Loss

Scriptures: Lamentations 3:19-26, Revelation 21:4

MOURNING

How do you process pain or loss? Some of us just sit in it and wallow in our sadness. Some channel it into a creative outlet, creating songs or art that are birthed out of pain. Some of us push it down, act like everything’s fine, and try to avoid it. But, wherever you fall on the “dealing with pain” chart, you need to know that it’s perfectly fine to mourn…to feel the pain of loss deeply and to let yourself process it. We tend to not be great at that as a culture, but we can learn by looking at others.

The Old Testament Prophet, Jeremiah, was one of the greatest mourners in history. He had the unfortunate assignment of giving the people of Israel their final warning that turning away from God was going to result in the destruction of their homeland, and when they didn’t listen, he had to watch it all go down. Just try to imagine standing in your home town and watching it be destroyed, burned to the ground, and then all your fellow citizens being marched off as slaves…it’s a level of devastation that’s hard to wrap your head around. And it’s in the aftermath of that national tragedy that Jeremiah writes the book Lamentations. 

What I hope you’ll see today is the honesty that Jeremiah has when talking to God. He lays it all out there…he is deeply upset, he’s mad at his countrymen, he’s mad at himself, he’s sad that this event happened in the first place. He doesn’t try to mask it, he doesn’t try to act like he understands it…he just sits in front of God and feels all the feels. And you know what, God is perfectly fine with that. In fact, he wants to have that sort of deeply personal relationship with each of us, where we know we can say anything to him and he won’t be offended or put off by it. 

So, whatever you’re dealing with right now – whatever loss has crashed into your world unexpectedly – don’t run from those feelings. Just go to God with everything swirling around in your heart and your head, and let him know that you just don’t get it. As you do that, I’m confident you’ll discover what Jeremiah was reminded of at the end of the passage you’re about to read…that God is still God, that he loves us no matter what is going on around us, and that he is very, very good! And finally, a day is coming when God will get rid of all pain, once and for all.  

Scriptures: 1 Peter 5:6-11, Psalms 13

BLAMING GOD

When something goes wrong, humans have this natural tendency to want to blame someone. It frightens us to think about the seemingly random and uncontrollable nature of tragedy, and so we try to find someone to direct our anger and frustration at. Unfortunately, God ends up on the receiving end of that all too often. And honestly, it’s easy to make that leap. “If God is really all-powerful, then surely he could have stopped this,” we think to ourselves. And while God is all-powerful, who’s to blame for our pain and loss is much more nuanced than that.

While entire books have been written on what I’m going to put in a paragraph here, the very short answer is that in God’s all-powerful nature, he created human beings to have the capacity for a loving relationship with him. For that love to be real, we had to have the ability to choose whether or not we wanted a relationship in the first place. And where there’s choice, you have the potential for sin. And where there’s sin, you’ll always find pain. For God to use his all-powerful nature to stop whatever tragedy we’re facing would require removing choice from the equation, and that would remove real love. 

Okay, I know that’s a dense paragraph up there, so let me try to make it super practical for today. I know you’re hurting – God knows you’re hurting, and he hates it when we hurt. But, to blame God for your pain and loss will only drive you further from him, which will inevitably amplify your pain. It’s one of Satan’s greatest tricks…taking someone who’s already in pain and desperately needs God, and convincing them to run away from him. It’s like convincing a dehydrated person that water is bad for them…it’s just cruel. So, while we’ve already talked about mourning and laying all your pain before God, make sure you do that with the realization that God is on your side and he wants to help you through this.  

Scriptures: Psalms 8:3-4, James 1:17

FEELING CHEATED 

I don’t want to assume anything about where you’re at, but I know that some of you right now are feeling cheated. There was something you had planned, some way you thought this year was going to pan out, and that just disappeared. It wasn’t your fault, there was nothing you could do, but that dream is now dead. I’ve been there and I get it…but what do we do now?

We’ve already talked about the pain of loss and how it’s a good thing to let yourself feel that for a while. But, sometimes we also need a shift in perspective, and that’s what our reading is going to do for us today. You see, as much as we may not want to hear it, we were never entitled to have the experience or the plan we were expecting. It may be a good thing, you may have worked really hard to get there, but it was still never a guarantee. So often we like to look at God as some sort of happiness genie…surely, he wants me to be happy, right? So, if something suddenly comes in and takes away that potential source of happiness, then what in the world is God doing?

God loves you (more than you can even understand) and he absolutely wants what’s best for you. But, God’s top priority is not your happiness. He wants you to have joy (different from happiness), and he wants you to be closer to him, to look more like Jesus, and to ultimately lead other people to knowing him as well. Getting everything we want and expect to happen doesn’t necessarily lead to those more important outcomes. 

Okay, but what do we do with all that? Today, I want to challenge you to pause for a moment as you read these passages and take a fresh look at who God is and who we are. God is all good, all powerful, all knowing, and is completely perfect and holy. Comparatively, we are small, not all that good, and completely imperfect. With that in mind, we don’t actually deserve much of anything from God. The fact that we get anyof the blessings that are in our lives is a miracle and a powerful display of God’s goodness and grace. So, while it’s okay to be sad about something you’ve lost, let’s continue to be aware that we have so much to thank God for anyway. We don’t deserve any of it, but God has still filled our lives with good things.  

Scriptures: Acts 16:25-30, 1 Peter 3:15

OUTWARD FOCUS

The Apostle Paul was extremely familiar with loss, pain, and suffering. Really, his life from the time he met Jesus until his death was pretty intense. Yet, as you read his writings (many of the books in the New Testament) and read about his life, he is filled with joy. He never gives up hope, and he never swerves from his God-given mission to spread the message of Jesus as far around the world as he possibly can. 

Case in point: the story you’re about to read. To set the scene, Paul and his buddy, Silas, had been arrested, beaten, and thrown in prison. And what crime did they commit? They had set a helpless slave girl free from a demon that had been tormenting her…I know, bad dudes, right? Well, as you’ll see, after these guys had been severely beaten and shackled to a wall in the dark pit of a dungeon, they began praying and singing to God. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure my first reaction would be to pity myself and pout about how unfair everything is. But, Paul maintains his hope and his focus on Jesus. Then, when God supernaturally intervenes to set all the prisoners free (a massive earthquake that opens all the cell doors), Paul still thinks of other people. He stays put so that the jailer will not get in trouble (that’s why the jailer was about to kill himself in the story…that would be his punishment for letting the prisoners escape). Paul maintains his focus on others, and I believe that is one of the keys to his ability to stay joyful despite experiencing loss after loss.

For you and I, when we’re facing a time of loss, where does our focus go? If we’re honest, our natural tendency is to turn inward. We focus on our pain, our feelings, how this isn’t fair for us. And while we’ve discussed how it’s more than appropriate (and even healthy) to mourn and to feel sadness, we can’t stay stuck there. Once we’ve laid our hearts before God, it’s time to shift our focus back to others. Who do you know who is also struggling with loss right now? How might God use you to make a difference in the lives of the people around you? When we keep our eyes off of ourselves, we are able to live with the kind of unwavering hope and joy we see in the life of Paul. And I don’t know about you, but that’s absolutely the kind of life I want to live. 

Scriptures: Romans 8:28, James 1:2-4

FIND THE GOOD

Let me be honest with you: I envy natural optimists. You know those people who seem to be able to find a silver lining to every cloud…their brains just seem to lock-in on whatever shred of positivity can be found in any situation and that’s suddenly all they can see? I wish I was one of them…but I’m not. The good news is that no matter where you would place yourself on the optimist-pessimist spectrum, we can all have hope because of the promises of God.

And listen, I’m not talking about just forcing yourself to try and smile and find something to be happy about. I’m talking about trusting that God is always true to his word, and there will be some kind of good that comes out of any situation (Romans 8:28). It won’t always be the specific good we might hope for, but there will be something that works in our favor. The trick for us in the middle of a tough situation is trying to see it when we can’t see the end of our trial yet. A lot of times we don’t see the good that God did on our behalf until we’re looking back on a loss with the perspective of time on our side.

So, as we wrap this 5-day study on loss, I want to give you two challenges to work on as you wrestle through pain and disappointment. First, I want you to keep looking for the good in the middle of your pain. Look for any glimmers of hope God has given you, any little improvement or unexpected benefits you can see even while your challenge is still going on. Honestly, you may even be able to see what good mightcome out of a situation, and even that can provide some much-needed hope and perspective. 

Second, I want you to take the passage from James you’re about to read and memorize it. If nothing else, one of the good things God does in our lives through virtually every trial we face is that we get stronger. Our faith is strengthened, we have more grit and resilience, and we are better people overall for having weathered the storm. When you feel tempted to despair or focus on all the unknown “why’s” of your situation, remind yourself of James 1:2-4 and the fact that God is making you stronger every moment of your struggle. Your loss is not the end…it’s just a chapter in a long story that God is writing in your life.