A Grief Re-Observed...

Many of you know that we hold the works of C.S. Lewis in high regard at our house. He wrote a book about grief when his wife died from cancer. I tried to read it on the plane home after losing my sister to cancer almost two years ago.

His writings go too deep for my comprehension most of the time, and at that time I could barely finish a paragraph without putting down the book and wandering off in my thoughts. Today I read it again, this time from cover to cover in less than an hour.

In Lewis' book, entitled "A Grief Observed", he expounds on how grief is "like a bomber circling round and dropping its bombs each time the circle brings it overhead."

My mother and I revisited our grief again yesterday. It's not like you really want to keep going there. My father told her not to dwell on it, but how do we know that it is not dwelling on us? Like the circling bomber, another explosion of fresh grief just drops out of nowhere.

It was good however, to go together to that 'sacred place' and have another look from this distance. The pain does not seem to dim, but my understanding does seem brighter. Lewis describes our life and our building of this life as house of cards. He goes on to say that "God has not been trying to experiment on my faith or love in order to find out their quality. He knew it already. It was I who didn't. In this trial He makes us occupy the dock, the witness box, and the bench all at once. He always knew that my temple was a house of cards. His only way of making me realize this fact was to knock it down."

I do know that God is good, but He isn't safe. He will cause pain and use pain to grow us up into Him. I don't exactly like this plan, but then my finite wisdom is no match for God. Lewis says there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it. He poses the question: "Who still thinks there is some device (if only he could find it) which will make pain not to be pain. It doesn't really matter whether you grip the arm of the dentist's chair or let your hands lie in your lap. The drill drills on." (Nurse Child says this is not helpful!!) I am glad I am not alone in these larger than life issues.

Someday this will all make sense. Till then we wait the best we can. Loving one another, comforting one another with what we have been comforted, and doing the daily tasks at hand to the best of our ability.

I love you, family. All is well. Carry on.