Handling GriefSample

We Will Soon Be Reunited

In one of the greatest paradoxes on earth, joy and sorrow aren’t opposites. In fact, grief is the road that leads to renewed hope — if we let it.

The sooner we let ourselves feel our sorrow, talk about it, and process it, the greater our likelihood of emerging from the shadows with our integrity intact and our faith more resilient. 

In our darkest moments, we can live our life filled with resentment, stomping the ground and shaking our fists at God in a heated rage. Or, we can put our faith in the Lord’s control over life and death. We have the assurance that God is with us. We can put our trust in the words of Jesus who said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the world.”

The raising of Lazarus tells the final miracle of seven “miracle stories” in the Gospel of John. He calls them “signs.” Signs point beyond themselves to some other and greater reality. 

Martha and Mary wanted a miracle, and they got their miracle. Their request was granted, their prayer answered. But John tells us it is a sign. And signs point beyond themselves to something else, something more important and real.

We often want a reversal or resuscitation; Christ promises a resurrection. Jesus resuscitates Lazarus, the last and best sign; but Jesus is the resurrection and the life.

Jesus offers something more and better. Not a nice life but a new one. He is the real miracle of the story; he is the final and ultimate answer to prayer. He is the resurrection and the life. Not resuscitation but resurrection. Not reversal but renewal. Jesus defeated sin and death and hell. 

If we believe in him, then we will have life, real, permanent, abundant, substantial, eternal life. If we die, we will still experience that life. But even now we can experience that life because it is bigger than both the life that we know and the death that we dread. 

This is a joy that can only be appreciated by Christians who have lost loved ones who are in Christ. One of the sweet joys of Heaven is not only seeing our Savior face to face, but also being reunited with our brothers and sisters in Christ who have crossed Jordan ahead of us.

1 Thess 4:13-14 says “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.”

We see King David comforted by this truth when his infant son died. He confidently asserted that “He cannot come back to me but I shall go to him” (2 Samuel 12:20-23).

This is the silver lining we must draw our attention to when we are overshadowed by the storm clouds of loss.

Instead of seeing our loved ones as being “dead in the past” – start seeing them as being “fully alive in heaven” – and understand that we will be reunited with them once again in a very short period of time.

Our time on this earth is not even a blink of an eye compared to the eternal time frame that is operating in heaven.

Quote: As I go into a cemetery I like to think of the time when the dead shall rise from their graves. ... Thank God, our friends are not buried; they are only sown! – D.L.Moody

Prayer: Lord, I thank you for the assurance that we will be united with our loved ones soon. Amen