The certainty that God is always near us, present in all parts of His world, closer to us than our thoughts, should maintain us in a state of high moral happiness most of the time. But not all the time. It would be less than honest to promise every believer continual jubilee and less than realistic to expect it. As a child may cry out in pain even when sheltered in its mother's arms, so a Christian may sometimes know what it is to suffer even in the conscious presence of God. Though "always rejoicing," Paul admitted that he was sometimes sorrowful, and for our sakes Christ experienced strong crying and tears though He never left the side of the Father (John 1:18).
A. W. Tozer, The Tozer Topical Reader – Volume One, comp. Ron Eggert, (Camp Hill, PA: WingSpread Publishers, 2007), WORDsearch CROSS e-book, Under: "511. God: His omnipresence; Peace: in trials; Trials: God's presence in".
