IT'S OK TO GRIEVE

     The past couple days I've been pondering whether modern technology has made the grieving process better or worse.  Before cameras and camcorders, did the loved one become merely a fading memory as time passed helping to ease the pain of what was lost?  While now, we have videos and pictures allowing us to re-live the moments of time past.  Perhaps, technology has made no difference in that area...pain is pain!  Losing a loved one hurts!

     I've spent the past few days transferring home videos from vhs to dvd.  I've laughed...I've cried....and sometimes I just had to turn it off and walk away.  The pain of re-living what once was and the knowledge of knowing what never shall be again was overwhelming.

     Forty-seven is not that old!  Eighteen years of marriage is not long enough!  It doesn't seem fair or right that my children are left fatherless...that they have to endure this pain! It doesn't seem fair that they will not have their father cheering them on at their graduation, at their wedding, or the birth of their future children!  It doesn't seem fair that I am left a widow at such a young age (I'm not even in my 40's yet)!

     But life isn't about being fair - it's never fair and this is the cross my children and I must carry.  I'm being honest and open about how I'm feeling right now.  I've tried to "Be strong!" over the past year...after all, that's what people expect...but sometimes you have to be weak and honest with the Lord about your true feelings.  He knows what they really are anyways and He understands.  It's people who do not understand.  People expect you to 'be strong'.  People are understanding as you mourn for a short period of time but then expect you to 'get over it' after only a short span of time.  How can you 'get over' someone who's been in your life for so many years in just a few short months???  It's not that easy! 

     Paul was not instructing that Christians should not grieve when he wrote, "we do not grieve as those who have no hope."  It's ok to grieve...even Jesus wept over the death of his close friend Lazarus (John 11:35).  We grieve...but not like those who do not have the hope of the Resurrection.  We grieve because although we know where they are and the joy that awaits them, we mourn their absence here.

     Grief takes time. It's ok to grieve. So, allow yourself to grieve and in time, your tears will give place to healing.