Choosing God's Comfort in Grief
How we choose to process grief reveals where we place our faith in real and practical terms.
I've been mulling over a chance encounter with an acquaintance and the ensuing conversation about recent losses of those closest to us. I see it as a lens into how Christian’s process life events or even day-to-day circumstances differently. This matters because how we choose to process reveals where we place our faith in real and practical terms.
The depth of sorrow we feel when a loved one steps into heaven is real and full of pain, yet can also be peaceful and even beautiful. So many things come to mind, good and bad. Shared joys, tenderness, victories, and love, all good, are intertwined with sadness, memories of lost opportunities, emptiness, and a sense of being alone against our will. These are inescapable realities that we must face in the moment. How we choose to face them influences attitudes, responses, and our path forward.
It is tempting to blame everything bad that happens to us and those we love on the source of all evil, or a wrongness we feel gripping the world. It is tempting, but it signals a wavering faith and lack of mature understanding. As believers, we are to know Truth and depend upon it as our source and comforter. Truth tells us that we are in the Lord, who resides in God, resulting in our habitation in God through the virtue of our relationship with the Lord.1 That is a position of strength, comfort, love, power, and provision, yet we sometimes look elsewhere in times of greatest need.
God's power and heart for us are there for us to dwell on, appropriate and make our own, especially in this life moment. But we do not always do that, do we? Why not? There are, I believe, two primary reasons this moment causes some to turn from their faith. First, when we fail to focus on our identity and position in Christ. Second, in turning from these, we look to worldly provision for healing and solace, a world that is ruled by the Prince of the World,2 whose authority is temporary.3 When we choose to dwell on the world's provision and ways in this moment, we declare its power to be greater than God's. It is not, of course.
As is so often the case, the difference between desolation and hope, between heartbreak and joy, is found in where we choose to seek comfort. God's presence and peace is beyond anything this world can offer. It is there for the asking. We have an opportunity to turn and face him, to look into his loving eyes and feel his comfort, to know how truly and deeply he cares for us, to weep in his arms ... and to share in the joy of the one who is now with him completely. This brings a different perspective, appreciation, and source. This brings comfort.
So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. John 16:22 (ESV)
Shalom
John 17 | ESV.org
Ephesians 6 | ESV.org
John 12 | ESV.org