Grief (noun): deep sorrow, especially that caused by someone’s death. Synonyms: anguish, woe, heartbreak, mourning
Grief is the soul’s reminder of a love once shared. Grief validates that the love was real, is real, and continues on through the Holy Spirit until we can be reunited in the Heavenly realms.
The shortest scripture in the Bible, found in John 11:35, is just two words:
JESUS WEPT
He knows my pain. Even though Jesus knew his friend Lazarus was going to die, that knowledge didn’t keep Jesus from weeping. Even though Jesus knew he would raise Lazarus from the dead, that didn’t keep him from weeping either. Knowing a death is coming, and knowing a happy ending is coming, doesn’t stop the grief from coming.
Jesus not only wept, but was “deeply moved in Spirit” and “troubled” (John 11:33)
Jesus experienced real, human emotions. He can care for us with great compassion because of this.
Grief is a fickle friend. She sometimes appears as a surging tidal wave taking my breath away, and other times as a gentle lapping wave on the shoreline – an almost comforting reminder of the love once shared. Grief can come on so suddenly, I clutch my heart because it feels as if it is breaking. But it also sneaks up quietly, emerging as a silent stream of tears running down my face. Grief escapes as a heavy sigh, a low moan, a quiver in my voice, a flutter in my eyelashes.
Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and body with grief. Psalm 31:9
Grief pulls my head down into my hands with despair and then lifts my chin towards the heaven with hope. Grief brings along all her friends from the past. Each new death adding to the accumulation, yet brand new. The grief morphs into a new energy as the added death absorbs int the previous conglomeration.
And now I learn to adjust to the re-created grief, re-learn how to go through each day with this grief’s presence, carrying her with me wherever I go. She becomes a part of me.
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance. Ecclesiastes 3:1-4
Grief slows down time, or speeds it up, or maybe just distorts my perception of time. In times of grief, I can be slow to make decisions, often find myself “spacing out” or having long episodes of time “getting away” from me as I drift into memories. Oh, the ups and downs of grief! In one moment, grief creates a bleak dullness all around me. Dismal. No color, no taste, no smell. Then in a flash, she provides sharpness, vitality, and brightness to an ordinary moment.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Matthew 5:4
Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy. John 16:22
It is said that grief is “love with nowhere to go”. So, perhaps, is being overcome with grief to be overcome with love?
And maybe that is the real reason Jesus wept – he was overcome with love. For his deceased friend and for the sisters who grieved their brother.
Jesus wept. Jesus loves.
Me too.