Book recommendation for those who are hurting
(I originally posted this message recommending Robert W. Kellemen’s book God’s Healing for Life’s Losses to my personal Facebook account on May 13, 2023. I’m posting it here in case someone who’s stumbled across my blog is hurting and needs to hear it.)
This is a great book on grieving. I’m reading it a little late in my journey, but that’s okay because it’s allowed me to see how faithful God has been to me the last three years as I grieved the loss of my marriage. Looking back, I see how instead of feeling like I couldn’t be honest about how what had happened made me feel, God gave me the freedom to tell Him exactly what I was thinking, even when it involved questioning His faithfulness. When the pain was so intense that it threatened to overwhelm me, He showed me that I could cry out to Him for strength and then He ministered to me in so many ways and through so many people, I can’t even list them all. And when I went through seasons of depression, He comforted me repeatedly with His promises to eventually use everything that had happened to me for my good and to meet all my needs in His way and in His timing.
If I had to describe my grief journey to this point, it would be this: I’ve gone through some dark valleys in the last 3 years. God allowed something really painful to happen to me, and as a result, I was tempted to doubt His trustworthiness and His love. But by His grace, I wrestled with those doubts and I realized that even though it seemed impossible, I believed that God was good and that He would be able to use my pain for good. I had been wounded, but it wasn’t a fatal wound. God would heal it. And now with every passing season, I realize that even though I have scars, those scars don’t keep me from loving life. In fact, somehow they’re helping me enjoy it even more. In the words of Vaneetha Risner, “my scars have shaped me”. They’re part of who I am now, part of my story. And my story has all the elements of a good one—unexpected plot twists, new characters, and a Hero. ❤️
I’m sure I’ll pass through more dark valleys in the future because “in this life you will have trouble…” And I’m sure that when those times come, I’ll feel just as scared as I did with this one because that’s just how trials are—they’re scary and devastating and disorienting and lots of other horrible emotions. But this trial has taught me three things: First, God will never leave me in the valley. Valleys are temporary, even though when you’re in one it feels like you’ll be there forever. Second, God is with me when I’m in the valley, even when I can’t see or feel him. And third, it’s actually the “not seeing” Him in the valley that He uses to strengthen my faith so that I can eventually climb out of it. There’s purpose in the confusion because it forces me to examine what I believe and depend on God for the strength to endure. And God, being who He is, NEVER disappoints.
“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!” Romans 11:33