Tuesday, December 8, 2009

God's thunderous grief

This last week my grad students have been writing articles on how to encourage someone undergoing various kinds of grief experiences, so I've been thinking a lot about the subject.  One of them wrote that he would remind the grieving person that God is in control, and it occurred to me that in the early stages of grief, I am not sure everyone would find that equally comforting.  Some might be tempted to question whether God was all that loving if he would make such a terrible thing happen... but that is a subject to tackle another day.

For today, I want to think about what has comforted me, and one of those truths that I have found comforting is that God has personally dealt with loss and grief and that he really does understand.  Hebrews 2:18, referring to Jesus, says that "since he himself was tested and has suffered, he is able to help those who are tested." Hebrews 4:15-16 says this: "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.” ( NAS) 

Christ grieved at Lazarus' death, he wept over Jerusalem, as chicks without a hen.  Scripture tells us that we can grieve the Holy Spirit.

And then there's God... I was thinking about the crucifixion and the events of that day and how they showed God's experience of grief at the death of his son.  Remember that Luke 23 tells us that the sun's light failed and darkness came over the land for three hours.  Imagine God's love for his son and his grief...at first a wordless grief so great no light could penetrate it.  How many people who have lost something or someone precious to them have experienced a figurative, if not a literal, darkness?  God himself could bear no light to shine in his pain.

Then, I wonder if what we see next is the anguish of God, his cry so terrible that the atoms and molecules of very earth vibrate into earthquakes.  Luke 23 says the curtain in the sanctuary was split down the middle, from the top to the bottom.  Matthew 27 goes on to describe the earth quaking and rocks, imagine this, rocks splitting, tombs opening and dead people raised and walking about.

Have you ever seen someone hear, for the first time, that their loved one is gone?  A scream, a tortured cry fills the air, words useless, agony expressible only in sound, vibrations of the air, their meaning loud and clear.
So, I wonder if that earthquake, those rocks splitting, that heavy wide curtain tearing from the top are evidences of the pain God experienced, of his inexpressible anguish that his innocent son had to die such a horrible death, that he had to really know what it felt like to be separated from his son...I know that the tearing of the curtain has symbolic meaning as well, but I wonder if there is more here.

So, I find comfort in the knowledge that God, the trinity, the persons of God, understand my grief, and when I cry out to them, they hear in comprehension, and my burden is shared and in some way, borne even by God.  His comfort means something because it is the comfort that comes from having been there, from truly knowing, in some measure, my pain.


Well, perhaps I am way off base, but that is just something I have been wondering.

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