I’m writing this post with tears in my eyes. It’s 8 weeks this Thursday since Mom died. Life is still a whirlwind of grief, emotions, shock, pain, numbness, peace, laughter and agony. There is no normal for me or my family as of yet. So many things to do, so many things to feel, so many limitations. I’ll save “how I am” for a separate post, but to speak quickly to it, I am exhausted, hurting and grieving.

The focus for me after Mom’s funeral has been 1. to get on top her financial situation as her executor, and 2. empty out her apartment by the middle of July, when her lease is up. I knew I could have put all her belongings in storage and put it off, but I preferred to attack it now and get it done, with much help from some amazing friends. Thankfully, it’s almost done. There’s a whole other post in the “how I am” about what it’s been like to do such a horrible job at such a horrible time. For now, this time in her apartment, with her things, her smell, her journals, everything she left behind, has forced me to continue grieving. I understand why people put this task off after a loved one’s death, sometimes for years. It’s indescribably hard.

As I’ve been going through this the last 6 weeks, I’ve also been able to attend church again. I have not been attending since Mom’s surgery, save for a couple weeks when I had respite from caregiving. Both my husband and I were very involved in serving at our church, but since Mom got sick, we stepped out of our roles in order to care for her and our family. Ever since I have come back to Sunday mornings, things are different. I am different. I am no longer playing piano, teaching, leading a class, or serving in any capacity. I am just there. It’s quite a shift for me. And every Sunday, without fail so far, Sunday mornings are by far the time I cry the most during the week. While I have lots of memories of Mom in that building, it’s not just her memories that bring the tears. It’s being in the presence of God with other people who know and love him, too. It stirs my heart in a very different way than my times with God at home. Outward evidence, perhaps, of the fact that Christians are saved into a family. We were not meant to be alone. Thank you to my Jesus family for the hugs, the prayers, the tears cried with me, the ways you have loved me and helped carry me.

This uncontrollable crying on Sundays has made me very uncomfortable. I often feel like the only one who’s using up 6 tissues each week. Being told to stand and greet each other just adds to the awkwardness, as I don’t mind being honest about why I’m a blubbering mess, but there is no good way to be present with someone in a grieving state in one minute or less. We are told to come as we are, however, and I am coming as I am. Broken-hearted. I am not bringing my gifts to the church. I’m bringing my grief and sorrow.

While I know that’s okay, and it’s exactly what God wants me to do, it’s not normal for our church culture. I am very aware of standing out, and not just because I’m outwardly crying. Hurting people who prefer to privately grieve, or express it in different ways than copious tears, are also present on Sundays. And it begs the question:

What do we do with our grief as the church?

Maybe it’s not the pain losing a loved one. It could be disappointment over a lost opportunity, life not going the way it should have gone, unwanted singleness, the wayward child, chronic pain. Fill in the blank. At some point, all of us have tasted the twisted nature of life. Things are not as they should be, and when that happens, it hurts. What do we do when it hurts?

I am not the one to write a book on this subject. I’m busy reading them, because I was never taught well what to do with my grief. Thanks to friends who have been walking through this longer than I have, I am reading and using resources like Dark Waters, Deep Mercy by Mark Vroegop, Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering by Tim Keller, A Sacred Sorrow by Michael Card, and a four-part series on loss of a loved one by Kenneth C. Haugk. I’m looking to join a Grief Share group in the fall to pursue it further. But I ask this question about what we do with our grief as the church because right now, we don’t know how to deal with it well.

Christian radio teaches me to always be positive. Quote those Bible verses, find the silver lining in your situation, sing minor key lyrics in a major key (one of my biggest pet peeves as a musician), and just remember how good God is! Even when your daughter has died, or your mom has incurable cancer, keep up the positive outlook. Since we know the end of the story, and everything will be okay, there’s no room for your grief.

Church teaches me that grief is a place of limbo. There really is no landing place for a person in grief. As a leader, I am welcome back when I am functional. When I can serve again. The implied messages are: “You’re welcome to come, but you can’t really do anything useful for us until you can teach a class again, or serve on the worship team, or teach in kids’ ministry. Let us know when you’re done grieving.” It’s as if we don’t know what to do with deeply hurting people. Give them space. Where is their space? I say this, fully acknowledging that I have believed this and done this, in my ignorance and to my great sorrow.

Yet God is showing me through my walk with sorrow, that broken-hearted people are vital for the church. In fact, in my friend’s (and I will always think of him as my pastor), Buzz’s sermon on Psalm 13 last week, one of the things I realized is that me coming with only my grief is exactly what God has for me to do. That’s my service. That’s my contribution in this season. Why, you may ask? How does me coming with sorrow and tears serve or help anyone?

It images God.

Yes, that’s right. Our sorrow at the brokenness, twisted nature of creation, at death and decay and despair, reflects to the world who God is. It’s the reflection no one wants to show, but everyone desperately needs. Since we all experience this brokenness, we all need to know what on earth to do with it. More than that, we also need to know that God grieves the ruptured state of his creation. In particular does he grieve the lost and shattered state of his people, his image bearers.

Need proof, perhaps? You don’t have to read far in the Bible to see and hear God’s laments. I’ve mentioned John 11 in a previous post, when we see Jesus lamenting the death of his friend, Lazarus. But if we turn back to the Old Testament, it is everywhere. God regrets making man in Genesis. God grieves over his lost people in Exodus. God’s anger and sadness is visible as his people continually turn away from him in Judges. He grieves over Saul’s turning away in 1 Samuel. The prophets are full of his laments. Jesus himself laments over Jerusalem, echoing God’s heart through the years. God has strong emotions, probably stronger than any of us have ever felt. He is sovereign, and he grieves, as a father who hates watching his beloved child choose death over life. It breaks his heart (to borrow our vernacular).

God doesn’t respond to the horrors of sin and death with positivity. I believe it’s impossible for us to fully grasp this, but it’s essential to at least try to understand how he can be fully sovereign over every particle of his creation, using evil to accomplish his purpose, redeem and rescue (and one day restore) all of his creation through Jesus, AND fully grieve over the death of a sparrow. Often we try to understand him, and since his ways are unsearchable (Romans 11), when we reach a conundrum, we put him in a human box. I’ll use Christian radio as an example again. When we get that diagnosis no one wants, when that sweet child dies, when sin’s effect rears its ugly head, Christian radio tells us that all things work together for good. Or the DJ tells us that he/she has peace about the situation. They quote Bible verses all day long, but they are not verses of lament or sorrow. They are positively spun, Romans 8:28 style, misapplied to the grieving situation. I have yet to hear a K-Love verse of the day about lament, sorrow, or anger. No, God responds to the pain in his people and his creation with passionate emotion.

It’s not only Christian radio. I’ve heard that message from other Christian quarters. We are ill-equipped to handle grief in a God-honoring way. We are ill-educated on how God handles grief of his broken creation. And because of that, when you are thrust into grief or disappointment, you lack tools and a robust theology of God and suffering that help you actually turn to him. You have no place for your questions and doubts, your anger and fear, your anguish and numbness. You wonder if something is wrong with you, if you are not trusting God enough. You hear the positive worship songs and wonder where the songs of lament are. While the Psalms express their doubts, anger, fear, and questions directly to God, we don’t. And that’s deeply damaging to all of us.

We need grieving people in our church. We need to learn from them. We need them to show us what God is like in their grief. We need them to be weak, to question, to doubt, to be angry, to have great sorrow. Because we are, or have been, or will be that grieving person. And we have a God who is deeply acquainted with our grief. He shares it with us. He knows. He grieves, too. When we learn to lament, to bring those feelings and questions and cries to him, it’s the bridge that brings us to him. Without it, we set grieving people floundering. They have no way to reconcile the pain they experience with a God who either seems not to care or couldn’t do anything to stop it. They see him as powerful, but not emotive, or emotive, but not powerful, instead of the truth that God is all-powerful and knows our suffering intimately, and cares deeply enough to suffer himself. They need to know by experience that he draws near to them in their pain. No wonder so many hurting people leave the church. I understand it now. I wish I understood it before.

If you’re not the one currently grieving, you are needed, too. Not just in the ways you are gifted to serve, but with your presence. Along with the one who grieves, you image God when you learn to come alongside the broken-hearted. If he is the one who is near to them, your nearness to the broken-hearted is God’s presence to them.

Obviously not all of the Christian life is sung in a minor key. There are beautiful truths of God’s character in which we rejoice. There are astounding promises in which we trust. There is abundant hope to which we look forward. AND. And there are deep sorrows in which we lament. Imaging God also happens in the deepest valleys, not just the mountaintops.

So my service at present is coming broken. Living in sorrow and with my tears. Not only does my broken heart image God, my lament helps bring me toward him. I cannot thank those of you enough who have drawn near to me in my pain and been God’s presence to me. You help me feel safe when I fall apart on Sunday mornings. You help me draw close to God. Thank you.