of her nature, but she knew now that down in the core of her own being she was so shaped that nothing could fit, fill, or satisfy her heart but he himself.  “Nothing else really matters,” she said to herself, “only to love him and to do what he tells me.  I don’t know quite why it should be so, but it is. All the time it is suffering to love and sorrow to love, but it is lovely to love him in spite of this, and if I should cease to do so, I should cease to exist.”

Hannah Hurnard, Hinds’ Feet on High Places