There is probably no greater Gethsemane for saint or sinner than the death of one of our children. Just minutes after he learned of his ten-year-old daughter’s accidental death, a father I know wrote a letter to her (I quote it with his permission). Note how this good man’s Gethsemane became a sanctifying experience because of his knowledge of the gospel and the gift he had received of the Comforter. Contrast his reaction with what it might have been without the light of the gospel:

"Mom and I and your seven brothers and sisters are better because you came to our house. Soon after your day of birth, you helped us to accept fear and the unknown; to better love others with physical, emotional, or mental challenges; to accept the disappointment accompanying an unknown prognosis; and to query and plead with our Father, who today you know better than we do. As you grew older, we learned determination from you, who had every right to spill your milk but never did, who royally defeated your Mom and Dad in Tetherball, who averaged 97 percent in spelling for an entire year and by sheer grit struggled with math, and who without ever a complaint sat with your mom every night—summer and school months—to read and understand what you had read. Yes, we did our best to help you learn, but what we learned from you cannot be printed in books—cannot be written because it is almost too sacred to rehearse.