When God Doesn’t Stop the Pain: The Truth About Grief | The Unbound Podcast Everything in this world that we love, we will lose. >> Say that again. >> Everything in this world that you love, you will lose. >> God, I need you now to make it cuz I don't think I can make it. >> Grief is that club that nobody wants to be a part of, but you're forced into it. For me, it was April 14th, 2015. The worst day of my life ((music playing)) still. I'm not supposed to just close this thing out and lock it down. >> I think it's more helpful to think of grief not as a journey but a language. The goal of a language is not to finish. The goal of a language is to become >> Here we go. ((music playing)) >> Well, it's my privilege to welcome to our Unbound podcast today, Dr. John Aku Chapa. Fix it for me. >> An Wua. [laughter] Okay. >> An Woo Czecha. All right. >> There we go. >> Now, that's Nigerian, I believe. >> Nigerian. >> Okay. Are you That's where you were born? >> Uh, I was born in Houston, Texas. So, [laughter] my parents were born there. They came over >> uh mid70s. >> Oh, okay. >> My dad landed in I think the first place was Boaz, Alabama. boy, Alabama and Pine Blood. >> He got baptized. >> Oh, listen. He got baptized real quick. [laughter] >> Well, I've had the privilege of going to Nigeria, I think about five times. Okay. >> Five times. And uh very interesting more than me. I've been >> Is that right? >> Yeah. >> Largest black nation in in the world. >> People don't know it. People don't know it. Uh 200 million people in Nigeria. >> Yeah. Wow. Yeah, there is a of course it's been in the news lately with uh >> all of the violence particularly against Christians and you know I know others as well but the large percentage by Christians how how has that >> affected you or have you been too distant from it for for you to engage in? >> Yeah. Yeah. So my parents um they go back probably once a year. >> Oh okay. So yeah yeah yeah still lots of family there and um you know it's an interesting thing when you talk about a country like that being yeah ravaged and being able to face that kind of grief right you think back to people know a whole lot about the genocide in Rwanda uh that took place 16 million people know about uh parttheid 60 million people most people do not know of uh baffan war uh civil war that took place there between 67 and 70 and that story has just largely been untold. So it's an interesting thing when it comes to Nigerians and the things that they grieve and how vocal and quiet they are about certain things. So yeah. Yeah. >> And it's it's it's a humongous Christian community. >> Absolutely. Absolutely. And what is the what is the angst against Christianity there? >> So that is something that is above my pay grade. I do not know. Part of it is um I've got an uncle that that says um Nigeria is an experiment that never should have worked. that when uh the British left in the 60s um really you have these three distinct tribes, Yoruba, Ibo that in some ways should have been three different countries and when they left it's like y'all are there [laughter] out. So there has been that angst yo-yo all across the board and it is a miracle that things are still together the way that they are. >> Wow. Well, we have to keep our brothers and sisters in prayer there because I know many are going through a very tough season. >> Absolutely. >> Now you are a writer, a teacher, a preacher, a pastor. You you're kind of one man kind of conglomerate [laughter] there. >> Yeah. So talk talk a little bit about you, your background and kind of >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. >> Let's let's let our folks get introduced to you. >> Yeah. So um my parents were strong believers, strong Christians and um grew up in the church every Sunday. Uh we grew up driving to church uh listening to the urban all you didn't. afterwards, me and you have to get a picture cuz I got to show my mom and my dad. And so it it was a it it was ingrained in me early. >> Um and the only re like there's a lot of people now that as they talk about their faith, they look back and they say, "It was so hard for me to believe that God was real because I saw the way that my mom and dad talked and I saw the way that they lived. Um, [clears throat] it was easy for me to believe that God was real because I saw the way that my mom and dad talked and I saw the way that they lived. >> Um, and [clears throat] I remember [snorts] the summer before going to college, I was set to go walk on and play ball with my brother Sam. And that was where I was going to go. My dad really wanted me to go to Baylor. And um 3 weeks after graduating high school, my parents took me and my uh four brothers and sisters to Nigeria. And [clears throat] while we were there, um 4 days before we were getting ready to come back home at 17 years old, we're driving down this um dirt road and [clears throat] our car gets a flat tire. Our driver steps out of the car, changes the flat tire. We're all out of the car, and before he gets in, two men come from out of nowhere with guns, and they shoot the guns up in the air, and they say, "Oh, y'all get down on the ground." So, we're laying face down on the ground, right? Heart is beating as the bags in our car hit the ground. And as a 17-year-old kid, all I could think about was um I think I've wasted my life. That everything that I spent my life trying to work for that with one bullet to the back of my head, it it could all be >> taken. And that was a time where it was uh you know, I did what anybody else does and I bartered with God, right? is like, "Yo, God, if you save me, I will spend the rest of my life >> telling people how good you are." >> The men left. Our driver was nowhere to be found. We were stranded in the middle of nowhere, Nigeria, 2002, pre-Cell. And [clears throat] um through a series of events, God saved us. We got out. Um we left when we should. And before I went off to school, I was just reeling and I just felt like, "All right, Lord, you did what you said that you were going to do." And so from then on, it was just uh I want to know God. I want him to be real. And I want everybody in my orbit to know him well. And that led me to Baylor, then Dallas Theological Seminary, then church planning in Atlanta, and then um leaving the pastor to spend my time um writing and helping people work through grief and hope. And along the way, met and married my beautiful wife, Ashandra, for 18 years, and we got a eight-year-old daughter, Ava. And >> yeah, so [laughter] that's the long and short of it. >> Wow, that's that's uh quite a story. Um that was quite an event to to see your kind of your life go before you and not know how it's going to work out. And so is it okay to barter with God? [laughter] >> I do not know. I know that I have come up short on my end of the bargain. [laughter] >> Most of us have. >> Yeah. But he's been gracious. >> Well, one of the great truths of scripture is that when when we are faithless, he is faithful. So trusting in the faithfulness of God, even when we're not uh batting 100 Absolutely. Right. Right. Right. >> It's pretty It's pretty critical. It's pretty critical. >> So this thing about >> grief, how did you get into that lane >> and and begin to develop uh this focus? >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, uh, unwillingly, right? Grief is that it's that club that nobody wants to be a part of, but you're forced into it. Um, for me it was um, April 14th, 2015. Uh, the worst day of my life. Still, you remember the worst day of your life because you remember the the unimportant things, right? It was a Tuesday. I was in Orlando, Florida, getting ready to speak at a conference and sitting at a Longhorn steakhouse when I'm getting these calls from my mother. [snorts] I go out, I answer the phone call in that humid Orlando heat and um she's having a hard time getting a hold of my brother Sam. So, I call around. I call my god brother and I hear him say that my brother passed out. And so I said, "Wake him up." Uh, but what he actually said was, "Sam passed away." And I just remember just me and everybody waiting in line at that Longhorn Steakhouse learning that my brother Sam died at the same time. And I just kept on saying, "He's dead. He's dead." And then I had to, you know, I said the word Sam's dead 10 times to my five family members because every time I said it the first time they said what and [clears throat] it's just a and I was a wreck for the next two weeks. And this was um 8 weeks before we planted a church in Atlanta. M >> I was 30 years old, a couple of months away from turning 31. And at the time, I hadn't had anybody that lost a brother. I didn't know what to do about my grief. I was surrounded by people that tried to rush me towards hope. >> And I started a church eight weeks later. And [clears throat] I kept saying I was good and pretending I was good. And [clears throat] a year later, uh, my life was falling apart to the point where >> the friends that I had just had to say, "Hey, John, I think you pastoring and helping people put their life together um, is the anesthetic that is numbing you to the fact that yours is falling apart." >> Wow. And for the first time, I sat down and [clears throat] you know, uh, CS Lewis says, um, I sat [laughter] with my anger long enough to realize that her real name was grief. >> And, [clears throat] uh, that started my journey, convinced April 14th would remain the worst day of my life. unredeemable. Nothing would change it. >> Wow. This you you used a phrase I think it's the only time I've ever heard the phrase grief club. [laughter] >> Grief a club. a a club that um all of us unfortunately have to face in some form uh some way >> because life throws those at us, you know, >> and the closer it gets to us, our loved ones, our family members, >> the greater the impact. >> And then [clears throat] you introduce this whole thing of dichotomy. you're you're helping other people when [snorts] you've not fully dealt with your own situation. Let's let's talk about the >> of the sophisticated term maybe the the dialectic of grief or the the tension points of >> of trying to minister and help other people. Was that more of an escape? >> Uh I mean that you you said another thing. I mean you you got and you're just casual conversation. [laughter] You're dropping bombs here. U of this this thing of [snorts] >> trying to rush you to hope. >> Rush you to hope. Okay. Everybody needs hope, but but you can be forced there when you're not ready to receive it. Talk a little bit about that. Okay. >> Yeah. Yeah. This is it. Uh it is not that the things that people told me about the resurrection and hope and that Sam is there and I will see him one day. It's not that it was untrue. I feel like it was under true, right? Like >> under true. >> Okay, so yeah, this what I mean like >> it is as to rush people to hope is as dangerous as an overeager grillm serving chicken. [laughter] Have you ever been to a cook out and there's a guy and he's just ready to get things off the grill and it's oh no no no no it's not that what you served me is uncooked it's undercooked and you give me that pink chicken and it's going to hurt everybody that in inested they're going to throw it up because it's not done yet and that's that's what I feel like when we try to rush people towards hope we haven't let them or us sit long enough to process the reality, right, that um God can be good and I can be sad at the same time. >> You're actually giving people permission to be sad, you know, and to let that grief process, you know, >> you know, you know, I love illustrations, you know, I love illustrations and you just dropped another bomb on you [clears throat] know that that undercooked meat >> can hurt you. Oh, yeah. No, not because it's not good, it's just not ready. Okay, so this whole thing of >> getting people ready and walking them through their pain, their hurt, their tears, their longings, >> their disappointments with circumstances, and maybe even with God, that God allowed it and didn't stop it, right? uh that process, help me, help us understand how you walk through it and how you're now helping other people kind of take that journey. >> Uh one of the most important books for me, one of the only books I could read at the time was Ecclesiastes. This is what context matters, right? Like we come to the Bible as we are with the pains that we have. My brother Sam was the closest family member that I had. >> I was frustrated with God. I was mad with God. And so it's like, "All right, I'm going to start to read the Bible. Let me just start from the top." By the fourth chapter, you have two brothers and one brother kills his brother. I wanted to throw up when I read that. I just couldn't. And so I'm like, "All right, let me just keep on." And then you've got Jacob and Esau and then you've got Joseph and all of this tension with brothers. I just it was hard for me. So I went to Ecclesiastes and it was the most hopeful book that I read. The opening lines filled me with hope. And you the folks are like I don't think [laughter] that you know what right. And it just starts off and it says, you know, meaningless, meaningless. Everything's meaningless. And why filled me with hope was that I know who wrote that book or at least who they want us to think like wrote that like it is this Solomonque guy who had it all. And that's when it hit me, right? I felt I felt like that, but because I lost it all, I was in a valley. He felt like that. And he had it all. we we had arrived at the same emotional place even though circumstantially we were apart. And that was the thing that helped me see maybe my depression isn't circumstantial. And if my depression isn't circumstantial, maybe hope and joy isn't even right. Maybe nothing in my life has to change and everything about my life can't change. Maybe tragedy doesn't ruin any [clears throat] and anybody. Hopelessness does. And so as I read and journeyed through that book, it was just the reality of um you know there's a guy Francis Wella um uh just so wise in this grief space and he brings the truth that is in Ecclesiastes just this concept that you have to sit with as you walk through these uh gates of grief and the first one is that we all have to sit with the fact like everything in this world that We love we will lose. >> Say that again. >> Everything in this world that you love, you will lose. That is gravity. That is fact. You cannot argue. It's going to happen. And when you first hear it, it it is cinder blocks on your ankles and you feel like your soul just sinks. But the goal of that phrase is not to make your soul sink. It's to make us sober. It's to remind us that uh these beautiful moments in life are as fragile as they are precious. It's meant to make us a better, more present version of ourselves. And as I journey through Yeah. >> No, no, you you you >> I saw Yeah. >> You're No, I'm I'm feel I'm I'm hearing you and feeling you at the same time. I'm I'm I'm mo I'm moing with you now. as I journeyed through all of that, it was those things that like changed me, right? So, my brother was the closest family member I had. um as I've worked through kind of what's gone on these past few years, there's a lot of grief that I have in that um I [clears throat] am I can get so wrapped up in the things that I do that uh I am not the best son or sibling but Sam was like my gateway and my key. So when Sam passed, um I know that pain that I felt and I think most times when a family member passes, you want to draw closer to the ones that are still there. The opposite took place for me. I instinctively distanced myself from the rest of my family [clears throat] because I felt on the inside, man, if it hurt this much to lose him. I do not want to go through that same pain when all of them go because I know that they'll go. And I thought I was protecting myself from future pain, but as time went on, I learned that I was robbing myself of present joy that I wouldn't get to any of their funerals. and feel like, man, great job that you didn't feel what you felt with Sam. I I I think I would get to all of them and feel a deep sense of regret. And um so it is like this sobering truth that is meant to change how we live here and now. It's meant to make us present, right? Whenever I'm with my daughter and my nose is buried in my phone, [snorts] grief just slithers up your spine and it whispers in your ear. Everything in this world that you love, you will lose. >> Take your nose out of your phone and nestle it into your daughter. And um >> I think that that diamond truth, that's [clears throat] the value I give to the statement that you just made. >> Yeah. Everything that you hold dear in this world, you will lose. >> That truth and the way you've tied it to scripture, your your journey Ecclesiastes >> makes the Bible come alive. The Bible is no longer a dead book because it's touching real life. >> Absolutely. You know this one one of the things in our you know our unbound series that we're doing tracing the journey of the Bible. One of the fascinating realities is seeing how much the movement of the word of God was integrated with life people problems chaos confusion war uh uh just just all kinds of angst >> in people and circumstances, cultures, personalities. And yet the Bible is emerging in that context, not in some theoretical ivy tower. Right. >> So when we read it and we read it like that. Yes. >> It has the same effect. It becomes alive because it is a living book coming out of living reality. >> Absolutely. >> Yeah. >> No. No. It Well, and so and it is it is the the biggest problem, right? Death is the biggest problem. Everything in this world that you love, you will lose. Period. End of sentence. Everybody agrees on that truth and on that fact. And then and then and so this is what changed it for me. And then Christianity comes in and [clears throat] uh I think about the gospel of John, right? Jesus deals with death three times. Very first time he stops a premature funeral. Uh God comes says, "My son's getting ready to die." Jesus says, "Your son will live." And then Lazarus is getting ready to die. And Jesus doesn't heal him from far off like he did that. He lets him die and then he goes and he soughts to raise him from the dead. And then the third time Jesus doesn't spare himself from death, but he he shares in the death that we all share. And this is what death does. Okay, there's a neuroscientist Dr. Mary Francis uh O. Connor and she says um you do not move through the world as you see the world. You move through the world as you remember the world. So it's this. You walk through your house if the lights are off. you can still make your way and you know how to avoid kitchen or yeah tables and things like that. >> If one day you wake up and you trip and you fall and you expect to hit a dining table and it's not there, you're shocked by the absence because you remember that it's there, but now it's not there. And so what your brain does is your brain is a GPS and it takes time to update. When our loved ones are here, it is a through street. >> When they die, it is a culdeac. And it takes your brain time to update to be reminded that when you send that text, they're not going to send a text back. >> Well, now that's another way of looking at GPS right there. [laughter] >> That's a that's a that's a different take on GPS. Yeah. But it's uh when Jesus dies, the disciples view that tomb as a culde-sac. I can't believe he's gone. And they feel that everything in this world that you love, you will lose. And they experience a depth of grief that we all do. But then Jesus raises from the dead. And for the first time, the culdesac is turned back into a through street. >> His death is one of a kind. Resurrection is the first of its kind. And that truth deals with the concept of death in the way that nobody else does. And so you have this group of people that can live life in this. And that was what did it for me, right? that there is this sense in which um everything in this world that you love you will lose and the rest of the world period full stop. >> Wow. Well, let let's let me let me personalize the >> the tension points of what you're sharing now. When I um when I lost my late wife in 2019, >> what was her name? >> Lois. Lois. We have this growing ministry, this dynamic ministry, this exploding ministry, [clears throat] >> and this great loss. >> And they they're happening simultaneously. >> Yeah. and trying to navigate, keeping the train moving [clears throat] and grieving that the her loss was like the eighth loss in my family in the two-year period of time. And so trying to navigate that as you tried to navigate because you went you went to pastor, you went to Okay. So handling the inside Mhm. [clears throat] >> while you're still functioning on the outside and trying to walk those things side by side. Talk about that. >> Yeah. >> That point of tension. >> Yeah. I think the point of tension came for me um because I misunderstood what grief was. Right. Metaphors matter. They are important. They are how we see the world. they are at the heartbeat of how I feel like you've helped so many right and when it comes to grief uh bad metaphors for grief um are not just unhelpful they are harmful because they give people the only thing in the world that is worse than real pain and that is false hope. This is what I mean. The reason why we try to run through and we try to go on is because it's been ingrained in us that grief is some kind of journey. The problem with that metaphor is journeys start and they end. >> Grief starts and it does not have an earthly end. And it's a cruel thing to send somebody in search of light at the end of a closed tunnel. So we go through and we move. We hear things like five stages of grief. >> Not knowing that Dr. Elizabeth >> Kubar Ross >> Ross created what was called the five stages of dying. She studied terminally ill patients that were on their way to death, not the people that they left behind. She spent her dying breath saying, "No, no, no, no. This never should have been imported to grief as some ant like this is a custom suit made for breathless bodies. So people find themselves in this place where they're like, "Oh, I haven't moved through." And it's a you're not supposed to move through. Right. >> There is a there is a freedom in that statement because when you tell me it's okay >> Oh, >> not to conclude. Yes. >> When when you have freed me up to to feel that it's it's okay. I'm not supposed to just close this thing out and lock it down. >> Never. >> That opens me up to keep living. >> Yes. >> And I feel like I have living lost. >> Yes. And so with that, I think it's more helpful to think of grief not as a journey but a language. The goal of a language is not to finish. The goal of a language is to become fluent. It is for the purpose of connection. It language deals with what I feel like is the true danger, the true malady I think that grief causes, right? That it's not just the [snorts] loss, it's not the initial loss, it's the eventual loneliness. And I think I spent my time trying to work through processing the loss and getting to a place where I don't feel the loss. And I did not realize that. No, no, no, it was actually the loneliness and the isolation and feeling like everybody had words, but all their words were the wrong ones. And I felt by myself and alone. And um that I think when we realize that uh grief changes how we live, how we speak, how we think, how we relate, then it starts to do things to us like um yeah, most 99% of the time when you talk to somebody that has lost somebody else, Dr. Evans, they're going to use a proper title for the person that they lost and they won't use their names. They will say, "I lost my brother. I lost my wife. I lost my mom." And I've learned that the only time it is polite to interrupt somebody when they talk is when they say, "I lost my wife." And you say, "What was her name?" >> "What was her name?" >> Because Yeah. Our loved ones, >> that's what you did with me. >> That's what I did with you. >> Oh, you you just made me a client. But I didn't even know it. Okay. Yeah. >> When when you do that, >> people smile a bit and their eyes go somewhere >> and then you ask, "Yeah, where did your eyes go?" Yeah. Would you >> Yeah. Would you tell me about them? >> And you find that um to be done with our grief is to close the door on our love. And I do not want to close the door on my love. I I [clears throat] want people to I want to be able to talk about uh my loved ones. I want them to to meet them and to and to know them, >> you know. And just in a on a whole personal note, um two years ago, I got remarried [clears throat] to >> Yeah. >> Carla, I give her name. Okay. [laughter] and her husband died on their way to my wife's funeral. He had a heart attack. >> He used to he used to work for me and they actually met at our church and then he went to pastor in Atlanta >> and and uh Robert >> Dr. Robert Oh, Dr. Robert Crummy. Okay. >> And um a couple of years later we I ran into her and we met and that that led to where we are today. But what you have reminded me of in our conversation is we will often sit down and we will reminisce by name. Lois and Robert. And now that I'm thinking about it and reflecting on it when we're reminiscing by names, we're keeping something alive [sighs and gasps] >> that would be would be dead in our minds if we did not give life to the reality of that >> and and to the ongoing reality since they're both with the Lord. We have, in fact, she pulled out a picture when they were at our conference of the four of us together and the [clears throat] two of them together. They were both sets of pictures and we were looking at the pictures and reminiscing about life. It gave life to something that you would tend to run from and and so it's a very dynamic Oh, it >> existence. Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. that of Carla, if she's ever going to know you fully, she's got to know Lois and the impact that [clears throat] she had on you that if you're ever going to know her fully. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. I have very dear friends in New York, Jordan and Jessica Rice. They're 44, both of their second marriage because they were tragically widowed in their 20s. >> Wow. >> Jessica's spouse died two and a half months into marriage. Jordan's spouse 10 months in, doctor comes in and says, um, pulls him out and says, um, she's got a form of brain cancer so rare I had to Google the pronunciation before I walked in the door. 10 months later, she's gone. Jordan and Jessica start to date other people. They date other people and they say, "Sorry for your loss. I don't know what to say." And then after time, it goes, "You sure do talk about them a lot? and is there any room for me? And the relationship ends. Jordan and Jessica meet each other and for the first time they meet somebody else fluent in widow. >> Fluent in widow. Okay. [laughter] >> And the conversation changes from sorry for your loss to ah would you tell me a story about your love? I want to know Giron. I want to know Danielle. And [clears throat] what you shared is the [laughter] exact same thing that they share. And this is Yeah. and giving people permission to do it. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> That you don't have to hold this in. What what what what we are talking about now is give not only the giving permission for the person with the loss, but the persons helping the people with the loss to help them better to walk through that. Let's talk about that for a moment. The the people who want to help don't know how to help. Help them help. >> Okay. This is this is the these are the two things that I think will help change people. The very first one we talked through um interrupt interrupt if somebody uses a proper title to talk about >> just like you interrupted me. >> Just like I did there. [laughter] Okay. >> What was their name? And then from there the main thing that people need to keep in their mind is this. >> Punctuation is some of the most important things that you keep in your mind. Most times when people die, we think that the best way to help is that the wouldbe comforter spends their time explaining a thing, trying to rush them to hope, or exclaiming a thing. They're in a better place and all that. And there's a time and place for that. But their statements are full of periods and exclamation marks. When at the end of the day, what keeps what what I found what helps the griever more than you know is not the words that come from you. It is the words that are trapped in them. And that comes with questions from you. >> What were they like? Can you tell me about that? How did they shape you? I want to hear about them. I want you to talk to them and you would be well I mean you wouldn't be surprised because you've gone through this but people that have never lost somebody close to them would be surprised at how little people ask uh about our loved ones and how little we have the opportunity to talk and to share. And it is it's those stories that remind us of them and how we've been changed and how we've been shaped. And so I would say proper titles, interrupt, ask them for specific names, and be mindful of your punctuation, ask more questions than you give statements. And I think that you'll see, right? People find themselves at this place where they're putting things together and being able to live and embody a kind of hope that they didn't even know that they had on the inside of them. our faith. We we're told to attach our faith to our realities, our belief system. The difference between sustaining faith and surviving faith. [laughter] I mean, God, I need you now to make it cuz I don't think I can make it. >> Versus the faith that keeps on allowing God to live in the moment that we are going through. >> Shape that for me from your perspective. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um so it's this right >> [clears throat] >> uh when it comes to this kind of grief there are three different sites or three different ways that we see things right one is you know our foresight and we'll go through a loss and we want God to make the future clear God I want to know exactly how you're going to use this to shape me and the future is always blurry it >> so As long as we see the shape of hope, then that's fine. Insight, I think we tend to think that all right, we have to piece together present puzzle pieces to put it to together and to find this hope. But God works in mysterious ways and we especially in our grief are not Sherlock Holmes. We're not going to piece together present. It is this incredible gift of hindsight. Um, and so what I mean is, um, the thing in our grief that we need more than anything else, um, is a type of patience. It is a type of look, I God, I do not know what you're doing, but Lord, just help me to make it to the point where you help me see a trace of what it is that you're trying to do, and things turn the corner. And then I think at that point things change. This is what I mean. Practical story. April 14th, 2015, my brother dies. Me and my wife have no kids at this time. We are grieving unexplained infertility. 4 days ago. We had an adoption that failed. 4 days later, Sam dies. I am a wreck. I do not remember much of the next two years except for um feeling very insecure about everything I thought about God's goodness and wisdom and kindness. And I was surrounded by a group of people that were just patient with me. April 14th, 2017, it is a Good Friday, two years to the day that Sam died. Our daughter is 8 days old in the ICU. Um, yoyo niku. She was born uh you know on a April the six breathing tubes all in her. >> And the scary the thing that you remember about the anniversary of the worst day of your life is you secretly hope that the worst day of your life stays the worst day of your life cuz you never want any other day to take first place. >> Amen. >> I remember what it was like. Good Friday. Sitting there with my daughter. I've got to drive back to preach and my wife lets me hold her for the 60 minutes that I can have her out of there. And I cannot sing at all, Dr. Evans. But I remember the precise tones and pitches of all of the um beeps that reminded me that my daughter was still breathing on that machine. And I remember the way that my heart sank when all the makings of another April 14th tragedy began. Before I knew it, the doctor pulls her out of my hands and all I hear is those beeps go deafeningly silent and he places her back in my arms um and he says, "Uh, today's the day your daughter's going to breathe on her own. two years to the day my brother took his final breath. >> My daughter takes her first unassisted breath and it is on Good Friday, >> a day where we call it good because joy and >> and that was a >> I don't remember much of the two years in between Sam's death and that date, but I remember vividly everything that's going on there. And that was the [clears throat] thing that God used for me to turn that corner. And so what I do is I constantly find ways to share that story because it stories are the thing that help us hold on to virtue and hope and it's yeah the Bible is this story that's meant to remind us right that um Tony Morrison calls it re memory and it is this act of reclaiming these past narratives to take control of our present and ongoing trauma. >> One of the things that said about scripture is the scripture was written to give us hope [clears throat] >> and in our conversation today about loss and grief and culde-sac ways [laughter] um people beginning to look at the story of scripture [clears throat] >> and its relevancy to our contemporary reality. It's not just words gone by that was recorded for them. Yeah. >> It was recorded for them that it might be beneficial for us. >> Yes. >> And to to to let the scripture live because we we find their stories connected to our stories. >> Absolutely. >> Now the Bible is no longer a dead book in our experience. It's a living truth in our reality. [clears throat] >> Amen. And and that's what we want that's what we want people to see about the Bible that it is >> it is it it is according to Hebrews 4 alive. [laughter] >> You know it's active sharper than any two-edged sword because it's relevant to me today. >> Yeah. And and we hold on to hope because we see the way that these stories started. We've seen the ways that they were absolutely hopeless and we see the ways that they turned around at the worst time. And as we look at our stories, we are reminded that our stories are still incomplete ones, right? God that God's his character is still the same. the characters throughout the Bible change. And I [clears throat] think it's the same for we are here in an incomplete story written by that same author. And so we we do not need to know how our story ends to know that he's repeated the same story line after story line after story line after story line and we just fall in that same vein. You know, I'm think I'm reflecting on Luke 24 where you got these disciples, you [laughter] know, and they they're going down the Emmas road and they are depressed. Okay. >> And Jesus shows up, but they don't recognize him. He says, >> and he says, "What what's what's going on?" And they they say, "Don't y'all don't you where where you been, stranger? We [laughter] are hurting here. I don't know why you're not hurting anywhere. Have you missed what's been going on?" We thought that this this person was going to be our deliverer and they didn't kill him and we we are hopeless. [clears throat] >> Jesus calls him foolish. [laughter] >> I mean it's not a compliment to oppressed people. I mean you know he says foolish and slow of heart to believe >> all that the scripture says. And then he goes to the scripture. He opens up the scripture. He walks them through the word of God. But what catches my attention is as they're going down the road, it says he acted as though he would keep going when they reached their home. >> In other words, he was only going to go further with them by invitation. >> Okay, there we go. [laughter] >> It's not because they didn't have the Bible. It's because they had not yet made invitation. >> Right? >> But when they invite him in and [clears throat] they're breaking bread because I know they see the nail prints in his hand. >> I I love this phrase. It says, >> "And their eyes were opened. their eyes [clears throat] were open. It didn't say their eyes were open when he was teaching the scriptures. It says their hearts were burning, but their eyes were still closed. [clears throat] >> But when the written word >> created an invitation for the living word, [clears throat] >> what was burning became sight >> and now their emotions had changed cuz they are lit. They are lit and on fire. that they just finished a seven mile walk, but they says they got up that evening and went seven miles back and say he is alive. To walk people from the scripture >> to the author >> in the midst of their depression >> and in a sevenmile walk, their whole perspective shifted. >> I love that story because hopelessness turned to hope. >> That's it. >> With the living and and written word of God being connected to their real life experience. >> Absolutely. Absolutely. And [clears throat] in so many ways, I think I talked about the liability that my grief had on me in pastoring, right? That folks like, "Hey, we think that you're trying to help people put their lives to together has numbed you to the fact that yours is falling apart." But I think after that point, pastoring was a great asset to my grief because week in and week out, I had to dive in and I I I could feel what people felt in a unique way. And I found hope week after week after week. Every time that I dived, I left and I came up with hope. And Proverbs 11:25 was true for me, right? He who enriches will himself be enriched. He who waters will himself be watered. And it was this sense of it was there the whole time. And every time I sent that pale down, I pulled it up and it was full of water. >> Wow. Wow. When when your hopelessness can become hopeful >> that helps others with their hopelessness [laughter] >> is a boomerang effect and it comes back >> on you as well% that that even gives ministry life and that's not just your job. You're you're seeing the fruit >> oh yeah >> out of your own frustration and pain and loss. So, so in your own experience as you walk through this journey, >> is there one thing you talked about Ecclesiastes, so that was one thing. Is there any else like that that helped bring you out? You had friends. So, you had the scripture, >> you [clears throat] had some friends who who kind of challenged you a little bit. Is anything else added to those two things that that were dynamic for that moment? >> Yeah. scripture uh friends uh and I think the third thing is um underrated. It is what the early church fathers would say um as Christians this is the virtue that is uniquely ours and it is this concept of patience. >> Okay. um patients, people that were patient. It was not just friends that came along to support and help it. It it it is being surrounded by a group of people that were just patient with me in my grief, patient with me as I journeyied. This concept of just patience that made, you know, life bearable, that made hope tangible. Um, [clears throat] and just realizing that, you know, John in 2015, >> [clears throat] >> um, uh, is a lot like John in 2016, but we're going to wait. And John in 2017, that, you know, smile starts to crack. And John in 2018 sees that um maybe something can be birthed out of this that I had uh yeah patience to uh be sculpted into the person that God would have me to be. And I think uh without that patience uh it is it is hopeless and very depressing because uh you do not see yourself grow and change and you think that how you are right then is how you will be for the rest of your life. I was with a um [clears throat] a dear friend the other day and uh a well-known young man and he was he was crying out of hopelessness. He was in a circumstance [clears throat] and he was hopeless. And I I said to him, I'm not going to give up on you. >> Even though things don't are not where you want them to be and they should be, I'm not going to give up on you because God's not going to give up on you. [clears throat] >> And he called me back after he left. He called me back and he said, "What you said that you weren't going to give up on me and God's not going to give up on me has given me a new hope because I was willing to give him some time. >> That's it." >> You know, that whole patience thing, >> not time to be passive. >> No, no, no. >> But time to work through where it he needed to go. And he says, "Just the fact that I had hope." >> Yeah. and and [clears throat] you were giving me time gave me some get up and go that had gotten up and gone. >> Right. Right. Right. You know, and so if we can create congregants who learn this way of operating with one another, cuz the pastor can only talk to so many people at one time, you know, but [clears throat] if if the environment is infectious >> with this kind of hope sharing, hope giving, hope depositing, >> [clears throat] >> uh, and walking people through their pain and their grief. We've, we've shifted the table. >> Oh, yeah. >> In in in ministry. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is this is the the the last thing that I'll say with that. It's it is that um when the type of patience that was shown was this. When I was in the midst of the dark darkness of my grief, I was surrounded by people that didn't try to turn the lights on, but they just stayed with me in it. Right? So, I used to say that my daughter was scared of the dark. She would wake up, terrible nightmare, sprint down the hallway, go past her mom's side of the bed, come over to me and dad, can I sleep in your bed? And it's like, all right, that's fine for 10 minutes. But then she kicks us in [laughter] the bathroom. All right, Ava, you've got to go to your bed. >> And she's getting ready to walk back down the dark hallway. She says two things, a statement and a request. Statement is unsurprising, but daddy, I'm scared of the dark. The request is the thing that gets me each time. Do you know what she's never asked me to do? She's never asked me to turn the lights on. She says, "Daddy, will you hold my hand and walk me back to the room?" >> I used to say that my daughter was scared of the dark, but now I say, "Oh, my daughter's scared of being alone in the dark. >> She's fine to walk through that dark hallway so long as she has somebody with." And this is even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no e evil because God says he'll turn the lights on. Right. >> No, he's with me >> cuz you'll cuz you'll hold my hand through the dark. And [clears throat] when we find ourselves in a, you know, a sea of people who know that I think one of the best things that you could do is hold somebody's hand through the dark, things change. Well, this has been a rich time and it's uh encouraged me as I've continued to walk through my journey and hear your journey and >> and it's going to help a lot of people >> to walk through their journey or to help others walk through their journey. >> And I like the word journey. >> Come on. >> Cuz it's not a cult to say. [laughter] >> Okay. We got a new throughway. We're opening up for people to keep on going. >> Yeah. And thank you for asking me, my late wife's name. >> Thank you, Dr. Evans. >> Thank you for being part of our Unbound podcast. And God continue to richly bless you. Thank you. ((music playing))