Your Grief. God’s Grace.

The death of a beloved is an amputation.

—CS Lewis

As we wrapped up 2018, our coastal congregation was rocked by grief. Loved ones near and far were lost as if the ending of the year meant that lives were concluding as well, like a succession of doors clicking closed. Mothers, fathers, grandparents, siblings.

And though no loss is less than another, none struck me quite like the Facebook post by a young mom who shared that the child she and her husband thought they would joyfully welcome to their home in 2019 was now home with the Savior.

Grief is no respecter of status in life or location. Just as those in our congregation, many of you will go into 2019 with one less seat at the table, one less gift to unwrap, one less person to plan for.

What do we make of grief? It’s painful and unyielding, stretching past the point of loss to become a defining moment for the future. Everything now is in reference to that moment, pays homage to it, remembers and reminds. As CS Lewis put it, the absence of our loved one “is like the sky, spread over everything.”  

And for us who know Christ it seems indefensible. Why God, do we grieve like this?

Grief is an emotion that signals loss. We can grieve losses besides death, such as divorce or job loss, but grief’s sting is sharpest when we lose a loved one.  Grief came into creation as a partner of death, the emotion that locks arms with loss and won’t let go. But the Bible teaches that with grief, like so much else we experience in this life, God offers an opportunity to walk more closely with Christ. God doesn’t cause us pain so we will grieve but He teaches us how to grieve. It’s how we respond that matters.

So, the Bible teaches that in our grief we can learn something about God we did not know before and know Him in ways we could not have known Him without the grief we bear. God knows we will grieve. He even expects us to grieve when we suffer loss. That is not a question. The only question is whether we will grieve as those who trust Christ, or not.

As such, the grief of the Christian is different.

First, We grieve with hope, not “as those who have no hope” (1 Thess. 4:13-14). We anticipate a future with our beloved in Christ. They have preceded us home. That’s all. Eternal life started here and it continues there (John 14:1-6). If our grief ignores our eternal life in Christ, and that of our beloved who had trusted Christ, we betray a lack of trust and even ignorance about the power and grace of God.

But even more so, to grieve with hope is to remember that it will not always be this way. Our faith clings to God’s gracious promise that grief belongs to this fallen world. In His redemptive plan God will wipe the thickest tears that stain our cheeks (Rev. 21:4).

Second, We grieve with God, not without Him. We reach out to Him. Grief is not a sign that God has forsaken or abandoned us. It is an urging to call out to Him, and to know that He is near “to the brokenhearted and the crushed in spirit” (Psalm 34:18). In our grief we experience something that we do not experience apart from loss—the comfort of God for the brokenhearted and grieving (Matt. 5:4).

In addition, when we reach out to God in our grief, we are reminded that He knows how we feel. God grieves with us, but we also grieve with Him. This is no small thing, and no pious platitude. The Bible tells us to be careful that we do not cause God grief (Eph. 4:30), and in so doing uses the same word that describes human grief.

This side of Eden, even God grieves. The Bible records Jesus weeping when He grieved His friend’s death (John 11:35). He knows how you feel. And He is the only One who can do anything about it. And perhaps, most startling of all, the Heavenly Father knows what it is like to lose one’s child, as He gave His one and only Son to die for us, and watched His life expire on the cross.

Then last, We grieve with one another, not alone. Suffering connects us, and for those who have struggled to handle the intrusion of grief, the connection is stronger than for anyone else. So we are told to “comfort one another with the comfort we have received” from God, our Father (2 Cor 1:3-6). It is the person who grieves that can honestly say to someone whose pain is fresh, “I know how you feel.”

Those who grieve alone have forgotten that God has designed us for community. For this, our young mother was wise. In her Facebook post she reached out to her community of faith and they responded with love, care, and prayers. But, more importantly, her Facebook community mirrored her church community. She is not alone in her grief.

 And neither are you.

Hope, comfort, community. In Christ, we experience God’s grace—not despite our grief, but because of it.