Late Night Visitor – Grief and Joy

Living with grief takes a toll on one’s emotions, health, and spiritual life. There is a time to mourn just as there is a time to laugh; so I had an idea. I put grief and joy in the same room with me (with 6 feet separation and we are all wearing masks).  Here is what happened.

Grief:  “Hi Kristine, are you going to introduce me to your friend?”

Me:  “Hi Grief.  Yes, I am going to introduce you to my friend.  Grief, this is Joy, Joy this is Grief.”

(Neither can they shake hands, nor can they see a smile on each other’s face, so they nod to each other.)

Joy:  “Hello, Grief.

Grief:  “Hello, Joy.”

Me:  “Grief, Joy, I brought you two together because I need you to know that you both exist in my life. Grief, you and I were spending way too much time together and it was taking a toll on my concentration. I had some negative comments when you were at your peak, but not everyone knows how tight we have been and it just looked like I was not on my game.  I was reading the Bible one day and I met Joy.

As the Bible states in Ecclesiastes 3:4 it is okay that both of you are in my life.  The verse says, “a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance”.  I don’t always want to be sad and I don’t always feel like laughing or dancing, but whatever emotion I want to feel, I need you two to respect, as well as, get out of the way of the other.  I would like to send you away, Grief, but Jesus said that in this world we will have trouble, but He has overcome the world and that is why Joy needs to step in between us more often. I am hanging onto Jesus’s promises rather than settling in with sadness. Jesus overcoming this world is really good news for me because I cannot do this alone or with my own strength.”

Living with grief takes a toll on one’s emotions, health, and spiritual life.  Let Jesus in with the joy He has in store for you and watch your emotions, health, and spiritual life be rejuvenated.

 

About the Mountain Top

No Regrets

Daily Post Prompt: Kick It
What’s the 11th item on your bucket list?

In Mysterious Ways

Mystery writers fill us with suspense. The pins and needles type of suspense. Who done it? twisted stories that keep the reader at the edge of their seat. There is an expectation for suspense, sprinkled with elements of fear.

How often have you heard, or said, this phrase? “God works in mysterious ways”. What does that mean to you? 

If your spouse, family or friend did something that seemed out of the ordinary, would you say, “My spouse/family/friend works in mysterious ways”.  Probably not as it sounds silly.  Why then do we insert God in the sentence and make it seem alright?

God, the author of our lives, does not want us living as if we sit on pins and needles.  He wrote love, joy, peace and kindness into our life-script.  Take a look into a few passages from the Bible for examples… 

Jeremiah 31:3 
The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness”.

Psalm 30:11
You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy

Psalm 4:8 
In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, LORD, make me dwell in safety.

God, …who loves with an everlasting love, clothes us with joy, draws us with unfailing kindness, and allows us peaceful rest because He is in control…, does nothing “mysterious” in my life.  

Expect a mystery writer to take you down some suspenseful paths, always wondering ‘who done it?’.  As a Christian, I can faithfully point to Jesus on the cross, the one ‘who done it’ so I need not live in fear, and, know the end of the story; eternal life.