“Love isn’t selfish.” 1 Corinthians 13:5 (ESV)
I was recently talking with someone who is coming up on a special date regarding their son’s death. Their eyes filled with tears as they talked about their son and how much they miss him. I appreciated their honesty and vulnerability with me. And I understood where they were coming from. But then, just as they started to share their heart – they stopped. The next words they uttered were – “I shouldn’t say that, it’s selfish to miss him and want him back, because he’s in a better place.”
While there’s truth in the fact that our saved loved ones who are deceased are in a better place, it’s not selfish for us to miss them. Shutting down our emotions will not help us process our grief. People often throw around the phrase “I love you to death”. But if their loved ended at death, then grief would be easy. What makes grief so difficult to process is the simple fact that your heart still loves the person that has been taken from you. You miss the relationship, the conversations, the hugs, their voice, their little quirky ways. Your heart doesn’t stop loving them just because they’ve been removed from your life. You’re left with all these emotions for the person, but they’re not here to share them with.
Grief is a lifelong process of learning how to handle the emotions regarding the person you are missing.
If you’ve spent any time reading the Bible, then you know that God loves people and He values relationships. He values them so much that relationships will be the only thing that will continue in Heaven. The fact that there will be accountability for our life lived on this earth stands as proof that we will be ourselves in eternity.
Scripture tells us that “Jesus wept” when he heard of the news of the death of his friend Lazarus. The tears that Jesus shed were an outward sign of the love He felt for his friend and the family grieving.
Grief is the cost of loving someone. 1 Corinthians 13:5 states “love isn’t selfish”. It’s not selfish to miss the ones you love. Until we take our last breath on this earth, we will miss our loved ones. We will grieve them.
When we reflect on the knowledge that God designed us for relationships, designed us to love. We can be comforted that He understands how our hearts miss them when they’re no longer on this earth. Our sovereign God is in control of everything. We can find comfort knowing that the same sovereign God is the same One who has experienced the pain we face daily.
By holding onto to our hope of our future reunion with them, we can find healthy ways to grieve the rest of our days.
My Hope Endures,
Laura Holmes
Ephraim Ministries, Director