O, Heavy Death

I referenced Bryan Bucher's quick exit from Houston in an earlier blog. I didn't want to say much until after he and his wife, Aimee, had a chance to put some of their own thoughts into their own blogs.

Aimee's mother died while our group was in Houston. Bryan made it home to Lima, Ohio in time to be with the family. I recommend their blogs to you. You can read them by following these links: Bryan and Aimee.

Reading their blogs reminded me of just how painful death is. I know 1 Corinthians 15:55 gives us the very beautiful refrain, "Where, O Death, is thy sting?"

Sting? Sting?!! Are you kidding me? Were that death were only a sting. Those of you have lost someone know that words like "sting" and "heaviness" and "pitch dark" are silly little baby words that merely deflate before the wideness and the depth of the emotional hole that envelops us from the inside out.

Don't get me wrong, dear reader, I believe in the resurrection of the dead. But when we stand, helpless, by the side of that casket; when we touch the hands of the person we love so dearly and there is no life flowing from those hands . . . the word "sting" doesn't even hover near the scene.

Don't quote 1 Corinthians 15:55 to someone standing next to the casket. Oh, it applies . . . but so does Ecclesiastes 3. There is a time for everything. There is still, even in the age of resurrection and hope, a time to mourn.

Bryan and Aimee, our prayers are for you, and for your family, and especially for Bryant, the grieving husband. We cannot stand in the darkness as fully as you. After the funeral your world will still feel like it's at a full stop. People you love, who loved your mother, will walk toward their cars, ready to resume their checklist of things to get done that day. It's the way of the world. But this little blog-community will be praying for you.

A.E. Whitham wrote that the "Christian faith does not pretend to understand God, but it does affirm that God understands us. . . ." In your grief, that for a time will be deeper than your classmates know, may you turn to your left and find each other. May you turn to your right and find the face of One who suffers with you. May those eyes shine forth with the light of the Crucified and Risen Lord and may the dawn from on high break upon us all and dispel the shadows until the resurrection is complete.

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."