Uplifting words

Friends--all our hearts are breaking but I have found some comfort in these words by Kenneth C. Haugk. May this message comfort you also. Love from jess
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Real Christians Really Can Grieve (from 'Journeying through Grief'—Book 2)

I’ve had many grieving Christians tell me they felt guilty for crying or being sad. They mistakenly thought that a person with a strong faith should feel happy if their loved one had died and gone to heaven. I’ve also had pastors confide to me that they were afraid to express their own grief because they thought it would set a bad example for their congregation members. It makes me sad whenever I hear these things because grieving people already have a big enough burden to bear without myths and misconceptions like these making it worse.

Just because you know a loved one is with God doesn’t mean that you can’t hurt—that you don’t hurt. We can believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that our loved ones are with God and yet we can still feel bad. That doesn’t mean that we’re bad Christians or that we have a weak faith.

Somehow we Christians seem to ignore or forget what Jesus did at the grave of his dear departed friend Lazarus. It’s the shortest verse in the Bible, John 11:35: “Jesus wept.” Those two words mean everything when it comes to grief. Jesus wept. His friend died, and he cried. Two verses earlier it says Jesus was “deeply moved in spirit and troubled.” Jesus isn’t just a little upset here. His emotions are in turmoil. He is deeply distressed over the death of his friend. Jesus showed very real, very human emotions in his grief. In doing so, he gave us permission to be human in our grief, too.

In a sense, grieving is actually a show of faith. We are trusting God to hold us in our most vulnerable time, when our feelings are raw, our life is in pieces, and our strength is gone. If that isn’t faith, I’m not sure what is.