The key to healing is through understanding. When we don't know why something bad happens to us, especially when we believe we are good, a good wife, a good parent, or a good friend, our pain cuts like a knife.

When our husband or wife leaves us, someone we love dearly dies, or we lose our job or home, we linger in the "Why me" of our memory. What did I do wrong? What could I have dont to prevent it from happening. Why God, why did you let that happen to me? We cry out in pain "You don't love me God". We believe God has forsaken us and we agonize to the bitter end.

How Do We Recover From Our Grief?

Let's take a look and see how the people in the Scriptures dealt with grief.

The book of Ruth is a great story for understanding why God does some of the things He does.

Naomi And The Reality Of Grievous Experiences (v6-13; 19-22)
Naomi, an Israelite in a foreign land, lost her husband and both sons, and thus all means of support -- she was an impoverished widow and was in deep despair. "One day she got herself together and she and her two daughters-in-law, to leave the country of Moab and set out for home; she had heard that GOD had been pleased to visit his people and give them food". Verse 1:6.

Here we see she grieved, pulled herself together and moved on.

Verse 6 is the turning point - God intervenes to provide bread for His people in Israel. To her, she believes this was her decision, but God is putting her life back together again. There’s a lesson here about God working in our lives. In the time of the Judges it seemed that God only stepped in during a crisis. But the story of Ruth teaches us that God is constantly there for his people, working all things together for good. God doesn’t live in the suburbs of your life, commuting in during the “rush hour” crises. He is always with you. That is His promise.

Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, "Go back, each of you, to your mother's home. May the LORD show kindness to you, as you have shown to your dead and to me. May the LORD grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband." Then she kissed them and they wept aloud and said to her, "We will go back with you to your people."But Naomi said, "Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons- would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the LORD's hand has gone out against me!"

Here we see Naomi believes God's almighty hand afflicted her. So, here is Naomi, bereaved and wondering “Why did God allow this?” But God is putting the pieces of her life together, although she can’t see it. She only sees the tangled threads, but God sees the pattern from the other side.

"But Ruth replied, "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me." When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her. So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem.

And Naomi trusts the Lord through it all. How do we know?

She still prays (v8-9)
She still recognises his hand in all this (v13b)
She trusts God despite the pain (v21-22).
Remember then, God doesn’t play dice with your life. God rules. God loves. God cares.

Arriving in Bethlehem, Ruth begins working as a poor widow, picking up the grain left behind in the field after the harvesters have gone through. She is noticed by the richest man in the county, Boaz, who shows kindness to her and gives her full rights to gather with the harvesters. During the time of harvest, Boaz becomes the benefactor of Ruth and Naomi. Naomi identifies Boaz to Ruth as a kinsman of her dead husband, Elimelech.

Our God, our extraordinary God, used the lives of these people, to produce an abundant blessing for all people. And He still uses people to accomplish his extraordinary will. Just consider, if He so used Ruth, Naomi and Boaz, how will God use you. How will He take your faith and your actions of kindness and compound them to produce abundant blessing that you cannot anticipate? You think about that.

Ruth And The Evidence Of A Growing Faith (v14-18)
Ruth was a Moabite, from outside the Commonwealth of Israel. But God has saved her. Was Ruth touched by seeing Naomi’s godly example in her sufferings? Was it the reality of Naomi’s faith that impacted upon Ruth? Was Naomi’s witness the means God used to bring Ruth to faith? Remember that God will use our sorrows to point others to the Saviour. That was Paul’s experience in prison in Phil.1v12-18. His imprisonment led to the spread of the gospel, the stirring-up of the church, and people were saved.

Boaz married Ruth and they had a child and named him Obed. Then Naomi took the child, laid him in her lap and cared for him. This child was the father of Jesse, the father of David, and incredibly, the ancestor of Jesus.

We see the agony of Naomi and Ruth, yet they got themselves together and moved on and into a wonderful future. We see Mary watching her son Jesus tortured again and again until death, then His resurrection to save you and me. We know the Scriptures must be fulfilled, yet we fight God tooth and nail. Will you let God take your agony and pain and use it toward the purpose of His kingdom? Or will you go down into the bitterness of defeat.

We don’t have slick answers, but we know this - that God understands. God sent His Son, who died upon a Cross crying “My God, My God, why....?” For every believer who ever cried “My God - why?”, there is an echo at Calvary.

And we now can look back, not only to a crucified Saviour, but to a risen Saviour too.

The chapter ends on a high note - prospect of harvest.
The great missionary Adoniram Judson summed it up so well - “ The future is as bright as the promises of God”.

For the goodness of Naomi, of Ruth and of Boaz, working together in harmony and human love, was able to surmount the vicissitudes suffered by the two women as a result of the hard times, in famine and pestilence, which then prevailed in those days of the Judges. And the final prosperity and happiness which succeeded the trials that beset the two women, was seen as the Hand of God in His Great Goodness and Mercy, outstretched to deliver His children from the evils of the world.

And in reading the story of Ruth, people have seen in the narrative the great influence which sincere human love and good-will, as the spiritual inheritance bestowed upon man with God's creation of the human soul, possess in making right the wrongs brought about by the action of material things as well as by those in whom the soul is dormant. So that Ruth is one of the great stories of the Old Testament which demonstrates the development of the human love, as a love given to mankind by the Father, who, while His children love with a human love, loves His children with that Divine Love which is His Essence, and which is now available to all those who seek that Love in earnest longing and prayer.

Let's take a look and see how David dealt with grief.

King David's son dies...
2 Samuel 12
His servants asked him, "Why are you acting this way? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat!" He answered, "while the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought,'Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me and let the child live.' But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me."

David is telling us that there isn't anything we can do to bring our beloved ones back. We can cry and scream and get mad at God, but that will do no good. We cannot wallow in our grief. Grieve and cry, yes, cry your eyes out, but then get up and go on.

David cried out to God in grief. He said,
"My eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, O LORD, every day; I spread out my hands to you" Psalm 88:9.

"Be merciful to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and my body with grief" Psalm 31:9.

"I went about mourning as though for my friend or brother. I bowed my head in grief as though weeping for my mother" Psalm 35:14.

"But you, O God, do see trouble and grief; you consider it to take it in hand. The victim commits himself to you; you are the helper of the fatherless" Psalm 10:14.

Psalms 57:1 "Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me, for in you my soul takes refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed". 63:7 Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings". Psalms 91:4 "Take refuse in Him and sing He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart".

Let's Follow David's example:
Call to God everyday and spread out your hands to Him. Pray and ask Him to have mercy on you. Get under the shadow of His wings and let Him protect you from your distress and stay there till it passes. Start singing and sing aloud, and He will shelter you with His protective barrier. Let Him hold you and comfort you and kiss your tears away.

Helping Others In Our Time Of Grief

When we go out of ourselves and seek to help others, our grief eases. Therefore, ask God to send you someone else who is hurting and suffering like you. When He sends them, help them, minister to them, be kind to them, pray for them, go out of yourself for them. Pray, pray and pray some more. Pray for everyone you know. Spend a whole afternoon going through your mental directory and pray for everyone you have come in contact with.

Pray for:

1. Their Spiritual well being
2. Peace to enter into their lives.
3. Healing for their body, mind and soul.
4. God to grant them financial blessings.
5. God to shower His love down upon them.

The prayer we pray for others, like a face in the water, returns to us in abundance.

One other thing we must do if we want to be relieved of our pain. We must learn to forgive. Unforgiveness is the very thing that will hold your pain and agony to you. Jesus died for the forgiveness of sins. "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do." We must force ourselves do the same. Forgive your neighbor for being nosy, forgive the grocer for being mean, forgive that kid who laughed and made fun of you when you were a child, and forgive yourself. Forgive everyone who has ever hurt, regardless of the circumstances. It doen't matter what they have done to you, forgive them so you can be forgiven and set free.

Do you want to heal? Do you want peace and happiness returned to you? If the answer is yes, you'll have to forgive everyone who caused you pain. Yes, your ex-husband or ex-wife, the person who belittled you last week, even the person who raped you. It doesn't matter what they did, forgive them because you want to heal.

And the most important person you want to forgive of all is God. Forgive God? But you say, "How can I forgive Him when He did this to me? Why did He take them from me"?

Let's see what Job has to say.
Man's days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed. Verse 14:5. God pre-planned the years everyone's lives. Some longer, some shorter, and every persons time is for a reason. We must learn to trust that God knows what He is doing? We have to forgive Him, thank Him for the short time He shared them with us and move on. Yes, pick up the pieces, take the bull by the tail and get on with your life. God has something Great He wants to do with your situation, and He can't until you heal.

You'll find your healing in the Scriptures, so stay in the Scripures. Use God's healing recipe and do everything that it says to do, and get your spiritual tapes out and stay there till you're set free. If you don't get up and out of the gloom you're in, satan will run rampid with your life and you'll lose your chance to be with your loved one again.

You want to go to God to heal you. He knows what you've been through, He's the only one who can take you back through.

Isaiah 43:2, "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they will not overwhelm you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned or scorched, nor will the flame kindle upon you".

Satan took you through the water and the water rose so rapidly you were washed away. He took you through the river, and the torrents came down with such great suddenness force, it drowned you. He took you through the fire and it burned you. But God, He will take you back through the water and you'll not be washed away. He will take you back through the river and the river will not overtake you. He will take you back through the fire and it will not burn you.

Take your situation to God and let Him walk you through the valley of the shadow of death, and you'll no longer fear evil. Let Him take you back through and into the glory of His comforting love. You will not heal by holding onto the pain. So let it Go and get on with your life. Like the Scripture said, "Get Over It". Your eternal life depends on it.

Romans 6:5 speaks on our reunion with Jesus in heaven. "If we have been united with Him like this in His death, we will certainly be united with Him in His resurrection". Don't lose this blessing!

God loves you and He is with your loved one. He is taking care of them and they are in the best of hands. Get rid of the pain so God can come into you and create for you something that will give you joy beyond the pain.

P.S.
Why did your loved one die? In due time God will reveal this mystery to you. It will all come out in the wash, washed by the blood of Jesus.

Let us join together in prayer:

Father in Heaven, we give thanks for every life that is remembered here today. Comfort us in our time of grief and remind us that our tears, and our memories, are forever sacred. May we remember that "In the evening when we cry, that joy will come in the morning." Teach us, O Lord, to live always with an open heart, for we know that love withdraws when we close our hearts, yet ever awaits an open door. O God of hope, with our hearts open, let us always remember and never forget the one you shared with joy, and we are grateful, Amen.