We Love We Grieve We Grow 3
We Love…We Grieve…We Grow – Part 3
How do I begin to put the pieces of my “shattered” world back together?
“Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and mourned for his son many days. All his sons and daughters came to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. ‘No,’ he said, ‘in mourning will I go down to the grave to my son.’ So his father wept for him.” (Genesis 37: 34 – 35)
“Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died, yet his eyes were not weak nor his strength gone. The Israelites grieved for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days, until the time of mourning was over.” (Deuteronomy 34: 7 – 8)
Joseph was 17 and Jacob’s favorite son. Not only was he dead, all that was left was a shredded, bloodstained tatter of cloth that used to be his ornamented coat. Loss shatters our assumptions about safety and security and many times the loss seems “meaningless”. In John 11:17-44, the sisters understood that Lazarus would rise again, but they couldn’t understand “why” he had to die now! The timing made no sense to them and further it made no sense that Jesus couldn’t have come to keep Lazarus from dying. The “timing” associated with death often makes no sense to us. The same could be said of Stephen’s death at the end of Acts 7. The brothers who buried him and “mourned deeply” for him most surely had to work through their mix of emotions and thoughts regarding his death (Acts 8:1-3). Review the Bible’s description of Stephen in Acts 6 and 7. Those mourning his loss may have been thinking: “Stephen was so young and powerful. His faith was amazing! Everything he touched turned out well and now he’s dead! This is crazy! Just imagine what more he could have accomplished! Why couldn’t Jesus keep him safe?” Loss shatters our assumptions about safety, security and meaning.
Not only must his death have seemed meaningless to them, he died in such a “traumatic” fashion (Acts 7:54-8:1). Trauma adds another layer to grief often making it a more “complicated” process for those who are grieving. Stephen was brutally “murdered”. His death was already hard to take; the brutality of stoning just compounded the tragedy. Sure, the brothers had that certain hope (Hebrews 6:19) in their hearts that Stephen was with Jesus, but even with that certain hope; the hurt, confusion, sadness, and anger associated with the loss would still be tough to handle. They would need time and support to work through it.