Most cultures overtly display their broken hearts to the world through certain clothing, behaviours and customs. I think we have all probably seen an Italian widow in her traditional black, mourning the loss of her husband. According to the aptly named website Myend.com there was a common ritual in southern Italy, called Lutto that dictated appropriate mourning practice including beating oneself, pulling your hair and wearing black. Others would often join in with the beating of their chests and heads to show their shared grief and support of the mourner.
“Another part of Lutto, dictated that women should wear a black mourning garment including a veil. That was not only a sign of grief, but also an invitation for others around to join in and take part in the grieving person’s new reality.”
Myend.com
In Bible times, we see a vivid picture of some of these cultural norms with the suffering of Job. I can’t begin to imagine the anguish of his heart as he mourns the loss of all his children, servants and animals and then his health as his body is inflicted with painful boils! Job 1:20 says “Job stood up and tore his robe in grief. Then he shaved his head and fell to the ground to worship.” And Job 2:8 “Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat amongst the ashes.” It was this outward display of tearing clothes and sitting amongst the ashes that conveyed the deep sense of anguish of the heart. In the tv series, The Chosen, if you’re a fan you would have seen this demonstrated so movingly by Nathanial (played by Austin Reed Alleman). Having his worse day at work, where all his dreams have come crashing down, he goes to sit under a fig tree, burns up the plans, he as an architect had made for God and then takes the ashes and with bitter weeping, sprinkles them over his head where some land and the rest significantly, scatter to the wind. You can watch the free episode here.
For me, growing up in Australia, in a mish-mash of cultures with a pommy (English) father and a convict-stock mother, I didn’t witness any of these types of customs in my encounters with death and grieving. Rather, it was only the people who really knew you that were aware of your loss and may have offered condolences. This may work in a small, country town where everybody pretty much knows everybody, but doesn’t equate too well in the big, old suburbs where maybe only your immediate neighbours and those you work or play with would know anything of your unexpected loss. I remember when my nanna died, even though she had lived and worked in the same little area of Melbourne for well over 40years, neighbours had sadly passed away themselves or moved on and work colleagues had long been gone. Only those few loyal friends outside the family unit knew of her passing and what a loss that was.
Why am I even writing about this? Have I recently lost a loved one to death, passing on to eternity? No, not recently, though I have lost a few people over the course of my 47 years including my dad when I was just 24 years old and my dear nanna when I was 34 years old, as I mentioned above. This doesn’t include the heartache of a broken marriage and the betrayal to those wedding vows, nor the betrayal of a long term boyfriend who made similar promises only to leave me and my then, 5yo child alone – again, so he could go ‘find himself’. There’s many more memories from childhood right through, but I prefer not to spend too much time in looking back except to learn something new and grow a deeper sense of thankfulness to how far God has brought me. No, I have had many losses in my life, but now it’s a loss that so tucked away in my heart I wish I could wear black, throw ashes upon my head and have a funeral of sorts to acknowledge my loss and communicate my pain. Maybe even to go as far as the Bible custom of hiring professional mourners to declare to the world, “I am suffering. I am broken. I have lost something of tremendous worth and don’t know how to go on.” The practicality of being followed around by a band of sorrow-filled groupies obviously prevents this so I must go on silently, carrying my invisible burden. The hurt in my heart, only eased by the love of Jesus and a wonderful husband and understanding friends, never goes away but radiates outwards from deep in my chest and comes and goes like the ebb and flow of the waves – at times almost unnoticeable, yet sometimes radiating throughout my body and mind, robbing me of sleep and concentration. This pain is mine alone. No one else is at the funeral with me, no one else feels quite what I am feeling, for I am a mother and my child is far from me.
While all my daughter’s old friends are celebrated on social media by rightly, proud parents of their baby growing up and becoming, I sit in my emptiness and just feel alone, numb, disappointed and hurt. I have no photos to show, I have no news to celebrate. Not from here anyway.
The waves threaten to come in over my head, but there is One who sits beside me, holding me, comforting me —whispering words that only He can utter because He is the only One who truly understands.
Jesus. There is no other hope in this situation. Without Him I fear what my life would be and how I would cope without becoming bitter and cynical as so many have when their hearts have been broken and their hopes have been dashed. In fact, that has become my own mother’s fate to the point where relationship with her is bound up in negative and desolate views of life so altogether consuming that I can no longer safely approach her. This of course brings its own heartbreak and pain, but — back to my daughter.
Only a few months ago, exasperated, after flying 2500kms to see her and being greeted with a closed door that refused to open to a mother’s entreaties, I was left with no option but to hang, a carefully chosen present on the front door and to send a text to say, “We just wanted to take you out for lunch and make sure you were ok.” No answer. A week later, still devastated by this response, I asked the Lord, “How can children do this to parents? You love them, work so hard for them, try to give them everything they need and they turn around and won’t even acknowledge you? How is that possible?” I heard His quiet, matter of fact answer and it stunned me. “I understand. Everyday, I paint my children a beautiful sunrise and yet how many of them do you think ever acknowledge me or thank me for it?” I was instantly humbled and comforted by His reply. How could I think I was the only one that suffered or that He didn’t understand my distress and pain? What comfort it brought to my soul to not only know God saw me and my situation, but completely and personally understood my grief as He had and continued to experience it many times over Himself as people continue to run from Him and ignore His displays of love.
“They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them.” Nehemiah 9:17
My grief will continue to be with me in my heart as I hold onto Jesus and pray for my child to come back to me and back to Him, but knowing I have a Saviour who is intimate and sees all my sorrow – in fact He catches each one of my tears in a bottle (You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book.” Psalm 56:8NLT), well what can I say? Nothing heals a broken heart quite like the King of Kings who not only made my heart, but made my daughter’s heart and is passionately pursuing her not just for my sake and for my earnest prayers, but because He loves her more than I can even comprehend. So can I encourage you, whatever you’re going through, don’t leave Jesus out of the equation – He is the equation! All problems/ sorrows/ heartbreaks/ disappointments + Jesus = peace and comfort. For He is the God of ALL comfort. Invite Him in to your situation and see what happens! — Bronwyn Olson
“Praise be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort and we ourselves receive from God.”
2 Corinthians 1:3-4 NIV