Theology of Suffering
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The Cyclical Nature of Grief
I find my heart is in a very sensitive space these days. Next week will close out 4 years now without Ezra. As I stepped into September, I felt a heaviness settling in; a sense of tender grief stirring once again. Grief is strange because in many ways, not only do you grieve what was… Continue reading
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Healing Is A Process
The end of this month, September 29, will mark the close of four years now without Ezra. In many ways, four years feels accurate. In other ways, it feels surreal, like it’s been half that time. I wrote last week about what healing has looked like for me; that although it has no metric, there… Continue reading
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There Is No Metric for Healing
After my post last week about my own healing which came rather quietly, I had someone reach out and ask what healing has looked like for me. I appreciated the question. It provided the opportunity for some introspection; what does it mean to actually heal after loss? It’s challenging to consider because healing doesn’t always… Continue reading
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Healing Came Quietly
When we first lost our 18 year old son to cancer, the grief was so acute, so intense, I was unsure I would ever heal. I could not fathom a day when the pain did not feel crushing. I could not grasp a time would come where I did not feel overwhelmed with sorrow. Those… Continue reading
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We Raise Them to Leave
We leave today to drop our middle-born son off at college. Although we have launched kids before him, there is a tender grief that arrives with each exit; a sort of reckoning that comes with the end of an era. When I first began having children, I did not consider the goal of mothering was… Continue reading
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When God’s Plans Seem Inconsistent With His Promises
I recently interacted with someone who has walked away from their faith. They have endured a long season of pain and suffering and the God they thought they knew did not respond how they had hoped. This time of testing and their disappointment over what God allowed has caused their heart toward him to harden.… Continue reading
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Drought Training
I love when God gives us real life pictures of how he often interacts with his children, training us in dependence and resilience. While there is not always a one-to-one correlation in every aspect, there are things we can glean from nature that remind us that we have a good Father, at work in our… Continue reading
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Wrestling with “Your Will Be Done” When the Outcome Is Not What We Hoped
There is a very real tension that comes within the Christian faith when we face times of loss and devastation. The strain comes for many believers on the road that travels from a head that knows what obedience is to a heart that feels deeply hurt by the outcome. We see the example of Christ;… Continue reading
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When Grief Becomes Identity
I had someone recently ask, “Do you think grief can become an idol?” My gut reaction was, “Yes, of course!” As Calvin stated, our hearts are idol factories. As I have chewed on this question over the last several days, I actually think the answer is much more layered. Long before grief becomes an idol,… Continue reading
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I Thought Healing Would Look Different
Had someone asked me 4 years ago, “how long do you think you could write about grief?” I imagine my answer would have been maybe for a year or two. I had no category for how long it takes to work through the layers of pain and loss. I had no concept of the difficult… Continue reading