Wake Up, Look Up

[Music]

hello everyone thanks for listening to

wake up lookup a podcast where we

connect events happening in real time to

the Gospel of Jesus Christ I'm Zach

wrock and in today's episode we're

asking the question is grief good for us

this is prompted by an article I read

this week called why we are getting

worse at grieving now the article was

looking at social media and the fact

that we know more about what's going on

in the world than we ever have before

which means almost every day we're

hearing about yet another sad story

natural disaster a terrorist attack some

some kind of awful horrific thing that

produces in US grief uh feeling of

sadness empathy for those who are

suffering or at least it used to the

author talked about how we're all living

in this state of shallow grief kind of

all the time we we don't really know the

people involved and and we don't really

know if we can do anything about it but

uh we're kind of sad because we know bad

stuff is happening it's almost like our

our knowledge of what's going on in the

world supersedes our capacity we know

that we we can't aim at it so we're just

kind of sad and grieving all the time

but the unfortunate consequence of

knowing about all that's going on in the

world is that it desensitizes us to

grief in two ways one is we learn to

suppress that shallow grief so we learn

how to shove down or swallow the grief

we're feeling because after all we can't

do anything about hurricane victims we

can't do anything about people in that

far off country where that bad thing

happened but it also can lead to a

desensitize to The Grieving around us so

the more comfortable I get with ignoring

and moving through grief maybe the less

helpful I am when someone actually close

to me someone who I could help someone

who I could be there for is in fact

grieving I'll just say two things about

this in by way of kind of bringing the

Bible to bear on it one is this is

another way I worry that social media

isn't helping us we we know too much and

and sometimes knowing too much about the

world leads to knowing too little about

our world the more time I'm in my phone

the less aware I am of what's going on

around me so we're becoming good at kind

of corporate grief and really bad at

personal grief because personal grief

and this is the second thing is

something the Bible calls us to pretty

regularly I mean Ecclesiastes 3 tells us

there's a time to mourn there's a a time

to grieve that is God's sanctioning

grief if you read through the Suter The

Book of Psalms you would you would find

a great many of them are dealing with

difficulty and pain to to grieve isn't

to be less than human or less than

worshipful uh actually to not grieve is

to be less than human and less than

worshipful because part of grief is

driving us to God part of it is driving

us to ask God for the world to be made

new to to to want change renewal these

are things that God brings Jesus did

this by the way in John 11 when his

friend Lazarus dies when Jesus knows

even he's getting ready to raise Lazarus

from the dead I mean he knows he's going

to do that he still weeps because death

is bad it's hard grief is a natural

response listen in Galatians 6 when

we're told to Bear one another's burdens

it doesn't mean liking a post or sharing

it on Facebook or Twitter what it means

is to actually sit with someone who's

crying and cry to actually join them in

their pain to join them in their

discomfort to bring a meal to clean

their house to do something practical

and loving and compassionate because

their grief matters to you they matter

to you listen are you any good at

grieving with those around you do you

even know who's struggling around you I

I mean brothers and sisters listening to

this podcast listen we have to be able

to turn off

technology enough to see people around

us who is hurting I I think about my own

church where we start almost every

service with here's someone who's lost a

family member and I wonder how many of

us myself included just blow by that

it's just yet another data point in our

world of grief but it is the data point

that's a person we can actually help a

person we can actually care for grief

for the with those around us matters

also because the Bible teaches us while

grief is a natural and normal response

to death and decay

it is always done because of Jesus with

Hope on the horizon in 1 Thessalonians 4

Paul says we should grieve but we should

grieve in a particular way knowing that

Christ is making all things new listen

when you're the one experiencing the

grief that feels A Million Miles Away

which is why I need you to sit with me

in that moment and remind me when

appropriate after we've cried together

that Jesus is at work which you can't do

for me and I can't do for you if we're

not paying attention and if we are on

our phones is grief good for us not the

social media kind not the low level

resting hum of knowing that the world is

broken but a deep personal relational

proximity driven Ministry driven

presence driven kind of grief is

essential for what God has calling us to

as a church are you any good at handling

grief I know I need to get better let's

do it for the glory of God and for the

good of each other hey thanks so much

for watching this episode of wake up

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