pretty. neat.

Our culture routinely interprets losses as alien invasions that interrupt our "normal" lives... We search for spiritual shortcuts around our wounds. We demand others to take away our pain... Turning toward our pain is counterintuitive. But in fact, the heart of Christianity is that the way to life is through death, the pathway to resurrection is through crucifixion... the quickest way to reach the sun and the light of day is not to run west chasing after it, but to head east into the darkness until you finally reach the sunrise.

[Job] did not avoid the horror of his predicament but confronted it directly. What we do know is that he paid attention to both God and himself, choosing to enter the confusion of his personal "dark night of the soul"... My greatest challenge in following Jesus Christ...has been waiting on God when things are confusing... Birthing Ishmaels is common in both our churches and personal lives. 'Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him' (Psalm 37:7) remains one of the most radical commands of our day. It requires enormous humility. Job waited for a long time even when the people closest to him quit. They did not have a big enough God or theology to walk through phase two of grieving--waiting in the confusing in-between. Job emerged from his suffering transformed. After his great loss and time of waiting, God spoke to Job out of the storm of his life...suggesting a new level of intimacy and closeness with Job. (I had only heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes. Job 42:5)

[After we go through this] We are fully aware of how fragile we are and are under no illusions. We are at home with ourselves and content to rely on the mercy of God. Everything is a gift. Good grieving is not just letting go, but also letting it bless us. Job did just that, the old life for Job was truly over. That door remained closed. That is the great grief about our losses. There is finality. We can't get it back. Yet when we follow Job's path we will be blesses. That is the lesson of Job. As he followed the difficult path of allowing his losses to enlarge his soul for God, God blessed him superabundantly. This account is meant to encourage us to trust the living God with the many mini-deaths that we experience in our lives. "I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies it produces many seeds." (John 12:24) But remember, resurrection only comes out of death--real death. Our losses are real. And so is our God, the living God. There are many rich fruits that blossom in our lives as a result of embracing our losses. the greatest, however, concerns our relationship to God.

-Pete Scazzero, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality