Faith in Crisis

"You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth of falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you. It is easy to say you believe a rope to be strong and sound as long as you are merely using it to cord a box. But suppose you had to hang by that rope over a precipice. Wouldn't you then first discover how much you really trusted it? "
--C.S. Lewis "A Grief Observed"

I love the words to "In Christ Alone." I cling to the line that says "No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from His hand," because of its promise to me. Today I heard it and wept because of the promise it meant for someone else. For him, it means that the poisoned words that satan tried to get him to believe cannot keep him from God. It means satan didn't win in the end. Though this was a very encouraging thought, it saddened me. Why couldn't he have understood the Love of Christ better? He knew, surely, that God was with him always. But then, maybe this is the wrong question. I still question, wrongly, if I could have done more. I know the answer. Knowing the answer doesn't make my heart hurt any less.
So today I saw him in heaven where he knows no separation from the Father and the Son who died for all of his sins. And that glimmer is going to have to be enough for me.
At least until God calls me home.