Last week my husband received word that a fellow firefighter he worked with had passed away. I learned the same day that a teacher I used to teach with lost her husband. Two days later, a childhood friend suffered the loss of her dad and a co-worker learned her father passed away rather quickly.
This morning, a close friend just contacted me to share that her husband died late yesterday. In all of these, I prayed for the ones suffering a tremendous loss. I prayed for those who are filled with grief at their loved ones passing. I asked God to give them comfort.
You might be of the belief that it’s too late to pray. You may even be wondering why so many deaths and why didn’t God prevent these deaths. Or, maybe, like me, you trust God. You trust that He alone can bring the comfort each is in need of. Truly, only God can comfort in the midst of such grief.
God may use us to give a hug, to send a card, to bring a meal, to come alongside these during the memorial service or funeral; but in the dark of night, it is the Lord God who will be with them. God knows what it is like to lose his son on a cross. He knows what it is like to watch his children suffer.
What God knows and we don’t, is the celebration of eternal life when a believer enters heaven! Only God can be fully present in the midst of our grief and fully present in the celebration of one entering eternal life at the same time. That’s why his comfort is best. His comfort is filled with an eternal hope.
As we pray and intercede for those who are suffering a loss, let us lift them up to the One who can ease their pain in ways we cannot. If all the comfort a person could receive was left up to us to give, someone could be in pain for a very long time. We have a God who comforts in ways we cannot.
Let us go to our knees and pray for those we care about who have suffered a great loss. Let us pray to the God who will walk with them in this time and continue to walk with them into the time when they will one day reach a place of joy again.
Let us not fail to pray and intercede for them.
By Jacqui – One of God’s Intercessors