Imagine losing your first-born son, your very first grandchild, your first ever nephew, the oldest cousin of the entire clan. What do you do? Naturally, at first, it doesn’t seem real because there is just no way it could have happened. You question absolutely everything, from the most significant thing to the least. You swear up and down that there is no way it could have happened because you saw him not even three days ago and everything was perfectly normal and he was healthy and just all around great.
The entire family – which is a rather large one -floods your inbox sending messages of condolences. Everyone is at your house, calling you, texting you, and you’re trying not to lose your head because you need to be strong, if not for you, then for your family. You’re tired, but you can’t sleep, your once enormous appetite has now gone M.I.A.
You pray to God to let this be a bad dream but soon realize it’s not- it’s real and it’s happening. What options do we have left at this point? As awful a situation it is, there are some members of the family that are calm – sad and completely heartbroken, but calm. It seems as if they could care very little but it’s quite the contrary, they understand that God has a plan for everything and for everyone. We may not understand it, but He does. And unfortunately, this is one of those situations we cannot change.
So how exactly do we find that much need peace?
We pray. We pray for strength because this is one of those situations that we cannot get through on our own. Even though every family member is feeling the sting of the lost loved one and physically we're not alone, but we feel as though we are. It's a completely different form of "alone," it really almost feels like 'abandonment.' So we pray, for answers that perhaps we'll never really get, we pray for comfort, and for an endless supply of strength that we need in order to get through the tough day we know is still ahead of us.
We know the void we now feel will never be filled but at the very least we come to the understanding that God has a reason for everything. Like the story of Job in the Bible, he had everything, prosperous land and healthy sons and daughters. One day that was all taken away from him but he knew that despite not understanding why, it was Gods will. Job 1:21 says: "The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away."
We don't know why things like this happen, and we hands down will never really understand why, but one thing I know for sure is that we are overcomers. There is nothing that can be thrown at us that with God's help, we cannot get through.
