I was humbled when recently asked to speak a short sermon at our AGWM all-Europe missionary retreat. The theme of the week was “You never know what God can do through ______ planted in faith.” Below, you’ll find part of the transcript of what I got to share with 450 colleagues. I pray it encourages you today!
____________________________
“You never know what God can do through LOSS planted in faith”
As the saying goes, there are only 2 things certain in life: death and taxes. If I were to add an addendum to this, it would include loss. We all experience loss. Loss of life of someone close, loss of marriage, loss of close friendship, loss of a dream and future that you absolutely believed that God had given you! Loss of hope for having children when that test comes back negative yet again. Loss is an absolute unavoidable part of our life here on this earth.
And no matter how much we talk about it, read about it, spiritualize it, listen to podcasts about it, nothing quite prepares you for true loss until it’s your turn to walk through it. Something that should be so unifying (being the fact that we all walk through loss at some point), actually becomes one of the loneliest and most unavoidable pains. As much as we love it to be so, no amount of prayer or throwing Bible verses at it gives us a fast pass through grief. Even CS Lewis, honestly states in A Grief Observed, “Talk to me about the truth of religion and I’ll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don’t come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.” So for those of you who are here currently deep in the trenches of loss today, I do not offer you my religious consolations. But I do offer you my understanding. My heart has ached as well. I have also been in the place where I couldn’t see how life could continue. I do understand. And I’m so sorry for the unavoidable pain that you are consumed with right now.
I think we as Christians sometimes subconsciously believe that we shouldn’t feel pain, as if feeling the pain instead of “receiving the joy of the Lord” is somehow a less holy state to be in. But experiencing the pain that this life offers us— actually no— that this life FORCES on us (“offers” makes it sound like a choice)… experiencing the pain that is inevitably a part of life is JUST AS SACRED as experiencing the joy of life. Experiencing pain is both divine and human.
And let’s not go knocking the human experience, because Jesus himself chose it! He chose it not just by creating humanity, but by entering into it. He actually dignified our human experience by choosing weakness– by choosing to become human.
And Jesus didn’t rush past loss.
Jesus didn’t rush to Lazarus’ tomb to call him back to life, dismissing the pain of loved ones around him. He stopped and wept moments before fixing the issue that caused the weeping. The over-spiritualized optimist would say Jesus stopping to weep was unnecessary. “Death has no sting!” But he stopped and grieved all the same.
Jesus also didn’t rush to the cross, dismissing his own anguish and pain. He sat in the Garden of Gethsemane and labored in prayer, to the point of sweating blood.
If we truly mean that we want to know Jesus in all of his personhood, then experiencing loss is a part of that. Instead of rushing past grief, we can draw closer to the presence of Jesus in a way that we NEVER could WITHOUT that loss. God walked through loss, therefore there are parts of God that we cannot know unless we walk through it!
While I am personally still healing today, I still do not want to feel this pain, oh what a privilege it is to be able to know and understand and empathize with God in a way that I never could before.
“You never know what God can do through LOSS planted in faith”
At first, I thought putting the word “loss” into this prompt that I was given sounded a bit out of place. But loss does require death. And what do you do with a dead thing but place it in the ground?
Jesus tells us in: John 12:24 “I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels—a plentiful harvest of new lives.”
Loss fully planted into the ground– into the grave– always produces new life. It’s never the same life, what’s buried is buried, but there is still a PROMISE of harvest and new life!
And the beautiful part, which is highlighted in this verse, is that a seed that is buried does NOT remain alone. So when you find yourself in a season of loss, know this: you are not done, forgotten, or failing. You are being held by the same Savior who chose to walk through suffering Himself. Jesus is with you, and he doesn’t give his religious consolations either– but He gives you his PROFOUND understanding and loving embrace.
New life is coming—even if you can’t see it yet. A seed buried in the soil is in complete darkness. So even if you feel buried by your sadness, even if you can’t see it, new life is coming. So don’t rush past it. Plant it. Water it with tears. Draw close to your Jesus in ways that you can’t in times of joy. And watch—one day—what God will do with your loss sown in faith.
Audrey Wells 