Grief truly is a wonder to behold. Lies we believe until we experience full depth of the grief this world has to bare. Lies of belittling, of end to suffering, of time healing and God giving us only what we can handle. As if we were to handle life on our own. As if the suffering ends here on earth. As if time heals the root of pain.
Time dulls our senses like illegal drugs or alcohol perhaps, dulls the pain. Memories fade. Or suppress to cope.
Grief though, is much like love. As we grow, grief and love go with us. As our world’s expand, so does our love. And knowledge. And grief.
There is no end to grief as there is no end to love. Some may disagree. But I don’t believe real love stops loving. And grief is an extension of my love. Love that is lost. Love that is longing. Love that is broken and wanted. But still love.
I love my family and my friends, my animals and trees and property. I love a good coffee and a good book. Of course this love has different depths and meanings. As does grief.
I love longingly and desperately. I love fiercely and tightly. I love loosely. At times, I’m sure I love suffocatingly. I love confidently. I love boldly. I love until the end. My love expands with new members of the family. It ebbs and flows and shows up as favorite foods or a text or a phone call. It doesn’t often show up as gifts because I am the worst at gift giving. But it shows up in my words or tears. Sometimes with months in between, but still, the love lingers.
At times I must dig deep to find that love. The feeling flutters away, time has dulled but when I sit in the silence, get back to the Lord and his truth, the love, it redeems.
As with grief. It is the same. It is a love with no place to land here on earth. It grows and changes. It’s just below the surface. As with love, we pile things on and push it away. It’s there. Never really fading, we just simply add more to our hearts and lives.
As with love, grief has depths and layers. Different kinds of love and different kind of grief, we hold tightly and loosely and choose joy. Lose friends and grandparents pass away. We bury children and find new places to build our lives. What we want in life is easy, simple, unity, and love. What we find is everyone has a different idea of what this is and how it plays out in the everyday. And sometimes life just isn’t easy. Sometimes (most times) people and feelings and personalities are complicated. Sometimes restoration doesn’t happen. And it hurts so deep. And grief is confusing. It just won’t stop.
Love still lives here. In this humanness, messed up, broken world. It’s just a little twisted with perception and experiences and lack of grace and mercy.
This is it. This is life. It will be painful. It will be messy. I will hurt. You will grieve. You are loved.
These random thoughts on grief and love, they ebb and flow throughout my mind every day. I cannot gather them up and present them with a nice little bow. They are too wild and untamed. I want to fix it all, all the pain. I want to have the answers and I don’t. I want relationships restored and I can’t. I want things back the way they were, but that doesn’t even make sense. What we have though, is hope. Because of True Love, our Savior Jesus Christ.
And the thing is, we over complicate everything. We have an opinion on everything. We want to understand and fix everything.
But the truth is, Jesus just wants us to let go. Of everything. Because all we need is Him. And maybe this grief and this world and this brokenness and pain, is stripping away the excess, so we can see clearly the beauty of living a life for Jesus, no distractions, no idols, just Jesus.
I’m not there yet. I’m so far from it. But at the end of my life, I truly hope this is what people see. A lowly, humble servant, just trying to love through life like Jesus. Come, Lord Jesus, come.