Thanks for joining us again on Struggling Well. It's a great reminder this week for us why We titled this struggling well because we believe we all do struggle and different things bring on that struggle and one of the things is the loss of somebody you care deeply about and that was true for us in our life this past week lost a dear friend to his battle with cancer and Greg was a friend just I worked with him some but it's been hard cuz while he had stage four cancer I think the suddeness of his death was really kind of overwhelming moment has hit our community and we realize that some of you are listening are not from our Charlotte community, but we've all probably experienced the loss of someone we care deeply about.
yeah, death visits us all and we decided that we wanted to do this extra podcast because of that reason that death and grief we all experience it in different ways. Sometimes it is an actual death but grief also hits in different types of losses. But I think for the two of us. because of the love in particular that Jimmy had for Greg and we love their family and the suddenness with which he passed away. It has caused us to think about how we struggle through that. how do we do that? Well, that seems like an oxymoron to me. When somebody dies, how do you struggle well through that? both Jimmy and I have lost our parents. And I don't even like that phrase, you know? lost my parents like I misplaced them. all four of them passed away. We have been at the bedside of numerous people as they have taken their last breath. Jimmy has done hundreds of funerals. We've been with families as they have grieved decisions about taking somebody off of life support. we've been there after a tragic accident and you have too. Maybe it's your family member or maybe you're in ministry as well. Well, or maybe you've experienced grief that is just been overwhelming. And so we just want to talk about it a little bit. Let me say this first and foremost. Jimmy and I are not experts on grief. We've experienced it, but that doesn't make us experts. We just want to bring it up. We want to bring it out in the open. because grief is hard and each of us experience it uniquely because we're unique. made. Therefore, the two of us could experience the same situation and we will respond to it or react to it differently.
Yeah. And if struggling well is an oxymoron, as you said, here's the other part of it for me. As a Christ follower, is there a difference? So, can you grieve and at the same time have peace?
Those two things seem mutually exclusive. And yet in scripture and in the life of our savior Jesus, they were tied together so often. I think about when he stood by the grave of Lazarus and wept.
Yeah.
the grief pouring out. later on he's getting ready to go to the cross and leave his disciples and they're gathered together that night before he or the night he is betrayed and arrested. And he says this in John 14 27. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled. Let them neither be afraid.
Yeah.
And Jesus brings the realities of troubled hearts, fearful hearts, grief, and peace
in together. And that's what is striking to me even in the situation that we're walking through and many who are listening have walked through in their own lives. How do you how do you bring those two things? together.
Well, I think that's really hard, but I'm glad that scripture is so clear about this one particular area. I mean, I'm looking at the Psalms, and you all know I love the Psalms, but in Psalm 31, the psalmist is writing, "Be gracious to me, oh Lord, for I am in distress. My eye is wasted from grief. My soul and my body also, for my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing. My strength fails because of my iniquity." And in his case, he's grieving over sin. And my b bones waste away. That language right there allows me to go to that place where I can say I am wasted by grief. And I think when you know when you brought up Jesus sorrow at Lazarus tomb because death was not the option in the beginning in the garden. We were going to live with him forever,
right?
And so while Jesus is taken away through his death on the cross and pay for our penalty of sin. The sting of eternal death is taken away. We still experience the sting of separation here. And so, but scripture speaks to all sorts of places in the Psalms, in the Old Testament, e everywhere in the New Testament. Jesus speaks of it in the Gospels. Paul speaks of it as well in his letters that our grief is not a waste, but God does something through it. And you know, I love where it says, of course I don't have it in front of me right now. Not doing well putting sentences together this week, but where it says that he bottles our tears. I mean, that's I don't think that's just a metaphor. Maybe it is, but is it more than that? That every time we shed a tear, it's important to God. he knows when a sparrow falls. So, he knew that Greg was falling and dying.
Yeah. And what you just said too, Suzi, is a word that I think has to be kept at our forefront, and that's the word eternity. you if we're going to find the hope that the scripture promises, the peace that is ultimately there, it comes because we can't separate eternity from the life we're living here. And eternity is mine. Eternity is ours. Eternity is anybody's who puts their faith and trust in Christ, they're promised eternity.
Well, if you take eternity away, then they're really is nothing to place my hope in.
Yeah.
It's because he conquered sin and death and he resurrected,
he rose again, he's alive. And the same will be true for us if we know Christ as our savior. And that's where for me the potential of even feeling any kind of peace gets tied to that hope
that's there.
Yeah. And we know in our situation here with our friend Greg that without a doubt he took his last breath here. I don't mean to sound corny, but he took his next breath in eternity and he's good. It's the rest of us, his wife and his kids that are wrestling with his absence. And that makes me think about how we all deal with one another in grief. And by virtue of the long tenure we had at church, we saw a lot of grief exposed. I've also had just an incredible privilege not based on any qualification, but for about a year, I met with some young widows who had lost their spouse, their fiance in just horrific ways. And listening to them each express their story and watching them as they navigated through grief was fascinating. And one of the key things that came out of it for me was first of all, grief does not have a time limit. I remember reading a book years ago, the seven stages of grief or something like that by some psychiatrist and she said I think there were six stages of grief and the last one you know is like they grieve for about eight weeks it turns from anger to etc and I'm sure that's very true but after 8 weeks is it over I mean it's like so now they turn to acceptance so then now it's like okay now I get on with my life it doesn't work that way
and watching these women these young women navigate some had been had been widowed for a couple of years and one girl in particular was a widow for longer and had remarried and loved her the husband that God brought to her, but she still grieved the husband she lost.
Yeah.
And so when we're dealing with each other, we sometimes we're not very patient with the way someone grieavves.
Yeah. And I think that there's a sense that people feel all kinds of guilt Oh, I didn't get to say this to him. I didn't get to say that to her. I was planning to go to see her. I was planning to go to see him and I and then they passed away. And one of the things that I'm reminded of every time we walk through situations like this is don't ever take for granted that you've got another day.
And if you have something that you want to say, if you want to tell somebody you love them, if you want to tell somebody what they mean to you, do it now. Don't wait and then regret that you didn't have the opportunity. to do that. I think that's an important part of the process as you walk through that ripping because that's what death is. It's a ripping.
Yeah.
And that's why again I come back to it. It's why eternity is so important. for Greg's family, there was a ripping. for those of us who are his friends, there's a ripping, but there's also going to be a reuniting if we know Christ as our savior.
Yeah.
So, and I forget who it was. It was Moody Lewis. I don't know one of them. who said, "When you hear rumors of my death, they're just not true. I'm more fully alive now than ever."
And that's the hope of eternity. And I think that's where Jesus can make the statement, I leave you my peace.
Yeah. But I also, you know me, I like to come down to street level.
Yes, you do.
Like I act like I'm all street savvy. No, I'm not. Well, I'm from New Jersey, so that does help. But if we come down to street level and we're with people that have experienced a loss. And all loss to me is traumatic at any age, any time. My parents passed away at 92 and I had people saying to me, "Oh, well, at least they lived a full life." Well, yeah, they did, but I wasn't ready for my dad to go at 92. I wished he could have lived on and on. but there are some things that we have heard through the day through the years about when somebody passes like, God needed another angel, so that's why your child died. or you know all the those little trivial things that people say or they're afraid to say the name of the person and bring it up because they're they don't want that person to cry and yet from what we've experienced with our own parents is when somebody comes to us with a memory about your mom let's say Jimmy or your dad or you know friends that we've lost I want to hear their name I don't I mean I don't want you to pretend they didn't exist.
Yeah. No that's true. And so all of that rambling from us today in the midst of the grief that we're going through right now is to say that as a believer, as a follower of Jesus, you can find peace and you can find hope because of what Christ has done for us. That may not be what's at the forefront of your mind, but it has to be the bedrock that you anchor to
and that's where the hope is found and that's where the peace is found. That verse that I read, coach was a I just say he's a coach. He was a baseball coach. for many, many years. And at our the field that he coached at for 30 years in the cement wall behind home plate is John 14:27.
And long before he ever knew he was sick, long before any of this was a reality, it was about the peace that God can give in the midst of it. And so we hope and pray today if you're in the midst of loss, maybe it's a different kind of loss, but if you're in the midst of loss, that you can find peace that anchors your heart. in the midst of the grief that you have.