St. Padre Pio, the holy priest and stigmatist, used to pray (and encourage others to pray) thus:
“My past, O Lord, to Thy Mercy; my present, to Thy Love; my future, to Thy Providence.”
As children of an “infinitely loving Father” (St. Padre Pio), we must entrust the future to God’s love and wisdom. He knows what we need. God arranges everything for our greatest good, namely, eternal salvation. For this reason, we must trust in Him at all times. This will bring grace and peace.
Here is a beautiful illustration of God’s merciful providence, as well as our inability to discern the things of God: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways”, says the Lord (Isaiah 55:8).
(Taken from p. 319 of ‘The Life of Leon Papin-Dupont, The Holy Man of Tours’)
In everything that happened, even though in its human aspects it was most disastrous and apparently most detrimental to the interests of religion, his faith beheld the action of Divine Providence and the accomplishment of the Divine Will. Thus, when the terrible conflagration which took place in a church at Santiago, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, was exciting the greatest sensation throughout the civilised world, a lady of Tours felt herself tempted to murmur against God for having allowed so many devout clients of His Virgin Mother to perish by so frightful a catastrophe at the very time when they were rendering her their homage. Meeting M. Dupont in the street, she gave expression to her distress in passionate terms.
“But, madam”, he said, “you let your feelings carry you away. Instead of being afflicted, you ought rather to be thankful. See, I pray you, how, whilst His earthly children were occupied in glorifying their heavenly Mother, God chose that very moment for calling them to Himself and transported them straight into His Paradise. In an instant they are saved, they are happy; it is not a disaster; it is a mercy, and one of the greatest that could have befallen them.”
“I did not venture to reply”, adds the lady, who was herself the Abbe Janvier’s informant. “He was in another sphere. I looked only to earth, he to heaven.”
"The judgments of God are always right, perfectly just, and justice does not manifest severity except where souls have abused mercy." - Reginald Garrigou Lagrange
Littlest Souls 