| Let Go and Let God: The Reality © Betty Sue Eaton |
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| A Christian Grief Ministry |
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Life After Loss |
Life After Loss |
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| Years ago, when I first became a Christian and accepted Christ as my savior and learned to trust Him for my life, I heard of a saying common among fellow believers: “Let go and let God”. For a long time, that was a lovely platitude, and it was easy to recite in times of trial. It seemed to me that catch-phrases like that were always on the tips of the tongues of worshipers to apply whenever trouble arose, regardless of the severity of the circumstance. Little did I realize that those words when uttered in deepest faith were so powerful.
In the death of my youngest daughter in a tragic pedestrian accident, I fought for control of my emotions and grief, struggling to gain the upper hand in a declining health problem that daily beset me. First affected was my ability to eat and retain the food; then my balance seemed to desert me leaving me hugging the walls to just walk down the hall. Next, my throat began to close leaving me struggling to breathe and as well constricted my ability to swallow at all. Over a period of four months, I was rendered a helpless, grieving mother of two other grieving children and a husband who wondered how to help me, but not able to. I prayed constantly, “Why did you have to take Paula? She was too young to die!” Each day my grief deepened and my health continued to deteriorate. Nothing seemed to help me out of the deepening despair that gripped me. Friends began to drift away and withdraw their initial support. My husband lapsed into silence each time I would try to speak of our lost child until one day he said he just didn’t want to speak of her again. I couldn’t know that he was in a state of emotional “shut-down” and suffering as much as I. Our other two children attended school, associated with their friends and school activities and seemed to get on with their lives without Paula very well. Life seemed very normal for the other members of my family but my own life had stopped in a world where nothing again would be normal. One morning as I struggled to breathe and swallow my ever increasing number of medications, I desperately cried out to God, “Just let me die! I can do nothing to improve my health; my heart is so broken I will never recover! I can’t take care of my family, so just let me go and let them go on without me!” I meant it with every fiber in my body! But God didn’t hear me. I didn’t die and it seemed to me that I couldn’t even do that! How insane was that thought! What a presumptuous statement to a Power so great that He controls the entire universe! When it became apparent that I was not going to die, I became angry and shouted amid the coughs from a constricted throat, “Damn you, God! If you are not going to let me die, then get me up from this bed of pain; make me well so I can take care of my family! If you can take my child, then You can take away this agony and heal my pain!” Within two hours, my throat had begun to open up and the swelling was receding to the point that I could swallow my medications and sleep, a luxury that had been denied me for weeks! From that morning on, my health improved daily and soon I was able to eat and gain nourishment, my balance was restored, and my grief began to subside. I began looking forward to getting up and getting on with my daily duties as wife and mother. I was released from the doctor’s care and life began to take on the former routines I had long ago lost. I was even able to go back to work as a Kelly Girl on a part-time basis. I began to live again! Then I remembered the saying, “Let go and let God!” It took on an entirely new meaning for me. I knew what it meant to “Let Go”! God must have been waiting for me to turn loose of my controlling my own destiny and let Him do what He does best: Care for those who are suffering, wait on those who will not get out of His way to do what He wants to do for all of us: Help in times of great distress! Now when I hear that phrase, “Let Go and Let God”, I understand exactly what it means. It means to me, get out of God’s way, stop trying to micromanage what He alone can and will do if we let Him. Stop telling Him what to do, instead, ASK Him to help and He will in a measure greater than we can imagine. He tells us, “Come unto me all you who are burdened and heavy laden, and I will give you rest”. So my dear grieving friend, if you have lost a dear one and are lost in a morass of disabling grief, “Let go and Let God”! He alone can and will bring you relief and comfort in your suffering, but in His time! You cannot demand anything from God; it’s just the other way around, He demands from us that we rely on His omnipotence and power and He will sustain us in everything. It is his plan that our loved ones go home to be with Him in heaven when they do. It was His plan for their lives that has been fulfilled by His might. He alone controls life and death, and He alone can heal us and make us whole again. He promised that in His holy words many times over in the Bible. We can rely on them forever. All we have to do is let go and let God take control. Ask and you will receive! I pray that you will find comfort and release from your grief and I know you will. God promised and He never forgets His promise and is always true to His word. ~ Betty |