Sometimes the most wonderful time of the year doesn’t feel so wonderful. For many, the Christmas season is full of pure joy but not for everyone. For some, that joy is mixed with the grief and pain of loss. For others, the pain can be so deep that it banishes the joy of the season altogether.

I get it. Life brings us loss. It’s not a matter of if the losses will come, but when and how they’ll come, and how you and I will navigate the losses. I remember the first Christmas after losing my Dad to cancer. I was all over the place emotionally. There were moments when the sights and sounds of Christmas lifted my spirits. Then in the next moment, it felt as if those same sights and sounds were conspiring to mock my sadness, and all this might have happened before lunchtime! Grief is like that. I often describe grief as a “sneaky bloke” who can hit us out of nowhere … even, and sometimes especially at Christmas.

So, yes, Christmastime can be a mixed bag of joy and grief for some time.

And that’s okay.

Not only is that okay, but it’s also completely normal and healthy. In fact, the holidays, birthdays, anniversaries … heck, any other day for that matter, might be tough for a while, and that’s ok too. After all, as Nora McInerny says in her viral TED talk, “We don’t move on from grief, we move forward with it.”

So, what to do? Well, the thing about grief is there’s no way around it. We respond to our losses in either healthy or unhealthy ways. If you don’t process your pain, you’ll project it onto others, or as I’ve heard it put, “When you don’t heal what hurt you, you’ll bleed on people who didn’t cut you.” So try as you might through isolation, self-medication, or other forms of avoidance and denial, the only way around grief is through grief.

I found the way through grief in the pages of scripture, in the person of Jesus, and the presence of a supportive community. God’s word, particularly the Psalms, the book of Job, and the book of Lamentations provide the words we need to define, describe, explain, express, communicate, and convey our pain, to him. These same passages promise that the One to whom we pour out our pain is the same One walking with us through it – this is what it means when we say at Christmas time that He is Emmanuel, God WITH us. That “with-ness” is tangibly experienced in the support of people (family, friends, groups, therapists) who care for us and sit in the grief with us.

Let me emphasize the THROUGH part. You can get through this. Take it from someone who has made it through – on the other side of the hurt, there’s life, there’s joy, there’s peace, and there’s love like you’ve never known before! The holidays and much of life will not be the same as before, but life can get better. And you? You can heal. You can be stronger, healthier, and even better than before. Grieving well has a way of helping us find more to love and live for than we did before we faced the loss.

So, fellow traveler, I’d like to share some additional thoughts on processing grief. The two links below are messages on grief I shared earlier this year with my church family. If you or someone else is having a hard time this season, I hope these messages can be of help.

May the presence of Emmanuel grant you peace this Christmas!

Sincerely,

Kevin

Good Grief part 1: The Language of Grief

Good Grief part 2: The Way Through Grief

Resources for grief:

Griefshare: Find a group in your area

Option B: An incredible book and website

If you find yourself in a particularly dark place, please reach out for help here, or call dial 988 for immediate support.