Good Grief

May 3, 2024 | by Anthony Wade

When you saw the title of today’s devotion, did you think of Charlie Brown? Well, I apologize in advance if you were hoping to take a trip down memory lane with Snoopy and his human, because this isn’t about a cartoon character today. Instead, I would like to examine God’s strategy for us to navigate the difficult times of sorrow in our lives. If you’ve ever dealt with grief, I pray this ministers to you.

The first thing I would like to do is set a few expectations for the purpose of today’s topic. I believe that there is an unhealthy view of grief and sorrow in some Christian circles today. While these two things can be used by the enemy to keep us bound and ineffective in our Kingdom assignment, they are not inherently evil. They are simply emotions that are a part of our life here on earth. It isn’t a sin to grieve, and it isn’t a sin to be sorrowful. In fact, these emotions are no different than anger. Ultimately, the issue boils down to what we do with these emotions. As I have said many times, God purposed for us to have emotions; He never intended for emotions to have us!

If you have been taught that “grief and sorrow are sinful and of the devil”, let me further comfort you and assure you that they are not. Ephesians 4:30 says the Holy Spirit can be grieved, and Isaiah 53:3 says Jesus was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. I don’t know any believer who would ever say or think that Jesus or the Holy Spirit would commit a sin, yet they think grief and sorrow are sins in their own lives. Don’t be fooled into thinking Jesus was a robot. He wept over Jerusalem in Luke 19:41 and He wept sorrowfully over His friend, Lazarus, in John 11:35-36. While we’re at it, Hebrews 5:7 says that part of Jesus’ experience in the flesh was praying “with vehement cries and tears” in Gethsemane. It’s no wonder that Hebrews 4:15 declares that He is our High Priest who sympathizes with how we feel.

I know that I quoted a lot of verses in that last paragraph, but I genuinely want you to see that you’re in good company and need not feel any shame or guilt over your feelings of grief or sorrow. Jesus cried and He gets it when you do, too. You see, His tears were way more than a sign of emotionalism or shallow sentimentality. They were a genuine outflow of His tremendous care for His fellow man, and I believe we can learn something from this for the times we feel similar pain in our own lives.

Let’s consider the death of a loved one for a moment. This painful event is the main occasion the enemy will use as a launchpad for his attack against your soul. In 1 Thessalonians 4:13, Paul said, “I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep (physically died), lest you sorrow as others who have no hope.” He’s instructing the believer here to not experience sorrow like others who have no hope. Why? Because we do have hope and can grieve differently than the world!

Let’s look at an example in the Old Testament. In Biblical typology, Egypt is a type of the world and Israel is a type of the church. When Jacob died, the Egyptians mourned for 70 days (Genesis 50:3), and when Moses died, Israel mourned for 30 days (Deuteronomy 34:8). I believe God used this as an example to show us that we believers can mourn less than half the time that the world does. Not only that, but Paul says that when we do grieve, we grieve in hope, expecting a brighter future and a glad reunion day. If your loved one is a believer, they are not lost for we know where they are! I like to say that they are not gone, they have just moved from our present into our future. Be comforted with that today.

Again, the emotions of grief and sorrow aren’t the issue. The issue is how you’ll choose to handle them. Will you allow them to control you, or will you control them and continue to live by faith? If you’ll choose to live by faith and access God’s grace each step of the way, you’ll truly experience good grief.

Pastor Anthony