Category: truth

Lenten Reflections 2024: Letting Go to Make Space for Love

Letting go to make space for love is the only true fast.

I have observed Lent off and on for decades.

It’s an opportunity to set aside time and dedicate effort to thinking deeply about the current state of my spiritual life as well as refocus my heart’s affections on my Shepherd Savior King.

Faith, in general, is less about the sacrifice of stuff and more about the surrender of our souls. Lent, in kind, is less about well-mannered denials and more about thinning our lives in order to thicken our communion with God.

Alicia Britt Chole

Today’s fast: LENT AS PROJECT

Read the rest here: Lenten Reflections: Letting Go To Make Space For Love

Child Loss is NOT Divine Punishment

Because child loss is so devastating and painful, it’s easy to believe the only logical reason for this agony is that it’s punishment.

It took me awhile to allow the Holy Spirit to lead me into the truth that it is not.

All the punishment for sin was borne by Jesus.

I have not committed some awful act outside His grace and mercy that deserves this terrible burden.

Once I accepted that, I was free to allow my heart to hope again, to hear again, to trust again in my Shepherd King.

He is for me, not against me.

He is with me, not judging me. ❤️

Grief Work 2024: Shake Off the Shame

Shame is one of the most crippling aspects of child loss.

Depending on the circumstances surrounding your child’s last days on earth, it can be compounded by friends, family and even strangers who speculate, comment or simply give a parent “that look”.

It’s true that we all MAKE mistakes but none of us ARE mistakes.

Grief work is, in part, embracing this life we didn’t choose.

But it is also letting go of feelings, identities and burdens placed upon our broken hearts by ourselves and others.

Shame tells us we are unworthy of love and belonging and that is simply a lie.

❤ Melanie

Shame is a shackle as sure as any chains forged from iron.  

And it often finds its home in the hearts of those who bury a child.

Bereaved parents may feel shame for lots of reasons:

  • Circumstances surrounding the death of their child-suicide, alcohol, drug abuse;
  • Inability to provide the funeral or burial they want due to financial constraints;
  • Missing signs or symptoms of an illness that may have led to death;
  • Family dynamics that pushed a child away from home or relationship.

The list could be endless-on the other side of child loss our brains pick apart every interaction, every choice, every moment that could have gone one way but went another.

Read the rest here: Shake Off the Shame

Grief Work 2024: Forgiving Others

There are lots of opportunities for offense surrounding the death of a child.

Once your heart is broken open wide with great sorrow, there’s no defense against the bumps and bruises that are a natural product of human relationship and interaction.

  • Friends and family that didn’t show up.
  • Friends and family that showed up but said or did the wrong thing.
  • Friends and family that abandoned me as soon as the casket closed.
  • People that make me feel guilty for grieving or question my sanity or my “progress”.

But I’m learning to let go of offense.

Not only because it is too heavy to carry in addition to my grief, but because the Lord has commanded it.

❤ Melanie

I grew up reciting what’s commonly called, “The Lord’s Prayer” without much thought to the individual phrases or their meaning. It wasn’t until adulthood that I read it in context and continued on to the rest of the chapter.

Read the rest here: Forgive Us Our Trespasses, As We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us

Grief Work 2024: I Can Get Back Up, Even When It Hurts


When I wrote this a few years ago I had fallen outside when feeding the animals.

But I was reminded of the post when I fell-hard!-on sharp rocks in our creek playing with my grandson. I was holding his hand and both of us went down when my foot slipped.

I hobbled up the bank with a giant bleeding gash on my knee and I’m still living with a permanent knot on my kneecap. Poor little guy was frightened but not hurt.

He has recited that incident over and over and always ends it with, “I’m okay. Mama D okay. We’re okay.”

He can’t wait to get in again when it’s warmer.

I absolutely love, love, love that my sweet little boy has already learned the lesson of getting back up, even when it hurts.

It’s something I need to remember every. single. day. 

❤ Melanie

I hate that question that every doctor’s office asks now, “Have you had any falls in the past twelve months?”

I always say, “no” even though that’s rarely true.  

Because I know what they are looking for is evidence of disease that might be impacting balance and I’m perfectly free of that so I don’t want to place a red flag in my medical chart.

But I fall down pretty regularly. 

Read the rest here: Falling Down and Getting Up Again

Grief Work 2024: Faith and God’s Strength

A little review as we get to the last post in our series: Trying to stuff or hide my pain from myself, God and others is fruitless and unhelpful.

I’ve got to breathe out the sorrow, doubts, angst and disappointment to make room for the life-giving breath of Truth and the Holy Spirit.

And then I need to do one more thing. I must appropriate the strength and courage of my Savior-the Author and Finisher of my faith.

It is possible to endure. It is possible to finish well. It is possible to hold onto hope and follow the Light and Love of Jesus through this Valley.

❤ Melanie

My friend and fellow bereaved mom, Margaret Franklin, Ryan’s mom, shared a beautiful Dutch word with me “Sterkte” (pronounced STAIRK-tah).

It literally translates “strength” or “power” but culturally means much more.  It means bravery, strength, fortitude and endurance in the face of fear and insumountable odds through the empowering strength of God in me.

Not MY strength, but HIS.

It’s the strength Isaiah meant when he wrote:

But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

Isaiah 40:31 KJV

This is what it means to appropriate God’s strength:

Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Appropriate God’s Strength

Grief Work 2024: Faith and Truth

Have you ever walked away from a conversation and thought, “My goodness! I talked WAY too much”?

I have.

I can become so wrapped up in sharing my own experience, spilling my own feelings, trying to communicate my own point of view that I don’t leave space for the other person to get a word in edgewise.

Sometimes I do the same thing when talking to God-I can’t stop chattering long enough to hear what He wants to speak into my pain.

When I choose to listen, He is faithful to remind me of truth. He is faithful to lead me to the green pastures of His word where I can feast on His promises and be filled with hope.

❤ Melanie

“I wake before the morning light.  Every. single. morning.

I get my coffee, sit in my chair and wait for sunrise.

I never worry that today it might not happen.

I’m never concerned that after all these years of faithfulness, this day may be the one where daylight fails to make an appearance.

There is no fear in this darkness because I know it will not last forever.

Morning is coming.

Morning. Is. Coming.

And that’s the hope I cling to in this longer darkness of the Valley of the Shadow of Death-no matter how many years it may be, the Valley has an end.

Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Access the Truth

Grief Work 2024: Faith and Doubt

Some of us have grown up in faith communities where doubt is treated as disbelief.

I’m so sorry.

Doubt is, in my opinion, a precursor to deeper faith, stronger commitment, informed and more solid trust in God and in His goodness and sovereignty.

If devastating loss has brought you to knees or face down on the floor begging God to make sense of it all, you are in good company. So many of His saints have cried out in despair.

If you are frightened you are losing faith, remember this: the simple fact you know where and to Whom to bring your pain means your heart is still turned toward your Savior.

❤ Melanie

Grief forces me to walk Relentlessly Forward  even when I long to go back.

I can’t stop the clock or the sun or the days rolling by.

Those of us who are more than a couple months along in this journey (or any journey that involves tragedy and loss) know that it is ABSOLUTELY POSSIBLE to feel worse than in the first few days.

Because as the edges of the fog lift and the reality of an entire lifetime looms before you the questions form and the doubt sinks in.

Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Acknowledge Doubt and Ask Questions

Grief Work 2024: Faith and Pain

For those of us who follow Jesus, perhaps the most difficult and important grief work we must do is deciding how our faith fits into the new and awful reality of child loss.

I’ve encountered so many hurting hearts struggling to square their experience of devastating loss with their faith in a loving and all-powerful God.

I write about my own struggle over and over in this space but this series of posts is an orderly exploration of doubt, pain, faith and the hope I’ve found in Christ Jesus.

I pray it helps another heart hold on.

❤ Melanie

Child loss is Unnatural-no way around it.

Out of order death is devastating.

When my perfectly healthy, strong and gifted son was killed instantly in a motorcycle accident on April 12. 2014 my world fell apart.  My heart shattered into a million pieces.  And after almost eight years, I’ve yet to even FIND all of those pieces much less put them back together.

So what does a heart do when that happens?  Because, try as I might, I cannot stop time. 

Even THAT awful day only lasted 24 hours.

When the sun rose again, the pain was still there.  And behind that pain and mixed with it was something else-disappointment, disaffection, distrust.

Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Admit the Pain

Facing a New Year: A Prayer for Hurting Hearts

Some of us enter trembling through the door of a new year. 

This last year wasn’t so good and our hearts are broken.

What if the next year is worse?  How will we manage?  Where can we hide from bad news, bad outcomes, disastrous trauma?

Truth is, we can’t.  

So here we are, bravely marching in, hanging on to hope and begging God for mercy.  

Read the rest here: New Year’s Prayer for Hurting Hearts