Holiness and grief

Earl Grollman, a rabbi and grief counselor, says penetrating  things about grief. For instance, "Grief is not a disorder, a disease or a sign of weakness. It is an emotional, physical and spiritual necessity, the price you pay for love. The only cure for grief is to grieve.”

I know that grief visits when least expected, but if I shut the door on grief, it will only come calling again and again. Letting it in, feeling it, expressing it, or letting happen whatever it brings is the only way to satisfy its painful demands. Grief is relentless and without it, our broken hearts cannot be healed.
Today’s reading is about holiness. Dare I compare it to grief? Certainly it is at the other end of the spectrum but both are about love. Think of it; holiness is to be like someone who loves us so much that He was willing to become like us but without sin — and die so that we could become like Him. How is that like grief? Without holiness, our broken lives cannot be healed.

Not only that, the love of God is relentless, as is grief. Jesus says this:

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. (Revelation 3:20)

Grief does that too. It knocks at the door of my heart, a painful visitor yet a healer. Jesus comes to eat with me, not painful but He also is a healer. When He first came to my door, I was broken and in pain. He did more than tap on the door; He opened it and walked in. Ever since that day, whenever sin deals its awful blow, He is there, knocking, wanting in to bring repentance and healing. He persists. Like grief, He will not let me go until I welcome Him.

Today’s reading says that His commands to be holy are all based on the fact that He to whom we belong is holy. In order to be one with God, which is our final destiny, we must be like Him in character; and since He is holy, we cannot be “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4) without ourselves being holy. That is, it is because we are the Lord’s and not in order that we may become His that we are called to be holy.

“I am the Lord your God” is always the ground of His appeal. He doesn’t say, “I will be your God if you will be holy,” but He says, “Be ye holy, because I already am the Lord your God.” I have been  bought with a price. Holiness is the result. That event happened and holiness happens, just as a searing loss happens and grief follows. Grief is His sorrow, weeping with us, part of what we feel.

When Jesus saw (Mary) weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept. (John 11:33–35)

Even though Jesus knew what He would do — raise Lazarus from the dead — He wept. Even though I know my lovely sister-in-Christ is gone and in heaven with Jesus, it is not a sin to weep, to grieve for sorrow. Yet this also points to the holiness set before me.

Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. (1 John 3:2–3)

PRAY: Jesus, my friend is now like You — and our loss is her gain. Her holiness is perfected. Grief ultimately leads me to thoughts of my own life and death. Because of You and because of grief, I am motivated to holiness even as You are holy. No one knows when You will call us home. The desire to be more like You is heightened because of the depth and sorrow felt this week. Keep knocking. The door is open.