Here is part two of the paper I wrote for seminary in my God, Evil and Suffering class. I am glad that I chose to talk about my brother's passing because it has helped me to put my thoughts on paper.
The blame game is what my family and I were playing with the death of my brother Leroy. We were trying to find a place to put the blame and God was it. God was to blame? My mom kept asking why God would take my brother. The word take is kind of harsh. Especially when we have a God that sent his one and only son to walk among us, live among us, and feel our humanity with us on earth. I don’t think God takes people from us. I don’t think God sits in heaven contemplating who am I going to take now. Am I going to take this infant or this young man? Having Leroy part from us was not an action from God. Whether the accident was a natural evil where the road was slippery that made the car lose control and hit a pole or a moral evil in which my brother chose to drink and drive. (The drinking and driving idea was not a true statement just an example of a moral evil.) I needed to be able to articulate this to my mom, my family, and myself. We have an all knowing, powerful God and God knows us. In Psalm 34: 17 – 18 it says:
“The righteous cry out, and the
LORD hears them; he delivers them
from all their troubles. The LORD is
close to the brokenhearted and saves
those who are crushed in spirit.”
Our spirits were certainly crushed but not fully taken away from us. We were all crying out for our Lord to help guide and deliver us from this evil.
God created us to feel all the emotions a human can feel. “God knows my situation, better than I know myself. And knowing my situation, better than I know myself. And knowing my situation-my agony, my pain, my fear-God touches me where I am, offering me what forms of transformation are possible even in my dire circumstances. It may not look like much to me in terms of what I wish God could give me-but because God’s touch meets my condition, it offers hope.”[1] From having heard the news of Leroy passing that Saturday morning to actually flying down to Texas to be with my family I had time to think, read scripture, and pray. How am I going to console my family and myself? I am the one who serves in a congregation and I am the one who is trained for if situations arise like this in my context. But this was more personal. It was happening to me. I needed the strength, wisdom, guidance and love from God to be able to move forward. The words of Psalm 13 came into my head while I was driving from Houston to Seguin.
“How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and
day after day have sorrow in my heart?
But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices
in your salvation. I will sing the LORD’s praise,
for he has been good to me.” (Psalm 13)
Thinking about Psalm 13 it was hard for me to think about my heart rejoicing and even my mom’s heart rejoicing because we were all hurting deep inside. How long, Lord will our hearts ache? How long Lord must I wrestle with my thoughts? As we drove from Houston to Seguin my family and I started singing in our rental car. We started singing silly songs, vacation bible school songs, worship songs, and secular songs. Singing was good for me. I have a huge love for music and especially good worship music. Worship music at times soothes my soul and makes me feel closer to God. This was one of those times. My girls and wife were helping me with my grieving process while we were singing and they probably did not know it. God was using my wife and girls to help me in my grieving process.
Being able to sing worship music and remembering Psalm 13 and other verses helped me in my grieving process. It also helped me process how to help my family in their grieving process. I could never explain in words how I felt when I got the news about my brother. Until I read the words in Suchocki’s book and those were the words that I needed to describe what I was feeling. “Sometimes I have an image of beating my fist against the chest of God, sobbing like a comfortless child.”[2] That is what I felt like. A child in my fathers arms sobbing uncontrollably and pounding my fist on his chest. I am sure that is what my mother was feeling. She had anger towards God. Why my son?
My mom having anger towards God was okay. Being able to have anger and rage toward God is okay. “To be human is to experience the full range of emotions, whether anger, outrage, despair, depression, grief, impatience, pain, cynicism, jadedness, hopelessness, unbelief. And being human, we experience each of these emotions to some degree at some point in our lives, as well as those happier emotions we may feel freer to name as our own”[3] I don’t think God takes our rage or anger personal and punishes us for it later in our life. Our hearts were troubled. We were trying to find answers. Scripture was a big influence in my grieving process. I read as much as I could and looked for guidance and wisdom from God.
“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God;
believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms;
if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going
there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare
a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with
me that you also may be where I am. You know the way
to the place where I am going.” (John 14: 1 – 4)
We have no problems remembering the good times we had with Leroy. Being able to have Leroy’s memories in our hearts and being able to share those memories and have family around us is what helped us grieve through this tragic event. That is what was going to help us grieve his loss. We knew for sure that Leroy was in heaven. When that day of resurrection comes we will be able to see Leroy again. “God receives us as we are, and how we are is no surprise to God.”[4] The sentence from Suchocki’s book is so true. There is nothing that can separate us from the love of God. God knows all our little quarks and God knows it and loves it.
I was asked to perform the funeral for Leroy by his wife Jenny. I said of course. That was probably one of the hardest things that I have had to do in my life. My emotions were going up and down. Before the funeral started, I went into a quiet room and prayed. I prayed for comfort, guidance, healing and the words of Psalm 121.
I lift up my eyes to the mountains where does
my help come from? My help comes from the
LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. (Psalm 121)
After closing my eyes, praying and asking God for guidance I felt a sense of calmness. I had a feeling that God had a hand on my shoulder saying everything is going to be okay. As I was reading one of the prayers in the occasional services book I was reminded of something important both in the prayer and in Romans 6. “When we were baptized in Christ Jesus, we were baptized into his death. We were buried therefore with him by Baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the father, we too might live a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.”[5]
Having to perform my brother’s funeral was one of the hardest things I have done in my life. It also helped in my questioning God about why. My family and I still hurt about the loss of my brother. We have the memories of Leroy in our hearts and we have each other as a family but we also have a God that is with us and pulls us from the muck in our life. We have a God that feels our pain and walks with us side by side even when we think God is not present. We also have the promise of the resurrection that one day we will be able to see Leroy. Scripture has been a big influence in my grieving process to heal and to help my family’s healing process.
[1] Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, In God’s Presence, (Chalice Press, 1996), p. 25-26
[2] Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, In God’s Presence, (Chalice Press, 1996), p. 38
[3] Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, In God’s Presence, (Chalice Press, 1996), p. 37
[4] Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, In God’s Presence, (Chalice Press, 1996), p. 38
[5] Occasional Services, Burial of the Dead, Augsburg Fortress Publishing, 2005, p. 113
No comments:
Post a Comment