But if something is going to be returned in one form or another, why is it taken at all? Subhan'Allah. It is the process of 'losing' that we are given.

Allah gives us gifts, but then we often become dependent on those gifts, instead of Him. When He gives us money, we depend on the money--not Him. When He gives us people, we depend on people--not Him. When He gives us status or power, we depend on and become distracted by these things. When Allah gives us health, we become deceived. We think we will never die.

Allah gives us gifts, but then we come to love them as we should only love Him. We take those gifts and inject them into our hearts until they take over. Soon we cannot live without them. Every waking moment is spent in contemplation of them, in submission and worship to them. The mind and the heart was created by Allah, for  Allah becomes the property of someone or something else. And then the fear comes, the fear of loss begins to cripple us. The gift--that should have remained in our hands--takes over our heart, so the fear of losing it consumes us. Soon, what was once a gift becomes a weapon of torture and a prison of our own making. How can we be freed of this? At times, in his Infinite mercy, Allah frees us...by taking it away.

As a result of it being taken, we turn to Allah wholeheartedly. In that desperation and need, we ask, we beg, we pray. Through the loss, we reach a level of sincerity and humility of dependence on Him which we would otherwise not reach---had it not been taken from us. Through the loss, our hearts turn entirely to face him.

What happens when you first give a child a toy or the new video game he's always wanted? He becomes consumed by it. Soon he wants to do nothing else. He sees nothing else.  He doesn't want to do his work or even eat. He's hypnotized to his own detriment.  So what do you do, as a loving parent? Do you leave him to drown in his addiction and complete the loss of focus and balance? No.

You take it away.

Then, once the child has regained focus of his priorities, regained sanity and balance, once things are put in their proper place in his heart and mind and life, what happens? You give the gift back. Or perhaps something better. But this time, the gift is no longer in his heart. It is in its proper place. It is in his hand.

Yet in the process of taking, the most important thing happened. The losing and regaining of the gift is inconsequential. The taking of your heedlessness, your dependence and focus on other than Him, and then replacing it with remembrance, dependence and focus only on Him was the real gift. Allah withholds to give.

And so sometimes, the 'something better' is the greater gift: nearness to Him. Allah took the daughter of Malik Ibn Dinar in order to save him. He took his daughter but replaced her with protection from the hell-fire and salvation from a painful life of sin and distance from Him. Through the loss of his daughter, Malik Ibn Dinar was blessed with a life spent nearness to Allah. And even that which was taken (his daughter) would remain with Malik ibn Dinar forever in Jannah.

Ibn ul Qayyim (may Allah be pleased with him) speaks about this phenomenon in his book. Madarij Al Salikin. He says: "The divine decree related to the believer is always a bounty, even if it is the form of witholding (something that is desired) and it is a blessing, even if it appears to be a trial and an affliction that has befallen him; it is, in reality, a cure, even though it appears to be a disease!"

So to the question, 'once something is lost, does it return?' the answer is, yes. It returns. Sometimes here, sometimes there, sometimes in a different and better form. But the greater gift lies beneath the taking and returning. Allah tells us, "Say, 'In the bounty of Allah and his mercy --in that let them rejoice; it is better than what they hoard'" (Qur'an, 10:58)