There is darkness these days: the clouds are ever-present, the rain is soft upon my ears, the sadness is welcomed and felt. Many of us are still grieving, still mourning and hurting and weeping, and let me tell you something that my dear friend recently told me: grieving is sacred ground.
Grieving is sacred ground.
It's been about one month since the passing of our sweet friend, daughter, and sister Colby McDaniel. I can't speak for her family or even those who knew her closer than I did, but I can speak for myself and this shaky dirt I'm standing on: it doesn't really ever get easier.
This tragedy is still just that: all sorts of awful and from some kind of deep, achy place. This isn't God; our Jesus is only life-giving. This awful event that has happened, the beautiful life of Colby that is now somewhere else and far from us is honestly quite heartbreaking, still.
There are still big questions.
There are still scarce answers.
There is still deep pain.
And there is also life.
That somewhat breaks my heart more, but in the melancholy, stretchy way. It's like when you're sore after a hard workout: your limbs are kind of numb, and when you wake up in the morning you can still feel the push of yesterday inside your calf muscles. They're stiff and unmoving, but then you reach down and touch your toes and the stretch becomes your saving grace.
Keep on stretching, even if it hurts. Feel through the pain, and push, push, push.
The workout has made you sore, maybe even a little bruised, but you don't let it defeat you wholly because you know there is beauty to come.
There is so much beauty that will unfold.
And even though it hurts, you know this pain isn't wasted on God, because God makes all things new.
You know this pain isn't wasted on God, because God sits with you in the sadness.
You know this pain isn't wasted on God, because God takes our hurt and mess and soreness and turns it into something hopeful, something light-y and redemption-y and every kind of restoration-y.
That's the only promise I have: one day, in the name of Jesus, every tear will be wiped away. Someday we will have full peace. Someday we will have complete kingdom.
In the here and now though, our world is moaning and groaning, and for now we are grieving right along with it.
And that's okay.
Hear me, hear the true words of a dear friend of mine: grieving is sacred ground.
I won't say to be fake-happy. I won't say to be joyful if you're not, to be fine if you're actually falling apart. It's one of the great lies of darkness that we don't need to talk about our trials, but somehow we've bought into it. We're all band-aids, band-aids, band-aids, but what we don't notice is the blood pouring from our gunshot wounds.
Talking it out, speaking out our hurts is the only way to reach any sort of healing.
Feeling through the pain is the only way to move forward on the path of redemption that our God has set us on.
I won't say to be a lot of things, because the Church too often sugar-coats what simply needs room to be, room to breathe. We don't need a theology of fake-happy and smiles, smiles, smiles. There is laughter and there are love-moments, but there is also sadness. There is weeping and mourning and every sort of dark.
We need a theology of lament. We need to open up the Psalms and cry with those words. The writers know our sort of pain, because they have been in those places too. We need to sit in our pain together. We need to grieve with God.
Grieving is sacred ground.
