by Thom Ernst
I’m sure that title will give pause to many readers. I’m equally sure that the greater majority of those of us who have experienced grief in any degree would be reluctant to call our personal struggles with grief, “good”. Why even use it as a title then? Because when approached about “grief” being the topic of this Purpled Nail submission, the first thought that popped into my head was the picture of Charlie Brown with rolled-up eyes saying “Good Grief.”
Yes, in Charlie’s case “Good Grief” is an expression of his incredulity or disbelief at something Lucy is doing or saying. However, I want to explore the actual words’ relationship with each other. In other words, “good” as the adjective of “grief”. Can grief ever be good? Grief is a painful experience and process – how can that be good?
Here is Webster’s definition of grief:
“Medical Definition of grief: deep and poignant emotional distress caused by or as if by bereavement. Although, there is no consensus on the defining features that would distinguish normal and pathological grief, it is generally accepted that grief becomes pathological when the reactions are excessive, prolonged, or unresolved.”
I doubt that anyone who has experienced grief would argue with the above definition. How can “deep and poignant emotional distress” sometimes to the point of becoming debilitating be considered good? Simply put because I’ve experienced the good that results from grief. Whether that grief was what I experienced in the death of my parents or when my dog died, while not the same in intensity it was still grief. I use the terms death and died because that is the reality. Terms like “passing” or “gone on” are ineffective attempts to ease the pain of grief. While God often wipes away the tears from our eyes in our grief, He doesn’t ease the immediacy of our pain and sorrow. When He speaks of His saints, He says: “They lived, they died”. We are left with the grief of those deaths in order to refocus our minds on the brevity of this life and eternity with Him or without Him. So, in that regard alone, grief is good – that’s exactly what happened in my own experience – it forced me to deal with my own mortality. Death and its corresponding grief cause us to reevaluate what’s of lasting importance. Just a few days ago I was watching one of the survivors of the 2009 plane crash into the Hudson River. He remarked over and over how his near-death experience changed him and caused him to examine the priorities of his life. While his experience doesn’t rise to the level of grief that we are dealing with here it does show how death or its proximity forces one to rethink life.
Let’s look at some synonyms of grief: sorrow, heartache and anguish are a few very descriptive words that help define grief. When Nehemiah (the biblical one not the one made famous by Three Dog Night) was in captivity in Persia, he was overwhelmed with sorrow at the condition of Jerusalem and the fact that it’s walls were in ruins and gates burned with fire:
“1. And it came about in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, that wine was before him, and I took up the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had not been sad in his presence. 2. So the king said to me, “Why is your face sad though you are not sick? This is nothing but sadness of heart.” Then I was very much afraid. 3. I said to the king, “Let the king live forever. Why should my face not be sad when the city, the place of my fathers’ tombs, lies desolate and its gates have been consumed by fire?” ~Nehemiah 2:1-3.
The result of Nehemiah’s sorrow or grief was that he was used by God through Artaxerxes to rebuild Jerusalem. That was good!
Or, consider what Paul said to the Christians at Corinth in 2 Corinthians 7:10: “10 For godly sorrow works repentance to salvation ….” In other words, grief over personal sin results in repentance and forgiveness. That is good!
Consider too Jesus: John 11:33-35 “When Jesus saw her [Mary] weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, He was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. … “Jesus wept” (v35). What’s interesting about this encounter with grief is that the word used for the people’s weeping means the cry of lamentation or the wail of excessive grief, while the word used for Jesus’ weeping means the calm shedding of tears in empathy. However, lest we think His tears were less a part of His own grief we are told that He was “deeply moved in spirit and troubled”. We can conclude that whether grief is quiet, without voice, or a loud wailing it is all grief – a pain of the soul. The good here was that Jesus’ empathy resulted in Lazarus coming back to life. It’s always good to share our grief, whatever it’s cause, with Jesus – He truly does weep with those who weep and rejoices with those who rejoice (Romans 12:15).
I am always intrigued when things I am pondering about are added to my attention in seemingly random ways – via the God of providence? The other day I was on FaceBook and came across this statement (yeah, even fb can occasionally produce gems):
“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It is all the love you want to give, but cannot. All the unspent love gathers in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in the hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.” ~Jamie Anderson.
I have no clue who Jamie Anderson is but I do know, just from reading his heart, that he’s had personal experiences, like most of us, with grief. He expressed that ache perfectly – “love with no place to go”. At least no place where it used to go; thus, the pain and despair. If that drives us to Jesus then it’s all good.
Good grief! Yeah, through our tears we can see it’s all that!