The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me
to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores
my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His names sake. Yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil;
for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. (Psalm
23:1-4)
For those of us who have read the Bible, we know it has a happy ending. You
can be assured, reading through chapters like 1 Corinthians 15, that
when our loved one has accepted the Lord and then leaves this world, theyve
gone to be with Him and are in His joy. The Bible is deep and
profound, leading us to understand through His Word, what we cannot otherwise
know. The Lord is with us when we trust in Him, and whatever happens in life or
in death, we will be with Him forever. He helps us understand that when we
walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
He is indeed with you and me. And that goes for our loved ones, as well.
Yet, as Paul, in Gods Word reveals, we have what is called an old man, or perhaps the old woman, which was our
nature before we trusted in the Lord. In some places it is called the old nature. But thanks be to God, when we give our
hearts and lives to Christ, He gives us a new nature
that takes us in a better direction forever. That old
nature is strong, however, consisting of the attitudes we acquired before we
came to our Lord. The old is with us, but now,
blessedly, the new is here as well (Colossians
3:9-10).
Somewhere inside, the new nature understands and rejoices that our lost loved
one is safe, healed and filled with the joy of the Lord. But the old man, our old way of looking at things tends to be hurt,
bitter and depressed at any loss. Are we somehow sinners because we mourn our
loss? I dont think so. Jesus walked this earth just like we do, and He is
speaking to the Father right this minute, calling out your name and mine, saying
Father, forgive them, for whatever attitudes we
might have that are contrary to Gods best. Our Lord isnt blaming us. He
instead comforts us, heals us, restores us and give us His peace.
Jesus wept for the mourners at the tomb of
Lazarus and He cares for you. In Psalm 56, where it says, When I am afraid, I will trust in Thee, we are told in
Verse 8, that our tears are kept in Gods book
and in His bottle. When we read Matthew 26, we
find that among Jesus last prayers was, If it is
possible, let this cup pass from Me. He understands how we feel when we
think we just cant go on.
Jesus told us to be wise as serpents in
addition to being harmless as doves (Matthew
10:16). Harmless includes those who are poor in spirit those who mourn
and the meek He said, those
who mourn will be comforted (Matthew 5:3-7) and yet we can be so
shattered by the loss of a loved one that we dont feel God's comforting hand.
The Lord reaches out in His Word, through friends, including our Great Friend,
the Holy Spirit of God, and He will touch us through "mercy
ministry," sometimes called grief support;
a help to those who have suffered personal loss.
We need to see that not only are the spiritual gifts given to us today, but
the so-called natural gifts are from the Lord as well. Athleticism is a gift
from God. Intelligence is Gods gift, along with artistic abilities and
eloquence. Some in the church have been suspicious of the psychological
principles involved in grief support because they seem to be from those
apparently natural gifts. But such ideas can be helpful to the Christian who
has fallen into the pit of suffering that we call, grief, including the
depression that can come from great loss.
Do you remember the words of Jesus, when he said about hell, that it would be
a place where the fire is never quenched and the worm
never dies? (Mark 9:44). Like all the others of that time in the area of
the Mediterranean Sea, the Jews were heavily influenced by the psychological
ideas and principles from ancient Greece. The Greeks were surprisingly modern in
many areas. They had sanatoriums for the mentally ill, offering stone tanks that
contained electric eels. Doctors would make a patient grasp one of the eels,
causing some to experience alleviation of their symptoms through this early form
of electroshock therapy. The phrase, the fire is never
quenched and the worm never dies, is actually an ancient Greek
expression for those who suffer deep depression.
Is the Bible for today? Yes it emphatically is 40-years ago or so, it
brought me to Christ. And it reveals incredible understanding of what is
normally thought of as psychology. David, for instance, in places like Psalm
19:12, asked God to heal him of what he called, hidden
faults or secret sins; thoughts we have
and actions we perform while not acknowledging (even to ourselves) that they exist.
In other words, David knew about the subconscious mind thousands of years before
the world even thought about psychologist Sigmund Freud of 100 years ago. Are
psychological principles helpful? They can be, and if they alleviate the
suffering of those who are stuck in grief over the loss of a loved one
wonderful! Thanks be to God! Psychological grief support for suffering is like
the hammer and saw in relation to building a house. Grief support is a useful
tool to restore us from the destruction of great loss.
My major in college at graduation was Religion With
Emphasis in Bible, but I also took 23-units of psychology, perhaps
because the wife of my youth became mentally ill and I remained grief-stricken
because of what had happened I was shocked at losing her to that terrible
disease of the soul. I remember intently reading the case studies in a class
called Abnormal Psychology. The class contained
wonderful, deep examinations of the tragic circumstances life can throw at us,
but to understand, we also need the Lord.
When some individual or a set of ideas helps us through terrible loss, it is
really the Lord who reaches out through them. Mercy
Ministry or Grief Support, is a tool in
the Hand of God. We can thank the messenger, but it is the
Lord (who) is my shepherd, and I shall not want because of Him. He
makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me
beside the still waters, often through people He sends. He (wonderfully) restores my soul
and guides me in the paths of righteousness for His
names sake. Many are helped to find still waters
by people who dont even know they are doing the work and the word of God. And
when we are whole once more, we can boldly say: though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are
with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me (Psalm 23:1-4). Our
Lord has all the mercy ministry, all the grief support we could ever need.
Lord, we have all lost so much in life, and sometimes we have felt we just
cant go on. Help us to see that You are with us and help us to recognize Your
still waters and green pastures when You bring us to them, even if they
seem secular to us. In Jesus Name. Amen.
