May is usually a bittersweet month for us in the Kendall family. Although new life is apparent everywhere we can't help but remember that it is the month that our baby, Megan beat us all into heaven! So we remember and let ourselves take time to reflect and grieve. It is healthy though painful.
Gary and I are also sharing the message this weekend at Indian Creek, What Keeps You Up at Night...Grief? Since I didn't share on Mother's Day as has been my joy the last several years I missed the time and volunteered to share. So we would appreciate your prayers that we may offer hope, help and healing through the comfort that we have received from Christ Himself.
I also composed the Go Deeper section of our worship folder. I have attached it so that you might benefit. The only reason we can share and offer hope and help is through Jesus. Our prayer is that all who read and hear this message and the one on Sunday will experience being held in His arms of comfort.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2m1HZekCcc
What Keeps You Up at Night . . . Grief?
Ready
Good Grief! Everyone’s experienced grief on some level. Think about it. Have you ever lost anything? A watch? Important papers? Your wedding ring? A job? A family? A marriage? A loved one to death? Do you remember the feelings of frustration, sorrow, anger and hopelessness? Grief is universal. How do I deal with loss in life? Does anyone else care?
Set
I believe that God cares when we lose things. I pray about finding lost things like keys, rings or my watch often. There are three parables in the Bible about looking for that which is lost: a lost coin, a lost sheep and a lost son. Parables are stories that Jesus used as teaching tools to illustrate a point. Let’s look at the first of these three and see if we can gain any insight about looking for the lost.
Read Luke 15: 3 – 7, Parable of the Lost Sheep
3 So Jesus told them this story: 4 “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it? 5 And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders. 6 When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 In the same way, there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents and returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away!
Read Luke 15: 8 – 9, Parable of the Lost Coin
8 “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and sweep the entire house and search carefully until she finds it? 9 And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors and say, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost coin.’
When we lose something all we can think of is searching for it until we find it. We are preoccupied with it. Earlier this week Luke had misplaced his ipod. He could not even think about resting at night until he retraced his steps and found it. It was all consuming. We both rejoiced when he found his it!
· Think about the last time you lost something.
· How long did you look for it?
· How did you feel? Anxious? Frustrated? Angry? Hopeless? Foolish?
· Did you enlist the help of others in your search?
· Did you pray about it?
· What did you feel when you found it?
· Have you ever lost something you have never recovered?
· Have you ever lost someone precious to you to death, divorce or distance?
What do you do with a loss of some thing or someone you never recover? Grief of that magnitude will not only keep us up all night it will paralyze us during the day. What do you do with that? Where do you go with it?
Go
Read Psalm 6: 6 -9
6 I am worn out from sobbing.
All night I flood my bed with weeping,
drenching it with my tears.
7 My vision is blurred by grief;
my eyes are worn out because of all my enemies.
8 Go away, all you who do evil,
for the Lord has heard my weeping.
9 The Lord has heard my plea;
the Lord will answer my prayer.
On Sunday, May 21, 1989 our youngest daughter, Megan died in her sleep. We were devastated to say the least. Although we knew where she was in and had a firm belief in heaven, she was lost to us here in this life. How do I live with that kind of loss and where do I go with it?
The very next Sunday I found myself in church crying out to God. Where else could I go? I remembered the story of King David when his infant son died. Read II Samuel 12:16 – 20.
God gave us one another to encourage and comfort each another. Read I Thessalonians 5:11, II Corinthians 13:11 and II Corinthians 1:3 – 4. He is the God of all comfort but in times of deep grief we need someone to be His arms of comfort and voice of love. We as followers of Christ, believers in Him, house His Spirit, and become His arms of love. We are His hands of help.
Go Deeper Still
The challenge this week is to tell someone else of your deepest grief and ask them to tell you about theirs. If you are looking for a story to read about someone who lost everything: health, wealth, property and family and survived, read the book of Job. I don’t know that we could go any deeper than that in the experience of grief unless it was the story of An Almighty God, Creator of the universe Who willingly surrendered His One and Only Son to die for those who could not have cared less.
Verse to remember: II Corinthians 1:3 – 4.