"Will My Life Ever Be Good Again?"

I want to write a book called, “Life Can Be Good Again!” – Finding Meaning & Purpose in Your Loss.

After writing his best seller, A Grace Disguised, Jerry Sittser found that one question kept surfacing in the hundreds of letters and emails he received in response to his book – “Will my life ever be good again?”

People want to know if life has any joy in store for them in the future after suffering a catastrophic loss. I wandered the exact same thing immediately after losing Jackie because the loss was so devastating and overwhelming. I honestly didn’t know what to do or how to process it. I didn’t know how to grieve. I needed someone to help me frame my loss.

Out of desperation, I called Jerry Sittser at Whitworth College, and asked if he would come speak at the church I pastored in Auburn. It was totally for selfish reasons – to help me recover from my grief. Jerry came and helped me frame the loss. He became a model to me of someone who had suffered great loss (he lost his wife, mom, and daughter when a drunk driver hit their minivan) and yet had joy in his life. Jerry loved God, his family (what remained), other people and life. He had a smile on his face and a bounce in his step. I wanted to be like Jerry. I figured if he could do it, then so could I. I thought that if God could transform Jerry then maybe he could transform me too. I think we all need models, people to look up to, which have gone where we want to go.

I have found that life can be good again, really good! Life will never be the same again. Things are different now - but good! I have a new joy, which I believe is even greater than before. By experiencing such deep sorrow I can now experience an even deeper joy. I have a smile back on my face and a bounce in my step. I have a new found passion to help others who grieve experience joy in their lives as well.

Because of His mercy and grace,

His grace is sufficient, and his mercies are new every morning .... Great is thy faithfulness!

Dp

p.s. I recently saw Jerry Sittser speak in chapel at Westmont College in Santa Barbara. I thanked him personally for the difference he made in my life and for being my role model for living a healthy life after loss.

Ocean Waves and Grief

I grew up in Southern California and one of my favorite activities was (and still is) going to the beach. When I was a kid my parents owned an apartment in Laguna Beach that we would frequent a lot. It was there that I learned about the ocean, waves, body surfing and boogie boarding. I learned to respect the ocean and it's power (water is the most powerful force on earth) and to never turn my back on it.

I remember one time when my mom and I were walking on some rocks looking at starfish and turned our backs on the ocean and a big wave came and knocked us over and dragged us across the rocks. We emerged bloody and bruised but learned an important lesson.

Turning your back on the ocean is like turning your back on grief and ignoring it.

I remember another time when a set of waves came out of nowhere and I got trapped in the set. I was thrust under water for what seemed like eternity but in reality was only a few seconds. I felt helpless, disoriented, and frightened. When I did surface I found another huge wave bearing down on me and under I went.

Losing a loved one and going through the grief process is like being caught in a set of big waves. Waves of anger, doubt, denial, sadness, depression, loneliness, helplessness, and confusion that keep crashing down on you. Despite what some experts say, the grief process is not a neat and tidy set of stages you successfully go through and move on from. Rather they are like emotional waves that come in all different sizes and shapes that knock the snot out of you. When they break, you are broadsided, and find yourself tossing, spinning, and bouncing off the bottom of the ocean with a mouth full of salt water and sand.

If you fight, it takes longer to get to the surface. But if you float with the current, you come right to the top. Floating when we are frightened is difficult. It takes trust, focus, and concentration. Dealing with the death of a loved one is similar. In order to cope, it takes TRUST. Trust leads to hope. Trust that God is in control even though it doesn't seem like it. Hope for a better tomorrow and that life can be good again.

We all need hope to cope.

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your path." Proverbs 3:5-6

Dp

p.s. I know some people (and I'm sure you do to) who got caught in a set of ocean waves and it frightened them and now they don't venture into the ocean anymore. I don't know about you but I'm ready to venture back out into the deep end and live life to the fullest! I think Jackie would want it that way ... :-)

"Held" by Natalie Grant

What It Means To Be “Held”

Natalie Grant sings a moving song about grief, loss, suffering and hope called, “Held.” However, the writer of the song is Christa Wells. Her inspiration for the song came from 3 different women that greatly influenced her life. Each of the women experienced the loss of a family member.

1) Patti, a young widow with 3 kids, lost her husband

2) Vaneetha, experienced polo growing up, lost her infant son Paul from a heart defect. The first verse of "Held" refers to Vaneetha and her son, Paul. She shared with Christa about how knowing sorrow allowed her to also know joy and about the strange reality of feeling God's presence most keenly in the moments of deepest grief.

3) Sherry, Christa’s mother-in-law, lost her daughter Erica at birth. She spoke through tears about the pain of carrying a child to term and then having to let her go without even getting to take her home from the hospital. She told Christa about the still, small voice that spoke to her in the delivery room, “You have to choose how you will carry this loss after this moment. You can choose bitterness or you can choose to let me wrap you up in peace that can't be explained and that will lead to hope. You can choose to trust that you are not alone, and that everything you suffer here will someday be redeemed."

Because of the influence of these women, Christa realized that no person of faith since the beginning of time has ever lived without suffering. In fact, those who are students of Jesus have been promised that we certainly should expect pain and suffering in this life.

BUT …

In the middle of that heartache, at every lonely, dark, lost moment ...the Truth. That in those moments, especially then, we are held, held up, held together, by the the One who has walked here and knows the pain, and who also holds all of time, every story, my story, your story, the Greatest Story in his hands.

Christa said, “Every word (of the song) was chosen with loving care, because I didn't write this song for a market, or any audience, but for those three women. I wrote it and recorded it with my old 8-track and made a cassette copy for each of them.”

Link to the Natalie Grant video/song “Held.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOufqWodFNo

Below are the lyrics to Held:

Two months is too little
They let him go
They had no sudden healing
To think that providence
Would take a child from his mother
While she prays, is appalling
Who told us we'd be rescued
What has changed and
Why should we be saved from nightmares
We're asking why this happens to us
Who have died to live, it's unfair

[Chorus]
This is what it means to be held
How it feels, when the sacred is torn from your life
And you survive
This is what it is to be loved and to know
That the promise was when everything fell
We'd be held

This hand is bitterness
We want to taste it and
Let the hatred numb our sorrows
The wise hand opens slowly
To lilies of the valley and tomorrow

[Chorus]
This is what it means to be held
How it feels, when the sacred is torn from your life
And you survive
This is what it is to be loved and to know
That the promise was when everything fell
We'd be held
[Bridge]
If hope is born of suffering
If this is only the beginning
Can we not wait, for one hour
Watching for our savior
[Chorus]
This is what it means to be held
How it feels, when the sacred is torn from your life
And you survive
This is what it is to be loved and to know
That the promise was when everything fell
We'd be held
We'd be held

This is what it is to be loved and to know
That the promise was when everything fell
We'd be held

This is what it means to be held.....