Let It Matter

I had a friend in college who suffered a career-ending injury. For the first few weeks afterward, she kept saying she was fine and that it didn’t matter that she would never compete again. She wasn’t letting herself admit how hard this was on her; thus, as her friends, we couldn’t do anything to support her.

How would we help her through this if she wouldn’t admit she was hurting? Eventually, it started to sink in, and as soon as she began to grieve, her community was able to step in and comfort her.

In Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, His second statement was to encourage us to be able to grieve the sins and hardships in this life. When we do this, instead of running from them, we allow ourselves to be comforted by His Spirit.

It’s often easy to reframe or distract ourselves from the hard aspects of life. We have endless ways of distracting ourselves in our modern age. Instead of processing through pain and suffering, it’s easier just to pull out our phones and scroll through social media. Will that bring us comfort?

Jesus warns us that we must mourn if we ever expect to be comforted. The comfort He is talking about won’t immediately take away the pain, and the sin in the world will still be present. It will guide us to a healthy place of healing and comfort while we grieve. As we grieve, we are drawn closer to God, and by being closer to God, we feel His love and comfort.

Grieving didn’t bring back my friend’s athletic career. Grieving allowed her to use her sadness as a part of her testimony and help others through this same pain. She was comforted by God’s never-ending love and can now comfort others.