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What Grief Teaches Us

By Vicar Lisa

Depending upon where you are in the grief process, you may not be ready to think about what you can learn because of your grief. Grief is a teacher (a tough one!), and the lessons are difficult. But it is worthwhile to take the lessons with you through the rest of your life. In my final installment from the book, Grieving with Hope: Finding Comfort as You Journey Through Loss I will share some of the lessons presented.

First, God uses suffering to help us grow. We will all suffer grief. The question is whether we’re going to waste our sorrows or not. Are they going to make us bitter or are they going to make us better? “I can look back on my widowhood,” shares Elisabeth Elliot, missionary, “and realize there have been priceless lessons I couldn’t have learned any other way. I have made steps in the spiritual life that I could not have made if I had refused to accept what God had ordained.”

Joy and pain can coexist. When you’re going through grief, the pain is intense and it affects you emotionally, spiritually, and physically. But we get into trouble when we move from wanting the pain to go away to defining “healing” as the absence of pain.

Defining “healing” as the absence of pain is a trap. God never promised us that this life would be pain-free. You’ll always feel a sense of loss when you think about your loved one. It won’t be as strong as it is right now, but it will still sting. To heal even though we are hurting, we must realize that joy and pain can coexist. Understanding that joy and pain can coexist can help you see how people can be joyful after suffering devastating losses. You may think that they are faking it or repressing their feelings (and they may be) but there are those who are genuinely joyful—despite the fact they are hurting deeply.

Time does not heal all wounds. This is a common misconception. If a person does not deal with the source of pain, that person is not going to heal, regardless of how much time passes. God is the source of healing, but God isn’t a magic wand. He wants to help you face and sort through your hurts and emotions. You need to seek his counsel and obey his Word, day by day until you finally come to the place of true healing.

You harvest what you sow. You’ve heard it said, “You reap what you sow.” When you grieve, you see just how true that statement is. The daily choices you make about how you grieve, what you think and say, what you do with your time, how you relate with people are what you are sowing, what you are planting in your life. Whatever you plant will be what grows and comes out of you. If you isolate yourself, you sow loneliness for the future. If you reach out for comfort and joy, you solidify friendship.

Life was always out of control, but God is sovereign (in control). Our ability to plan is an obvious blessing. Unfortunately, we can dupe ourselves into thinking that our ability to plan means we are in control. Losing a loved one makes us painfully aware that we’re not. However, even though life is out of your control, it doesn’t mean it’s out of control. In the Bible, God tells us that he controls everything. In other words, he is sovereign. Grieving is a good time to remember that God is God, and you are not.

We must reset our expectations. One thing that can keep us from coming to terms with God’s sovereignty is that we expect something different from what God has promised. God’s assertion of sovereignty is not a pledge to explain his plans to us. If your prerequisite for accepting God’s sovereignty is understanding his plan, you’ll never move forward in your healing from grief. What’s worse, you’re setting yourself up to be frustrated with God. You’re demanding that God do something he said he would not. In fact, he tells us that even if he tried to explain himself, we couldn’t understand.

God uses suffering for good. God hasn’t promised to explain every detail of why he’s allowing your life to unfold the way it is. But that doesn’t mean God will not share any of his plan with you. In fact, he reveals a great deal. One of the most eye-opening and instructive aspects of his plan is laid out for us in Romans 8. “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.” This does not mean God wants you to consider your loved one’s death a good event. Nor does it mean God thinks your loved one’s death was a good thing. Instead, he wants us to understand that he will take your loved one’s death and bring about something good from it. It is hard to believe amid suffering, but he keeps his promises.

2 Corinthians 1:20 says: “For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.” Amen.

First Sunday of Advent, Dec. 3, 2023

10 a.m. Worship with Communion

Flowers – Flowers are given by Jeff Smith in honor of Carol’s birthday.

Announcements

The First Sunday in Advent, Dec. 3

  • After Worship: Join us in the Fellowship Hall for our First Sunday Potluck and Sunday Bible Study, as we continue the series, “How Lutherans Read the Bible”.
  • Fellowship Hall Tree Decorating Party: Join us in the Fellowship Hall on Wednesday, Dec. 6 at 6:30 to decorate our Fellowship Hall Christmas tree. Bring a beverage of choice and a snack to share!
  • Congregational Meeting: Zion’s Church Council is calling a special congregational meeting for 11 a.m. (or after worship) Sunday, Dec. 17, to review and vote on changes to Zion’s constitution and by-laws. The meeting originally planned for Oct. 29 was cancelled due to the weather. Voting members should have received the updated information this past week. Please contact Julie or any other church council member if you have any questions or did not receive the email updates.
  • Thanksgiving Numbers: Did you know that Zion’s 30th Annual Community Thanksgiving Dinner served meals to more than 900 people, which included the delivery of more than 625 meals in under two hours. Please remember that this year, we will have a 5 Loaves Christmas meal delivery on Saturday Dec. 23. If you can help with meal preparation or delivery for that event, please contact Norine Hazen.
  • An Opportunity to Give: Again, this year, Zion’s is working with First National Bank to provide gifts for senior citizens. We have 18 wish letters. If you would like one, please contact the church and leave a message or send an email to ZionsLuth@gmail.com
  • Save the Date: Our special Blue Christmas worship service will be Thursday Dec. 21.
  • Volunteers Needed: We need ushers and lectors for Blue Christmas and Christmas Eve services. Please contact JoAnn Karspeck or Vicar Lisa if you can help.

E-formation – First Sunday of Advent
Dec. 3, 2023

Although the historical record is sketchy, it appears that our Advent arose out of a season of fasting to prepare for baptisms at Epiphany. By the sixth century, an eschatological emphasis was present.

Our Advent comprises the four Sundays before Christmas. Each year, the first Sunday deals with our readiness for divine judgment, the second Sunday the ministry of John the Baptist, the third Sunday the Baptist’s call to a repentant life, and only on the fourth Sunday a narrative concerning the birth of Jesus. God comes, in the past in the history of Israel and the incarnation of Jesus, in the present in the word and sacrament of each Sunday and in the sufferings of our time, and in the future at the end of all things.

The lectionary appoints readings to fit this pattern, and its tone stands in stark contrast to our society’s weeks of preparation for Christmas. Liturgical advice to keep a meaningful Advent without a December-long celebration of Christmas is meant not to be a killjoy, but to awake our longing for the surprising ways that God comes to us.

Mark 13:24-37

Advent begins the liturgical year, and in this year B, gospel readings from Mark complement the festival gospels taken from John. At this beginning we contemplate the end: the arrival of the divine judge means the end of the earth as we know it. In Advent, we are called to ready our lives to receive our disorienting God, for whose arrival we must keep awake.

Isaiah 64:1-9

The Isaiah reading is chosen to complement Mark’s cosmic imagery of the end of time. God is like fire, earthquake, father, potter. We ask to be saved from “the hand of our iniquity” and returned to the hand of the one who created us.

1 Corinthians 1:3-9

At the start of Advent, the word of God from Paul bids us grace, peace, knowledge, strength, intensified spiritual gifts, and life with the risen Christ. Lutherans see Paul’s prayer as “gospel,” filled with the good news of life from God.

Zion's Lutheran Church

zionsluth@gmail.com

719-846-7785