Grief is something we all have or will feel at some point in our lives. It might be over the death of a loved one, of a beloved pet, or maybe that test you didn’t study for and made an F. Whatever the issue, grief will come to you and me. And when it does, how we deal with it is all important. If we ignore it, battle through it, or act as if it will just go away, it will make us sick, always spiritually and quite often physically.
The hardest part of grief, it seems to me, is the anger. My mother, father, and brother all died within a 14 month period, so I truly do understand grief. I also understand the anger. In a sermon I read recently, the point of the sermon was that we can rant and rave at God all we want and that it is okay. The scripture was about Lazarus. That story is interesting for what is not said, that Mary and Martha were hurt and angry at Jesus. They told him if he had been there none of this would have happened.
When you are in the heart of the storm of grief and loss, if you are like me the first thought is “God if you were really here none of this would have happened”! And we are angry. But who are we really angry at? Most therapeutic discussions talk about being angry at the one who died, for dying. And that is most certainly the case much of the time. But, I will give you another point to consider. We are equally angry at the dead, God…..and ourselves.
How can I say that? Think of this, we often grieve over silly things like our wrecked new car, a lost job, a lost love, and so much more. It is not that those things don’t matter it is just that grieving over things means we had an attachment to them that may not have been so healthy. We are mad at ourselves for losing. So trust me, when my family all died in a 14 month period, I felt cheated, robbed and, well, angry. I found that inside myself, all of the hurt and anger of a lifetime came boiling up. Most of all because I had believed for so long that I was never good enough, that I could have done more to relay my love or understanding or caring but never did.
There is good news, God lets us get really angry. God lets us cry out in anger and hurt to God. In the eye of the storm, that “still, small voice” still speaks to us. It says, “I know it hurts my child. I will always be in these moments with you. You are not responsible or to blame. You are not alone. You have always been good enough for me. Always.
TMM