A Roundabout Way

I am unsure if this excerpt will be clear without more context, but it comes from a fairy-tale I mentioned in an earlier post about George MacDonald. Whether or not it could be called a true allegory, it contains many "pictures" of the life of faith in God.

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So saying, the lady turned, and threw the little ball into the rose-fire.

"Oh, grandmother!" exclaimed Irene; "I thought you had spun it for me."

"So I did, my child. And you've got it."

"No; it's burnt in the fire."

The lady put her hand in the fire, brought out the ball, glimmering as before, and held it toward her. Irene stretched out her hand to take it, but the lady turned, and going to her cabinet, opened a drawer, and laid the ball in it.

"Have I done anything to vex you, grandmother?" said Irene pitifully.

"No, my darling. But you must understand that no one ever gives anything to another properly and really without keeping it. That ball is yours."

"Oh! I'm not to take it with me! You are going to keep it for me!"

"You are to take it with you. I've fastened the end of it to the ring on your finger."

Irene looked at the ring.

"I can't see it there, grandmother," she said.

"Feel—a little way from the ring—toward the cabinet," said the lady.

The Princess and the Goblin, by George MacDonald

"Oh! I do feel it!" exclaimed the princess. "But I can't see it," she added, looking close to her outstretched hand.

"No. The thread is too fine for you to see it. You can only feel it. Now you can fancy how much spinning that took, although it does seem such a little ball."

"But what use can I make of it, if it lies in your cabinet?" 

"That is what I will explain to you. It would be of no use to you—it wouldn't be yours at all if it did not lie in my cabinet. Now listen. If ever you find yourself in any danger—such, for example, as you were in this evening—you must take off your ring, and put it under the pillow of your bed. Then you must lay your forefinger, the same that wore the ring, upon the thread, and follow the thread wherever it leads you."

"Oh, how delightful! It will lead me to you, grandmother, I know!"

"Yes. But, remember, it may seem to you a very roundabout way indeed, and you must not doubt the thread. Of one thing you may be sure, that while you hold it, I hold it too."

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This reminds me of a few words from a song:

"When you can't see His hand, trust His heart."

And of the many verses that describe God leading His people, 

no matter how rough or long the way:

"So I led them out of the land of Egypt and brought them into the wilderness." 

Ezekiel 20:10

"You have led in your steadfast love the people whom you have redeemed; 

you have guided them by your strength to your holy abode." 

Exodus 15:13