Truth for Responding to Grief

This is an article I wrote for the May/June 2021 edition of FrontLine Magazine about my personal experience with grief and the spiritual journey I went through.

How should a believer respond to grief? 

The topic is a daunting one, for every person experiences their own journey through it; that journey is shaped by an individual’s personality, kind of loss, sin tendencies, and heart idols. In this article, I seek to establish a basis for enduring grief in a godly way so that we do not waste the sovereignly-appointed trials God intends to use for our growth in holiness.

Testimony

In 2019, when I was twenty-six years old, my wife of almost five years died suddenly and without warning. We had met in Bible college and she helped me to hone my talents and callings in many areas of life as first a close friend, then as a girlfriend and fiancée, and finally as my wife; we married the day after I graduated. We continued to sharpen each other both mentally and spiritually until the evening of February 19, 2019 when she collapsed after mentioning a pain in her chest; somewhere within the next two hours consisting of paramedics removing her from our home, an ambulance ride, and the hospital staff’s failed attempts to resuscitate her, she passed from this life into the presence of her Lord.

I was shaken. I was torn by grief and in agony of spirit. I cried out with the psalmist and my Savior, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps. 22:1). I wrestled with spiritual doubts about the nature of the world, people, and God Himself. I agonized over my attempts to reconcile spiritual truth with the emotional pain that racked my physical body. I fought daily the urge to simply “curse God and die” (Job 2:9). There were marked steps in God’s restoring me to Himself: first came dealing with my anger toward Him, followed by a choice to be thankful to Him even in loss, and finally the acceptance of His will as always being worth it, regardless of the pain I might experience. Little by little, stage by stage, I learned to be thankful to God for His blessings, even when they are tainted with death and loss.

Definition

What I have just described for you is my experience of what is called grief. It has been described in many ways at many times in terms of mental, physical, and spiritual perspectives. The fact of the matter is that, while there are many common denominators, each person has a unique experience. For some it is more emotional, for others more physical, and for still others it is primarily spiritual, although all sufferers must deal with each of these aspects of grief. Theologically however, grief is what happens when images of God come into close, personal, painful contact with the extent and ramifications of the Fall on our lives; it is what happens when we are forced to stare face-to-face at the Curse.

Grief is what happens when images of God come into close, personal, painful contact with the extent and ramifications of the Fall on our lives.

Scripture doesn’t use the technical term “grief,” but it does use words that express the universal experience of the Curse on humanity. In describing his ministry as an Apostle, Paul uses the terms, “troubled,” “perplexed,” and “cast down” (2 Cor. 4:7-9). The Psalmists’ descriptions are picturesque, using such expressions as, “My soul is also sore vexed” (6:3), “I water my couch with my tears” (6:6), “my soul is cast down within me” (42:6). While the language and terminology has changed through the ages, the human experience of suffering has not, nor has the theological basis for it: suffering exists because sin exists. On that basis, I will present three truths that helped me deal with my grief correctly, and I hope they will be of encouragement to you.

It’s okay not to be okay

Grief is not a sign of weakness, wickedness, selfishness, sinfulness, or a lack of faith. Granted, it presents one with the possibility of choosing these responses to the trials of life, but essentially grief is the agreement of our souls with the truth of the brokenness that creation itself endures because of sin. When presented with such situations, the psalmists cried out to God with questions that many of us find uncomfortable: “Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?” (Ps. 10:1), “Why do you cast off my soul?” (Ps. 88:14), “How long will you forget me?” (Ps. 13:1), “Why have you forgotten me?” (Ps. 42:9), “Why have you rejected me?” (Ps. 43:2), “Awake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord?” (Ps. 44:23). By inspiring and including the Psalms in Scripture, God is communicating that He welcomes such questions; “He remembers that we are dust” (Ps. 103:14).

We live in a broken world.

God created all things perfect and whole (Gen. 1:31), but ever since Adam and Eve chose to reject God’s authority as Creator, sin has reigned over our world, and with it death (Rom. 5:14). It is an unavoidable fact that all humans must die because of Adam’ sin (Heb. 9:27); God in His sovereignty manages exactly when that death occurs to bring about the most good, but it must occur. Death is not a good thing. Rather, it is the ultimate affront to an image of God. It is “the last enemy” that Christ will destroy when He reigns eternally (1 Cor. 15:26). It should come as no surprise to us that, if the creation itself groans in agony under the Curse (Rom. 8:22), we as the specially-made images of our Divine Creator feel the weight of that burden with greater acuteness (Rom. 8:23). This Biblical background is essential to understanding both grief itself and its effects on humanity.

When we sorrow over pain, illness, and death, we are agreeing with the Son of God Himself; when we weep for the difficulties of this life, we become better acquainted with the “man of sorrows” who “bore our grief” (Isa. 53:3-4); when we beg our Heavenly Father for the removal of great suffering that we cannot bear, we have as our companion our Lord and Brother with whom we are co-heirs of the kingdom (Mt. 26:39). when we cry out to God in confusion at His permitting tragic events, we do so hand-in-hand with the Author and Finisher of our faith: the Man, Christ Jesus (Heb. 5:7-8). After all, it was He who quoted the psalmist when he said, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps. 22; Mt. 27:46). This psalm, a lament, echoes the cry of our souls for God to rectify the effects of sin, and it is through these desperate cries to our Father in heaven that we obey the command, “casting all your care upon Him” (1 Pet. 5:7).

Nobody is really okay

Everybody is experiencing the effects of the Fall in their lives; perhaps it is more acute at certain times for some than for others, but sin’s disruptive tendrils extend into every inch of this world and its inhabitants. As mentioned before, grief is not inherently selfish, but it does present opportunity for selfish thoughts and actions. Because of the nature of suffering and our natural human response to it, grief tends to turn us inward. That inward gaze is not wrong; God intends for suffering to lead us to reevaluate ourselves in light of His truth (James 1:5). The danger is that, if we are not vigilant, that inward gaze can turn selfish.

Sin’s disruptive tendrils extend into every inch of this world and its inhabitants.

One of Scripture’s key passages dealing with the believer’s response to suffering is 2 Corinthians 1:3-11; this passage makes it clear that, instead of making them selfish, the experience of grief should lead believers to serve others. Here, the Apostle Paul tells the church in Corinth that God – the source of all comfort – comforts us in trials so that we can in turn offer that same comfort to others. In the context, Paul is speaking of how his sufferings as an Apostle have led to the comfort of the Corinthians, for his preaching ministry fraught with suffering brought about their initial conversion as well as their sanctification through subsequent trials.

The principle is that suffering equips followers of Christ to be better servants. No better example exists than that of our Lord who, being equal with, God became a servant to redeem His fallen images through the ignoble death of a criminal (Phil. 2:5-9); who, on the very night of His betrayal by his friend, debased Himself by washing that betrayer’s feet (John 13:1-5); who, in the agony of his physical body during his torturous execution and the incomparable spiritual torment as God’s wrath was poured out upon Him as He bore the sins of all mankind, took time to see to his mother’s care after His death (John 19:26-27). “Let this mind be in you” (Phil. 2:5) – Don’t waste your grief; use it to serve others.

God will make everything okay

But there is hope. The comfort we are commanded to share with others is not a wishy-washy, emotional well-wishing; it is shared confidence in our good God’s sovereign control over suffering, death, and sin.

First, our Savior is present with us in all our trials, both to encourage us (2 Cor. 1:3-4) and to use the fire to sanctify us (Jas. 1:2-4). Our labor has eternal significance (Rom. 8:18), and it will bring about praise from our Lord (1 Cor. 4:5). Suffering exists because of sin, but God in His sovereignty can use that suffering to bring about His good plan (Rom. 8:28). We serve the same Yahweh that Joseph came to know, who was present with Him in all of the injustice he endured, about which Joseph concluded near the end of His days: “ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive” (Gen. 50:20).

Suffering exists because sin exists, but God will one day do away with sin.

Second, our suffering is temporary; this “light affliction” is “momentary” when seen from the perspective of eternity (2 Cor. 4:17-18). Suffering exists because sin exists, but God will one day do away with sin. In His time, the Savior of our souls – our Lord, Jesus Christ – will not only redeem our physical bodies (1 Cor. 15:50-55), but also the very earth itself; He will remove all trace of sin’s taint from it (Rom. 8:20-21). After the Deceiver is finally dealt with, the new heaven and the new earth will be the perfect, eternal home of every believer, where “the dwelling place of God is with men” (Rev. 21:3).

This is the truth to which Paul refers when he tells the church at Thessalonica, “comfort one another with these words” (1 Thess. 4:18), and it is the belief (faith) and confidence (hope) in these truths that result in a godly attitude (joy), which evidences itself in service to others (love), and when all of these are present in the life of a believer, he is truly whole (peace).