Good Grief

There really is such a thing. This week we have been led through grief, even corporately, something I never expected to experience.

Will you pray for our family this weekend? 

Most of our new friends now feel like family and they are leaving on Friday. We have a weekend open and then start our next two week program. The Littles are going to have a new teacher and three new classmates. They are going to miss Obie, big time. Over the weekend they were annoyed when they couldn’t be with him.

Naptime on “the cute little cots”…

“Each stage of life brings a new set of changes.  and each change brings with it unavoidable losses.  The reality of these losses needs to be acknowledged and incorporated into ourselves and the world.  This is essential if we are to recover from loss; it’s the process we go through in a particular recovery hourney called grief. Grief is not itself something we recover from.

Grief helps us recover from the many losses we experience. Grief makes it possible for us to face the painful reality of our losses, incorporate those losses into our understanding of ourselves, our world and God Himself, and somehow move on.

The purpose of grief is not to help us to forget what we have lost, but to help us grow in understanding, compassion and courage in the midst of our losses.

We all know that grief is emotionally painful work. Grief allows us to heal and grow, but the cost in emotional energy is often very high. Because of this, we often seek ways to postpone the disciplines of grief. We may tell ourselves to “Look on the bright side,” or to “keep a smile on our face.” But attempts to avoid the emotionally painful process of grief do not lead to growth.”

-Adapted from “Recovery from Loss” by Dale and Juanita Ryan

Our group altar of what God has taught us the past three weeks.