Tag: How To Parent Well After The Loss Of A Spouse

‘Then Elisha prayed, “O Lord , open his eyes and let him see!” The Lord opened the young man’s eyes, and when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elisha was filled with horses and chariots of fire.’ 2 Kings 6:17(NLT)

We all have painful memories—memories that hurt to the core every time we revisit that moment through our thoughts.  You know the memories I’m referring to. The memories that immediately disrupt your reality and send you back in time to a place of devastation. These become seared into our thoughts and warp our perspectives.



In 2 Kings we see Elisha and his servant surrounded by a great army.  The situation looked bad to their human eyes. Elisha then began to pray.  However, he did not pray for the situation to change or for the circumstances to be different.  He prayed that God would open his servant’s eyes so that he may see.



What did he need to see? I believe that in every painful situation that we face the enemy has lies he wants us to believe. He wants fear to cripple us so we can’t be mighty women and men of God. He wants to tear us down and cause us to have a perspective of a situation that is not accurate.



I believe that we can pray the same prayer that Elisha prayed.  We can ask God to open our eyes that we may see. We can see that in those painful memories God was still there.  

Even though the circumstances were bad, God was cheering for you. He was standing there with His arms wide open waiting for you to run into His arms, embrace Him, and take rest in Him.  



You may have to revisit a painful memory. But first, stop and pray and ask God to show you exactly where He was in that moment and what He was saying to you. This will completely change your perspective on a situation when you can see it through God’s eyes and love.



No matter what pain you have experienced, God wants to open your spiritual eyes and show you the truth in that moment.  God has a truth that He wants to replace the painful memories with so you can look back and see it differently to have healing and peace.



The truth that you may need to hear could be God saying to you, “I loved you so much in that moment,” or “You don’t have to perform to earn my love or make me proud of you.  I love you because you are Mine and I created you.” 

from How To Parent Well After The Loss Of A Spouse

‘“I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb. Before you were born I set you apart and appointed you as my prophet to the nations.”’ Jeremiah 1:5(NLT)

‘You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.’ Psalms 139:13-16(NLT)

 “All I remember is her suffering,” were the words my stepdaughter said as she sat at the kitchen table crying. 

I had no idea of what to say. The fact was that by the age of 10 she had experienced more loss than I ever had and by 15 years old, death had become a common word in her vocabulary. When my daughter’s biological mother passed, she was about 5 and shortly after her paternal grandmother passed when she was about 7, both due to cancer.

Over the years, I noticed that she was very intrigued by cancer. She read fiction books about cancer, watched movies about cancer, and had decided she was going to be an oncologist, specializing in helping cancer patients. Even though she didn’t always enjoy the activity, it seemed to me that cancer had become her identity and I was never really sure how to talk with her about this sensitive topic.

But that day, as she sat at the table crying, the doors of opportunity swung open. 

As I consoled her I said, “Do you believe your mom suffered her entire life? I asked.

“I don’t remember.” She said. “I just remember her being sick and being in pain.”

I decided to pull my husband into the conversation for a moment to discuss the timelines a bit.

As he talked, and confirmed that the cancer was only two to three years of her 29 years of life, she looked at me as if she had never really thought about how much life her mother had actually lived before the cancer.

“You are half your mom and half your dad so the gifts and talents you have come from both. There are so many things that you are talented and gifted in so no matter what you decide to do or become, you’re representing her. You are her daughter.” I explained.

When the conversation ended, I could see a weight lifted from her. 

When our children have experienced loss, God will use us to remind them if their identity—an identity that may have been suffocated and suppressed by their pain. When we do this and ask God to intervene, we will begin to see our children walk in their God-given purpose while honoring the legacy of the parent they have lost.

from How To Parent Well After The Loss Of A Spouse

‘We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. ‘ Romans 5:3-4(NLT)

For me, the greatest comfort I found in God was the fact that I knew I could tell Him anything, whether I was happy, sad, confused, or angry. We see King David do the same thing countless times throughout the Psalms. Even if I was angry at God, I knew that He could handle it. I simply always kept talking to Him about how I was feeling.

And that’s what I believe our kids need, as well. They need to know that we will be there to listen to them through it all, no matter what they are feeling. This, of course, applies in many situations outside of grief. But it is especially important during such a trying time. I made it my goal for my kids to feel comfortable telling me anything. I strove to get my attention up whenever it seemed they wanted to talk. We won’t always have words that can comfort them, but just holding them and being there with them and sympathizing with them will show them we are with them no matter what the pain. It can be easy during those times to run away, especially when we don’t have the words to say. But those are the times we really need to press in.

I never knew when a night would descend into tears and pain from one of my children. It most often happened during Bible reading or prayer time, though any random thought could do it. Something would spark a memory, and that would well up a pain in one of my children. Often times, that would spread to the other one, and soon enough, I would be sobbing, too. But, despite the tears, those were some of the best times we had together as a family. Our bond grew deeper, and we all felt validated in how we were dealing with our loss.

Possibly the hardest and most important thing is to have persistence. With every new milestone —and in between—will be a new reminder of the absence in their lives. It’s one of the things that makes grief so difficult. It is unrelenting. We have to be even more unrelenting in being there for our children.

from How To Parent Well After The Loss Of A Spouse

‘He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. For the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us with his comfort through Christ. ‘ 2 Corinthians 1:4-5(NLT)

It was overwhelming enough to endure all the heartache and pain that I felt because of Stephanie’s death. But it was an even worse pain to consider how my son and daughter would be forever impacted by it, and for many years to come; probably, even, their entire lives. No parents want their children to go through pain, but there was no way to avoid this. So I knew I needed to figure out a way to walk with my children through the pain.

Thankfully, the Bible provides us with great wisdom about what to do in such times. In 2 Corinthians, we are told that God the Father comforts us so much so that we are equipped to comfort others in the same way. We need to depend on the Father to walk with us through our own grief, trusting that He will comfort us in ways we can’t even fathom. And then, just as the Father comforts us, we are able to comfort our children. It’s important that we work through our own grief in order to most help our children. But, we need to also be careful not to wait until we are completely “healed” before helping them because we might never come around to giving them the comfort they need. We need to sincerely pursue healing through our grief so that we can teach our children to do the same and to walk with them through the process. 

Tomorrow we will talk about how but for now, meditate on today’s verses.

from How To Parent Well After The Loss Of A Spouse