Fear And The Goodness Of GodShembull

We began using the #prayforjonah hashtag online so friends could track updates. I then discovered that on the other side of the country there was another Jonah the same age also battling leukemia. The story was the same—but altered. The parallels were unsettling, and then—they were no more. My Jonah lived. The other Jonah died.

The morning I read the news, guilt struck me. Why that Jonah and not mine? Why is that Jonah’s mother selecting music for a funeral while I listen to my Jonah practicing music for a recital? I’ve been laughing while she’s grieved. The pity I felt was deep, and yet I could not weep for her son and rejoice for mine in the same breath. Now when I use that hashtag, I think of the other Jonah. As much as it hurts to think of him at first, I now feel gratitude. I’m thankful for my son’s life. It gives me joy. I cannot stifle that joy out of a false respect for another mother’s grief. It is her grief that makes my joy stand out in higher relief—her grief that keeps me from taking my joy for granted.

This contrast—one man’s joy and another man’s pain—is often a source for far too much false guilt. In any given moment, among our hundreds of Facebook friends, there’s bound to be at least one who is struggling with heartbreak. So, out of sensitivity, we’re told to be careful sharing—or to avoid sharing—reasons we have to celebrate. Tone back the engagement photos because some are dealing with loneliness and divorce. Birth announcements rub salt in the wounds of the childless and bereaved. So we are urged to never do anything but weep with those who weep, and to weep with those who rejoice. Just weep. All the time. For, public rejoicing is tone deaf and insensitive.

I understand the desire to find the right time and place to say something. But we should feel joy. And we should be able to invite others to join us in it. We cannot ignore a friend’s suffering, and we may need to share our news gently, but we do not honor the dead or comfort the suffering by refusing to honor the living or to rejoice in God’s gifts. Godly joy does not gloat over the grieving. But godly grief must not guilt-trip the joyful.

Refusing to rejoice with those who rejoice does nothing to improve our ability to weep with those who weep—it does the opposite. True rejoicing expands and trains our hearts and imaginations to come alongside the grieving—and vice versa. Before I experienced the joy of motherhood, I simply did not have the imaginative experience that would allow me to weep with a grieving mother. My motherly joy is what broadened my soul enough to weep over the loss of that joy. Our sensibilities must mature in order to both grieve and rejoice deeply, wisely, and to the full.