Searching for Help After Heartache

Around this time last year, I found myself awake in the middle of the night. I was having an argument with God. Technically, it was a silent one because both my husband and son were asleep, but I was screaming inside. How could he have let this happen? I was a good person.

Why didn't he protect me from the loss of our second son?

This was not a reality I wanted to live in. This couldn't be what a life spent loving God could look like, right? I was desperate to hear God and was so frustrated by his silence. That moment in bed, with tears running down my face, I acknowledged there is evil and pain in the world.

How could I reconcile this pain to a loving God?

For some time, I needed to lean on the faith of my spiritual friends. I was not up for praying again and was not up for listening to the trite, canned religious answers to my heartache. I had an especially hard time if I heard people asking God for help with mundane, everyday-life things. If someone prayed to sell their house, I'd have to bite my lip to keep from shouting at them, "Please, I prayed for something much more important and he did not deliver."

I felt broken and separated from God. But I did keep going to church and stayed close to some friends in my faith community -- maybe just to hang on, or because I thought people would be watching the youth pastor's wife, but I did keep a foot in the door regardless.

I started to hear God again -- slowly. I was able to listen to some psalms without gagging. I started hearing his whisper through nature and songs. I was able to have my friends pray for me -- I would even ask for it occasionally. The casseroles and cards had stopped coming, but I did hear God's voice through my closest friends who continued through the pain with us. I cried an ocean's worth and felt a presence beside me each time I finished sobbing.

I have come to realize that his grief for our loss is just as strong as my own. I have rediscovered a God who is so personal, constant and near. There remain many unanswered questions in my heart. But I still have hope.