Because We’ve Loved Deeply

The new year has begun. And while many of us are jumping with joy into our new goals, resolutions, and even relationships, others are navigating unexpected pathways into grief and mourning, due to the deaths of loved ones.

In one of my community of friends, I have several brothers and sisters who are mourning the recent death of a dear sister and friend in ministry named E. She battled cancer for quite some time and this past weekend she entered into eternal healing and the loving arms of God.

I met E one time, about three years ago.

nordwood-themes-162462-unsplash.jpgShe encouraged me with her heart for God’s kingdom and to see oneness truly happen in the Body of Christ so that the love we have could touch those beyond church walls. She is a woman who leaves an incredibly deep legacy of love, intentional living, and fruit that has borne witness to the power of the gospel of Jesus and God’s indescribable love for people.

She also leaves a husband and three young children, along with family members and a huge community of friends. People who are missing her deeply as the first few days of acute grief settle upon on their shoulders and the pain of the loss becomes a new part of normal.

I know that acute grief and that pain very well.

And from my own journeys of grief, I wrote these words and posted them on E’s CaringBridge site, as a comment to the post her husband wrote sharing that she’d passed away. My prayer for him and those mourning E is that they would be present with their grief. The grief has purpose and it is needed in this journey:

“A dear friend told me 10 years ago, ‘We grieve deeply because we’ve loved deeply.’ S, you and your children and so many others loved and will continue to love E deeply. Your grief is a unique and tangible reflection of that. It says with raised hands, ‘I loved someone, and it mattered, and there will always be something beautiful, significant and special about this.’ Grief shows us where the trees of love in our life have been planted. You planted deeply with E. That love will continue to grow in you and comfort you in the journey ahead. Sending my prayers from Orlando. I am so very sorry for the loss of your beautiful bride. Praying God’s comfort and supernatural peace in this time.”

For those who grieve please know this: you are not alone and as much as you want to let others into your journey with you, please do.

For those who know people who are grieving: choose to be present with them and encourage them. Love them and check in on them regularly. The lessons you see them learn in their grief could help you in future seasons where you too will enter the house of mourning as well.

Life is a gift and it is also finite. The days we have here on Earth will pass by faster than we can imagine. Living and loss are entwined together. We can learn much from both.

Applicable

Sometimes we need to pay attention to the journey of grief and loss others are enduring before us.

You may not be in it now but a season of your own will come as transitions, death and mourning play no favorites and exempt no one.

You may realize your deep need to apply the lessons learned from the suffering of grievers to a stage that will be set before you in the near future.

Life is applicable in nature, in all things and in all seasons.

Learn from those who carry cups of tears. Their sorrow has much to offer you and greater strength than you can imagine.

All+Cups

My Shepherd Said Goodbye (Pt. 1)

Eight years is a long time to be somewhere. Those years represent your life, your time and the changes you’ve been through. Eight are the years I spent in a community of people who came from different cultures, life experiences and even heartaches. People who merged together weekly to learn more about God and share our journeys of faith. People who helped me grow and discover the young woman I was becoming.

This community is my church home in Orlando. I landed on the doorsteps of Discovery Church in February 2005 after moving to central Florida for a new position with my job. I grew up in a black southern Baptist experience and my connection to church goes back to my childhood beginnings: memories of Sunday School lessons with the late Mrs. Maxine Tucker, singing in the children’s choir at First Baptist off Gresham Road, being dressed to the nines for Easter Sunday and feeling the humidity of those hot Georgia summers during Vacation Bible School. I know a little something about the church. 

Being connected to a community of people who desire relationship with God has always been a part of how I experience the world. Moving to Orlando meant that along with all the other new things I needed to do – find a doctor, change my car tag, get a new license – I wanted to find a church to call home and start new relationships.

I didn’t want to church shop. I wanted to go to a place that felt welcoming and God’s truth was being shared and would know “this is where I should be.” On my first visit to Discovery, I knew “this is where I should be.” The sermon messages constantly spoke right to my soul and truth was being preached. I was all of 26 years old and started building relationships and developing community in a church that wasn’t quite mega in its size but wasn’t mini either.

I joined a diverse group of 25 college and post-college folks who were in our early to mid-20s. The church offered several groups like this one, designed around similar seasons of life and interests of people to help them grow spiritually. Our group learned about community as we unpacked the truths of the Bible and understood more of God’s plans for our lives. My group leaders were Peter and Lynn and we all had one heck of a time together.

Desiring to learn more about nutrition and good body weight management, I also connected with a small group of women, led by the incredible encourager Deb and built more relationships in my church. Fall of 2005 brought with it the unexpected death of my father James that devastated me to my core.

Pastor Berry, our church’s care pastor, joined me in my loss, providing resources to help me put words to this shocking grief and understanding how to mourn. Several months later I became a part of the church’s first-ever Grief Share group, which met over 10 weeks and walked through messages that helped us process and heal from the deaths of those we deeply loved.

Months would merge into years at Discovery that included more connections in deep ways through more small groups and Bible studies I joined:  a “9 to 5” group for professional young women navigating the twists and turns of life as we pursued God and a creative group for photographers, writers and filmmakers who set out to document stories of hope, justice and faith locally in Orlando.

I regularly attended Status, our 20-something weekly gathering for young people at Discovery. Status was full of real good music, real good people and real good messages that challenged me to grow and commit more of myself to the faith I believed in. Status was also a place where I worked through a cute crush on a cute guy. The experience helped me learn more about myself, relationships and the value of being in community with others.

More years zoomed by and I committed more of myself to Discovery, a gathering of people in a simple building who illustrated the family of God to me and his heart for his church. It’s not just a church, it’s my church and it’s part of my identity and it’s place that’s safe and invites me to learn and serve. I began serving with the hospitality team, offering my warm smiles and soft hellos as a church greeter for a couple of years. I then followed a passion to encourage others and joined the prayer team for a season. I provided a listening ear to those who needed someone to talk to after our Sunday services and pray for them.

My heart soon led me to invest in Discovery’s children’s ministry and I became a teacher for the orange and green room aka the 5 and 6 year-olds. What an adventure those years were! Kids are just hilarious. Investing in their lives and seeing them respond constantly to God’s love with their beautiful faith overwhelmed me. They reminded me that goodness still thrives in this very fallen and broken world.

While serving the kids I also connected with a new group of women at the church and started attending a new small group for 20 and 30-something women. We were a little group at first and over time more women have come into our gathering and it’s been exhilarating and full of many hot mess moments, i.e. intentionally holding backwards socials where we wear clothes backwards and eat dessert before dinner, enjoying our version of “The Hunger Games” and karaoke adventures that will go down in history.

I became a co-leader of the group and have deeply enjoyed building into the lives of other women. We do life together, share our challenges and put our hope in Jesus for better days to come.

Eight years in this community known as Discovery Church was rich and meaningful.

Eight years of growing, losing and living through the cups of pain and cups of joy that comes with being alive.

Eight years of feeling that you belong to something and you’re part of something bigger than yourself.

And then one day, everything changed.

In May 2013, on a typical Sunday like so many others, I sat in the auditorium ready for Pastor David’s message. After the welcome and music, two members of our church’s leadership team entered the stage and began to share words I never anticipated hearing.

They said something had taken place involving our pastor and he would not be at church today. At first I thought he had been hurt in an accident and was injured. But then they shared that he had given his immediate resignation that week following the disclosure of an immoral relationship outside of his marriage.

It didn’t feel real hearing those words. I felt stunned. Speechless. I was in shock. Many seated around me echoed my feelings, as people began to cry and weep and express the tremendous loss that the news brought. It felt like someone had died.

Many tears. Incredible disappointment. Great pain. Discovery is a family. And on the heels of this news, we were hurting very much and very deeply.

Our pastor, our shepherd had left us. He’d said goodbye and we didn’t know what all of this would mean for us and the future of our church.

This post is part one of three where I will share more of my experiences through this loss and what I’ve learned about God, his church and his people.

I’m curious: have you experienced the pain of seeing a leader in your life, like a pastor, mentor or someone you look up to, fall from their position of influence? How did that experience make you feel?

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