When my granddaughter Brynley died as a stillborn, full term baby, I lived for a couple of years in a place that is difficult to explain. I could not get my mind around any form of satisfaction that she was with Jesus. It seemed as if she didn't belong in Heaven. We never even had an opportunity to enjoy her sweet life on earth, to see her smile, or hear her laugh. I don't know what I expected the void of not having those expectations realized to have on my emotions, my mental apect of the reality of death, the attitude I had always held about life and death....but it was nothing like I had ever experienced before. I was overwhelmed, It was at least two years before I could even find any form of relief by trying to imagine her in heaven. NO mental exercise I could come up with gave me a sense of relief. No scripture, no poem, no devotion, no blog, no card, no outside influence on this earth allowed me to see her happily enjoying heaven, and even if it had, my daughter and I felt cheated. History actually changed in my mind. I suddenely looked differently even at history. So many mothers had lost thier little ones at or near birth, that there were certainly great crowds of people in heaven who never even experienced the joys and pains of earth. They were of course blessed, but those left behind without enjoying their presence were denied the gift of their life. I had never experienced the hole that left in time. And there is nothing except the experience that can give a perspective on just how awful that feels.
I had totally hoped to never feel that helpless again. But the reality is, that there will be times when the impact on our emotions of loss, and unfulfilled expectations will grip us more tightly than we can emotionally receive. For everyone the response will be different, but I am finding that for me, it shuts some part of me down. Shutting down until the Lord gives me His remedy for the pain, is the only way I can cope. And here I am again. Someone I love is dying and all I can do is shut down. When Brynley died and mother died I couldn't cry. The stress involved with mother's passing, and the shock involved with Brynley's passing left me empty. But thankfully, these days I can at least cry. But I am failing miserably at being an support for anyone else. I don't have it in me. And God is not giving it to me. All I can do is shut down, hide and protect my emotional self. I don't know what it will mean for my emotional future, but I do know that eventually, God gave me the vision, the enlightenment that healed the pain after about two years, when it was my granddaughter who died.
So knowing that God knows how we feel, I am only able to pray that God will be there in a very special way for those who need him in these hours of near death. I simply don't know how, to be His tool on earth, because I fully believe there is no person on earth that can lessen that empty unimaginable crush of loss. God is the only one who knows our spirit well enough to provide the kind of spiritual medication that heals the wounds of that kind of reality. There are people all over the world today who need God in that kind of special way, and for some reason He choses to wait a while to reveal Himself as the healer.
When his dear friend Lazarus was dying, Lazarus' family begged Jesus to come before he died. They fully believed that if Jesus would just come, He could heal him. Jesus had purpose in not going when they wanted him to. We don't know if Jesus had experienced the loss of someone close at this point, although the absense of his father indicates that he may have died by this time in Jesus' life. Had Jesus known the special kind of pain that losing someone close could bring humans. With his unique aspect on Heaven, having known what living with the Father on a level we humans can only get after death, sending his friend home to the Father was a gift he might give him. Without Lazarus' death we might never have known if Jesus human side knew the pain we feel. I personally am glad to read that Jesus cried. What intensity of emotions did Jesus feel. He allowed his friend to die. Knowing how it hurt Mary and Martha. Knowing how his disciples and close followers would judge him for not coming. Feeling the pain humans feel in the death of a loved one, we know he knew he had power over death, and he let it happen.
Jesus wanted to demonstrate that power. he knew he had to demonstrate that power. But in order to demonstrate the power over death, death had to occur. He also wanted to foreshaddow his own death, and the expected end to that event. He was giving hope to those who loved him that he might have power even in his own death. Now, there are still two facts that remain...eventually, Lazarus died and Jesus was not there to resurrect him. And, even though Jesus was resurrected himself, he revealed himself in his resurrected form, but made a big deal of his being more ready to go to his Father. His heart was already in his heavenly home. He went ahead saying, " I go to prepare a place for YOU."
I don't feel like Jesus right now. I don't have the emotions that go with knowing a place has been prepared for those nearest death who must depend on Jesus's power over death, and promise of a better place. But having faith is not living out of my emotions. But having faith doesn't releive my emotions, and I don't think Jesus wanted us to believe it would. Because even he cried. He could have gone to Lazarus and been there and allowed him to die. We often see in the Biblical accounts that Jesus followers had not taken their faith yet to the point of understanding that it did not require his physical presense to make miracles happen. Mary who knew how he told the story of the soldier who had faith to say, "Lord, if you just say it, it will be done." He commended this man for his faith. It wasn't about faith for Mary. She didn't want his miracle without his presense. Her emotions needed him to be there. But he didn't go. Why? Was Jesus physically overwhelmed? Did he experience what I experience when intense emotions overcome me? I think he had to have known this kind of human pain, at least once. When he was dying, he knew how his mother felt, how his disciples would shut down emotionally, until he brought them the healing they would need. Until he removed the gripping sorrow that sent them to a place of not knowing what to do or how to live; until he revealed his presense and power would still be available in the Glorious third person of the Godhead. He would never leave them, but would remain constantly available in His Spirit, by indwelling them.
In spite of his constant presense, God knows when we are disabled by our physical or emotional pain. Sometimes he takes it away, but often he does not. He did not for himself, but he does set limits. In time, he brings an end to it, interjecting something greater than when and where we are while in our pain. But one of the values of death is that it is the end of pain we cannot bear. The blessed end.
No more tears, no pain, no more fear of death, no more canes, or prosthetics, or any other sting of ... anything that brings the need for death as the exclusive remedy.
Lord, my emotions are like the weather this week. From cloudy to sunny to cloudy to sunny and the same again and again. I wait on you. I lean on you. I have no resource but you. Once again I am can only say...."Only to they cross I cling."
Be there Lord for those who need you today.
AMEN
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