By Kyle Dushane
My mind wanders as I set up ball after ball on an oversized golf tee while my 4yr old son whacks away with an orange plastic club, and forces me to carry his Fisher Price Golf bag like we’re walking up the ocean-lined 18th hole at Pebble Beach. At his age, contact ratio with the ball hovers right around 50%, which can lead to toddler weeping, tantrums, and frustration, but contact with my shin is much more painful, even if only a 1% contact ratio. Despite my leg pain, and a few choice words masked for kid’s ears, the privilege to be spending this unscheduled, focused, quality time as a caddy for my favorite skinny mini-me, doing activities that fill HIS love tank, has not been lost on me.
During this very unique, challenging, and confusing quarantine situation, we are all trying to understand how God is using our struggle to be a blessing for his church. Many of us may never know someone who is personally inflicted with this disease, and yet, grief and loss due to absence of family, friends, classmates, and communion of saints is pure angst, all the same. Even as Christians, with the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, it’s very difficult to process our own losses, and comfort others while still actively pursuing our commission to spread the Gospel of Christ on an individual and personal level. Maybe, just maybe, the true blessing in all of this will be the lessons learned to truly connect and comfort others on a spiritual level, even while physically separated.
Before we reflect on others, let’s consider ourselves…..How are you processing this time? Are you spending extra time in prayer? Are you looking for online community with your church or school? How about dusting off those old Jazzercise or Insanity workout videos? Maybe eating extra Girl Scout cookies (They were supposed to last ‘til summer, ya know…hence the workout videos)? Or are you at your computer writing a blog while making jokes to bring some light to the situation? God has personally crafted you as a unique individual, and every response to this pandemic will be distinctly unique.
The problem with being uniquely human is the uneasiness we all have when we don’t know how, exactly, to share our grief process WITH others, or to flex our emotions to support the process OF others. Unless you really know someone, and I mean really know exactly how many times your 2 year old princess wants to listen to the Frozen soundtrack on repeat, chances are you won’t know precisely what someone needs and when they need it (1,237 times is the answer by the way…I just have to “Let it Go”). That feeling of helplessness is a natural human response and creates tension. But despite this tension, we know that through baptism, Christ has personally anointed us with his Spirit, and through his power, we are still called to personally minster to others during this trying time.
What this means, is that we should avoid pat answers; avoid cliché responses. Due to our human awkwardness, Christians have the tendency to lean toward these depersonalized statements, or even take it further and give our opinions of “proper” emotional and spiritual response. When you open your favorite digital window to the outside world through an App on your phone, you’ve seen these quotes before, right?…”God wouldn’t give you something you can’t handle”, “Now is when prayer is most important”, “Focus on your blessings”, “You have to dig a hole before planting a flower”, or in the prophetic words of Kelly Clarkson “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”…Sounds familiar? If we’re honest, none of these statements are an example of “personally ministering”. Unfortunately, while maybe well intentioned, these wrote statements can often backfire if the person is in the depths of grief, and your sunny disposition is the last thing their spirit needs at that moment.
I’m guilty of these things, aren’t we all? Do you know why? When we tear down some walls and admit it, these statements are a selfish façade so others don’t see your personal grief and fear. When we are unsure of what’s next and sense the awkwardness of a situation, we sometimes just want to say something we think will defuse the tension of grief so we can back away and leave others where they stand. As a result, we sometimes resort to those clichéd Christian responses, or even rattle off some out-of-context, generic scripture passage like we’re leaving a telemarketing voicemail. We should try to avoid these practices. Try to avoid telling people what to think and how to feel when they experience grief and loss. Sometimes, the best support is silence….just cry with them, just listen, read their heart, feel their pain. When the timing is right, and the opportunity presents itself, absolutely remind them of Jesus’ promises and turn to scripture, but love them enough to know what they need at that precise moment.
During your bible studies this week, and keeping in mind this season of Lent, consider digging in to John, Chapter 11, and soak in the story of Lazarus’ death and his personal resurrection in the power of Christ. In particular, the Apostle John tells us in verses 17 – 27, the story of Jesus’ personal ministry to the mourning sisters of Lazarus. Just a few short weeks before his entrance into Jerusalem, Jesus returns to Bethany four days after hearing of his good friend’s death. On the road, Mary and Martha come out to meet him, separately, but in their grief make the same exact statement: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” (John 11: 21 Martha and 32b Mary) Now, you’d think the same statement would warrant the same response; and yet, although both women shared grief over their dead brother, their hearts were uniquely different, and just watch how Jesus ministers to each of them, personally: To Martha, Jesus knew her heart was filled with doubt and he challenged her thinking, essentially rebuking her momentary lack of faith. He ultimately called her to a dependency on him; With Mary, her heart was filled with sadness, but dependency on Christ had not waivered. Jesus simply came nearer to Mary, and wept along with her. Jesus, fully human, loved his friends so purely that he knew how best to comfort each, ministering to them individually in their grief and loss.
The agony of caddying for a demanding toddler, while my shins bleed from a plastic 7-iron may not compare to Jesus’ troubled spirit upon sharing the emotions of Mary and Martha, it can be a simple reminder of our Heavenly Father’s unfailing, never-ending, and PERSONAL ability to carry our burdens. While still in the quarantine of sin, Christ became sin for YOU on the cross, he took upon YOUR inequities, he put to death YOUR transgressions, and he continues to minister to YOU, personally, today through his Spirit. It is in these truths that we can trust and know his resurrection, and victory over death on Easter morning, is YOUR resurrection and YOUR salvation. Through Christ, we have full confidence for an eternity of unscheduled quality time with our personal heavenly Father, where the contact ratio will always be 100%.