Enlarge Your Soul Through Grief and Loss

Today we’re talking about grief and loss. Sometimes grief and loss happens all in one go with a catastrophic event – like an accident. And sometimes it’s a slow drawn out process, like a disease. Loss is part of life. We lose our youthfulness. No amount of plastic surgery, cosmetics, good diet or exercise routine can stop the process of growing older. We lose our dreams. We experience loss in transitions of life. Each time we change jobs, or move is a loss. Our influence and power decreases as we grow older. 

Most of us, in one or more moments of our lives, experience catastrophic loss. Unexpectedly, a family member dies. A spouse has an affair. We’re diagnosed with cancer. Our company suddenly downsizes and we find ourselves unemployed after 25 years. They are all losses. We feel betrayed by a church tradition, a leader, or even God himself. 

Grief and loss will transform us or destroy us, but it will never leave us the same. There is no going back to change the past…. The choice is whether these losses will crush our spirit and life or open us up to new possibilities and depths of transformation in Christ.

Every culture and family deals with grieving differently. Some of us come from families/cultures where sadness was a sign of weakness. You weren’t allowed to be depressed. The expectation was that you would just keep going and pretend everything was OK. Others cultures do a lot of screaming and wailing, but that doesn’t mean they process it any better. 

In our culture, addiction has become the most common way to deal with pain. We keep busy, running from one activity to another. In our culture we see people indulge in overworking, overeating, pornography, drinking, taking pills—anything to help us avoid the pain. Some of us expect that someone or something (a marriage, an ideal family, children, an achievement, a career, or a church) will take our pain away. 

On top of this, in the church, we have little theology for anger, sadness, waiting, and depression. “How are you?” we are asked after a loss or disappointment in our lives. “Couldn’t be better! God’s working all things for good. I just can’t see it all yet.” We feel guilty for not obeying Scripture’s commands to “rejoice in the Lord always” (Philippians 4:4a). In the church today we often associate anger, sadness, and grieving with being unspiritual, as if something is wrong with our walk with God. If there are setbacks, disappointments, crisis – we feel the need to let people know we’re solid, we’re OK. Sometimes when sadness or grief did overwhelm – we would be encouraged to quote Scriptures “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” However, grief and loss is a huge way God “enlarges” our soul and transforms us into one who is more able to love God and others. 

A theology for grieving can be broken down into three phases. First, pay attention to it. 

We read in the Bible about Job, who lost everything in one day—his 10 children die suddenly in a natural disaster. He loses all his wealth – even though he is one of the richest people in the world, and he loses his health to such an extent that he is physically unrecognizable. 

Job didn’t hide his anguish. He screams out in his pain, holding nothing back. He was in so much anguish that he basically says he was sorry he was ever born. In Job3:3-4 (MSG) he says “Obliterate the day I was born. Blank out the night I was conceived! Let it be a black hole in space. May God above forget it ever happened.” The in Job 6, again in The Message, Job says ““If my misery could be weighed, if you could pile the whole bitter load on the scales, It would be heavier than all the sand of the sea! Is it any wonder that I’m howling like a caged cat? The arrows of God Almighty are in me, poison arrows…” (Job 6:1-4).

Job was so honest with God. I confess, I often have not been that honest with God. I remember in college hearing one of the cadets say they were so hurt by life’s circumstances they yelled out “God I hate you!”. Oh gosh I was really shocked. Probably because I wouldn’t use the word hate on anyone. But she was doing what Job was doing…paying attention to the depth of pain and acknowledging it before God. Job shouted at God. He prayed wild prayers. The told God exactly what he was thinking and feeling. For 35 chapters we read that he struggled with God. He doubted. He wept. The wondered where God is and why all this has happened to him. He did not avoid the trauma of his situation, but faced it.

Often in the Church we are taught that anger is a sin. We think to be like Jesus we need to ignore all feelings of irritation, annoyance, resentment, and hatred. But Ephesians 4:26 says “In your anger do not sin”. There’s an acknowledgement in the Bible that we will become angry, but the warning is, be careful what that leads you to do and say.

When we do not deal with these very feelings that make us human, such as fear or sadness or anger, we leak. Our churches are filled with “leaking” Christians who have not dealt with their emotions. Grieving is not possible without paying attention to our anger and sadness. Most people who fill churches are “nice” and “respectable. A lot of us stuff these “difficult feelings” down, trusting that God will honour our noble efforts. The result is that we leak through in soft ways such as passive-aggressive behaviour (e.g., showing up late), sarcastic remarks, a nasty tone of voice, and giving people the “silent treatment.” Job paid attention to both God and himself, choosing to enter the confusion of his personal “dark night of the soul” rather than try to medicate himself or avoid it.

 The 2nd phase of Biblical Grieving is -- Waiting in the Confusing In-Between. 

When we experience losses and setbacks, God invites us to wait. I hate waiting. I prefer to know what’s going to happen. Sometimes I even read the end of a book, or look at the summary of the TV series online so I know what’s going to happen ahead of time! I understand why Abraham, after waiting eleven years for God’s promise of a son to come true, took matters in his own hands and had a baby outside of his marriage with Hagar. In doing so he birthed a baby called Ishmael. Birthing Ishmaels is common in both our churches and personal lives. 

Job waited for a long time when those closest to him quit. They did not have a big enough God or theology to wait in the confusing in-between. In fact, Job’s friends wanted to make sense of it and told him they knew why this was all happening. They told him he was suffering loss because of his sin. ‘that’s how God works’ they said, ‘you sin and he punishes you’. It’s all your fault somehow.

This may sound a little familiar to you. You may have heard or read of people saying ‘well, the reason you’re not healed is because you don’t pray enough, fast enough, read the bible enough’. That is, it’s your fault. And if you were a better Christian God would love you more and you’d have a better life. You may have even had that thought creep in to your own head some dark night.But, it wasn’t true for Job, and it’s not true for you. Job’s suffering was not brought on by his sin. Job was innocent and God wasn’t punishing him. 

The truth is the confusing In-between bit, may last until we see Jesus face to face and all will be revealed. “Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him” (Psalm 37:7) remains one of the most radical commands of our day. It requires enormous humility. The confusing in-between resists all earthly categories and quick solutions. It runs contrary to our entire culture. God is not in a rush. 

The third phase of biblical grieving is to let the old, birth the new. Good grieving is not just letting go, but also letting it bless us. Job did just that. The old life for Job was truly over, that door remained closed. But there was new life after that. The central message of Jesus and the Bible is that suffering and death brings resurrection and transformation. Our losses are real, very real. But as we pay attention and wait on God in our losses and grief, no matter how long it takes, God, over time, births resurrection. If we will follow the biblical process of grief ---always there is a resurrection of some sort over time. A few years ago, in the middle of winter, I was contemplating life and God and all my questions. And I said to myself ‘spring always follows winter’, it’s God’s principle, there can always be new life and new growth after the most devastating winter of the soul.

There are many rich fruits as a result of embracing our losses. The greatest, however, concerns our relationship to God. When we grieve God’s way, we are changed forever. We all face many losses within our lives. That is God’s path for all of us. Don't be discouraged. The choice is whether these losses will crush our spirit and life, or will open us up to new possibilities and depths of transformation in Jesus. Pete Scazzero says “Here is where my soul is enlarged. Here is where I choose to sit for a while. I will feel my pain. I will admit my fear. I will grieve my losses. I will carry my grief and ask others to carry it with me and help me. I will stop acting like it’s wrong, or sick, for me to ask for help. And I will trust God to hold me, to embrace me, and ultimately to heal me”.