When We Understand the Plan

I reckon when the world we leave

And cease to smile and cease to grieve,

When each of us shall quit the strife

And drop the working tools of life,

Somewhere, somehow, we'll come to find

Just what our Maker had in mind.

Perhaps through clearer eyes than these

We'll read life's hidden mysteries,

And learn the reason for our tears —

Why sometimes came unhappy years,

And why our dearest joys were brief

And bound so closely unto grief.

There is so much beyond our scope,

As blindly on through life we grope,

So much we cannot understand,

However wisely we have planned,

That all who walk this earth about

Are constantly beset by doubt.

No one of us can truly say

Why loved ones must be called away,

Why hearts are hurt, or e'en explain

Why some must suffer years of pain;

Yet some day all of us shall know

The reason why these things are so.

I reckon in the years to come,

When these poor lips of clay are dumb,

And these poor hands have ceased to toil,

Somewhere upon a fairer soil

God shall to all of us make clear

The purpose of our trials here.