Grief: A Solid Fog
On Grief, Fog, & the Resurrection
Grief is solid.
Like fog is solid.
Thick fog has the opacity slider turned all the way up. It clouds our vision as quick as it appears.
The fog of grief is solid in the sense that it’s impossible to see through. Grief has this way of convincing us that because we can’t see through it, we can’t step through it.
In other words, grief only really seems like an obstacle because it’s opaque. We imagine we have to STOP moving forward because our eyes tell we've reached a SOLID WALL.
But that’s not true.
You don’t need to go around it, if you have somebody that can guide you through it.
I don’t know your faith backgrounds here. I just wanted to share MY reason for being so confident in talking about grief and hope's intersection. It's because of my hope in a future Resurrection.
A belief that death isn’t an destination but a detour.
At the center Christianity is not a list of rules, but a single earth-shattering, destiny changing event. 2000 years ago, a fairly popular Jewish rabbi with very unimpressive origins claimed to have gotten up from the grave. And a group of obscure, uneducated, marginalized Jewish people believed him enough to change the course of history.
The way they dealt life, death, and suffering (not just their own, but human suffering across pandemics, poverty, abandoned kids, etc) was compelling.
Tragedy ruined a lot of people. But they lived with a different sentiment:
Tragedy doesn't ruin anybody. Hopelessness does.
And it is absolutely amazing how much hope you can draw from the well of Resurrection. They set their hopes on a man who went six feet deep, buried as deep as everybody else's hopes and dreams, but He got up.
He GOT up. (It’s already happened, it’s old news)
He got UP. (Above all our doubts and fears and anxieties and worries)
Not only did he get up, but he pronounced that this event would be the source of their hope. So in one sense, He’s the only person that’s gone through the solid fog of death to the other side and offered to come and take us all by the hand to help us navigate through death.
This group navigated through death and grief, not just in a way that other people wouldn’t, but in a way that they couldn’t.
This is where my faith rests and the reason why I’ve thought it would be worth my time to talk about grief, hope and their intersection online.
As a follower of Jesus, I’ve learned that I can feel hopeless. My feelings are REAL. (My tense shoulders, pillows and sheets watered by night sweats prove it).
However, I’ve also learned that even though I can feel hopeless. I can never be hopeless.
If Jesus really went to the grave (the most HOPELESS place we know of in this life) and it was only a FOG (solid to the eyes but not to the body), then even though I can feel hopeless, I can never actually be hopeless.
Although my feelings are real, my feelings aren’t REALITY!
“If the Resurrection is true, then everything’s gonna be alright” - Tim Keller
What problems fade away when you think about a future Resurrection?
What problems still feel just as big, stationary and scary?
I'm so grateful that you talk about how I feel, since the transitioning of my husband, my life as I knew it with him doesn't exist anymore. The one opportunity that I had was being prepared for the transition, but NOT for the aftermath. I had NO idea it could allow transparency in all area of existence. That I wasn't prepared for, but I'm adjusting, because it has me in a place now where I'm depending more and more on Him.
Our God is bigger than all our problems, the only One who knows how to solve them.........(that song is so dope)
John O, once again, thank you for being sooooooooo you!!! :):):)
This was encouraging and a different facet of His resurrection and the hope it ministers to us, His followers. Thank you.
If i may be transparent, one of our adult children has walked away from the Church entering into a relationship with another identifying as the gender opposite the one the Creator gave. Loving someone not affirming their choice and the demands that come with it can seem a labyrinth. This is somewhat new territory. i find myself searching through the Word reading of the one caught with his father's wife, the woman caught in adultery on the verge of being stoned, the prodigal, and those God gave up to their debased minds in Romans 1...trying to make sense and for answers to questions. i grieve for both of these souls and experiencing the division Jesus spoke of among family members. i cling to Jeremiah 59:1 trusting none of this is impossible for Him to redeem.