I’ve been thinking a lot about this… Of all the ways for God the Father to prove His Lordship, why did He choose to lose His son to the grave?
He could have done it a million other ways, yet He chose the most painful, the most devastating, the most earth-shattering way. Why?
Since losing my dad, I’ve experienced scenarios that brought me right back to death’s door, whether it be in ICU with a family I know, at a hospice bedside, or over the phone with someone whose world has just been shattered by the loss of the one their heart loved.
As I ponder the grave and the ruinousness of death, I believe God allowed Jesus to experience death because it’s the hardest thing we wrestle with on earth. He did it so He could proclaim this: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39) to our weary souls.
I realize, after experiencing and facing my grief, God in His mercy has given me opportunities to step into several friends grief. In every situation, two things take place. The first is my heart breaks all over again. The second, words always fail.
It’s a horrible and humbling place to be welcomed into someone’s pain. Because you wish with everything in you that you could take their pain away, you can’t. And you know what an arduous journey awaits them, and it hurts to see another life altered by death. But what you can do is enter into that journey with them. Whether it be sitting with them in shock, crying with them, or being their sounding board when their anger and frustration comes flying out.
This brings me back to the grave — I couldn’t see it when I lost my dad, but I am reminded of this (again) now. Maybe the reason it felt like I couldn’t hear God speak during those horribly dark days was that He was sitting with me in my pain. And looking back, I’ve seen His footprints beside me through each year since the accident.
So if you’ve lost someone, know that God may be silent because He’s weeping with us. He knows that pain better than anyone. His grief has become our safe harbor, our refuge when it seems like no one else understands the loss. He does… and He conquered it…
As Elisabeth Elliot once said: “Of one thing, I am perfectly sure: God’s story never ends with ashes.”
And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross! Philippians 2:8
On this Good Friday, I hope you take a moment to listen to this song: Grave, by Cochren & Co.
