Alone For The Holidays: How To Deal With Grief

00:00 - Speaker 1
Real Life presents the Jack Hibbs Podcast with intention and boldness to proclaim truth, equip the saints and impact our culture.

00:09 - Speaker 2
Hey everybody. We're going to be getting together right now urgently, I might add, because this particular podcast is time sensitive and that is this Alone for the Holidays. It's almost like the sound of that old song right Home for the Holidays. But there are a lot of people going through the holidays right now that find themselves alone. By death or by abandonment or by separation, they find themselves in a state of grief. You do not have to stay there. God's got a better plan. Stay with me. I'm going to sit down with a man who is our resident expert in walking people through seasons of grief.

00:47 - Speaker 1
You can get the outlines of this podcast by going to jackhibbscom slash podcast Today. If this podcast lifts you up and encourages you to live a more fulfilled life in Christ, then make sure you leave us one of those five-star ratings. To us that's like saying amen or yes. Then that rating will encourage others to listen Now open your hearts to what God's word has to say to you. Here is Jack Hibbs.

01:16 - Speaker 2
Well, we are obviously coming to you at what is called the holiday season and, more specifically, as believers, this is a time, if you know this or not, but when it comes to ministry life, it is one of the most demanding seasons of the year for ministry. November, december, january those three months carry with it a tremendous burden, often on the hearts, on the very mind and spirit of so many people, because they find themselves alone for the holidays. Not home for the holidays, like the old song goes, but alone for the holidays. It could be a very painful time. And those three months by the holidays, like the old song goes, but alone for the holidays, it could be a very painful time. And those three months, by the way, are record suicide months every year, tragically, it doesn't have to be that way.

02:17
So listen, today we're going to be talking with Brad Steiler, and Brad is one who ministers to so many people who find themselves alone for the first time grief, loss. And one of the lies of the enemy is to say that it's you, it's uniquely you, what's wrong with you. You should be doing better than this. You're a Christian for crying out loud. But, brad, welcome. Thank you for this time together here Suffering If we go off what the title is? We're giving this alone for the holidays. How does somebody find themselves alone in the holiday season like now? How does that happen?

03:09 - Speaker 3
You say alone, and I think people might think of widow or widowers, but you can be alone within the family too. Grief contact strikes us differently, even within the family unit, us differently. Even within the family unit. Everybody responds differently to grief, and that's okay emotionally, physically, spiritually and so you can be in a family and be alone. So what we try to do is just talk about things to plan ahead for the holiday season. If you're aware of things coming up and plan ahead, it's not as intrusive.

03:48 - Speaker 2
So people find themselves alone by virtue of it could be abandonment, divorce, could be a child that has said you know what? I'm 18 now, or they think they're 18. Or they identify as an 18 year old and I'm leaving. I'm 18 now, or they think they're 18, or they identify as an 18-year-old and I'm leaving. I'm going to go live my whatever. It might be death, the devastation of that. You could be in a crowd of people and be alone. Oh, absolutely Absolutely.

04:28
Because the way that God made us, we internally process things and so we can put on the makeup or shave or the tuxedo or the gown and look like you blend in during the holiday events, but inside be absolutely gut-wrenching, heartbroken, many times asking the question why God, why Brad? What does somebody say? How does somebody take away from our time together today, being able to not only be ministered to, I hope, through what we're saying, but for those who know someone who's hurting, what can they take away from us and use? To those who are hurting who are saying why am I suffering this? Why me?

05:09 - Speaker 3
Yeah, you bring up the why question. We talk about that in our group and you know, the why questions are those things that you can never answer to your satisfaction and they create additional why questions. For me personally, I'll share that. What changed my way of thinking was I quit asking why and started asking what. What, Lord, what do you want me to do with this? How can I help others through this?

05:36 - Speaker 2
So in your grief of having lost your teenage, daughter for you and your wife you went through. Daughter For you and your wife you went through. It was during the grief process that at some point in time you stopped the why and said what I wasn't getting anywhere with the why that is so say that again. My gosh talk about that again. You weren't getting anywhere with asking God why.

06:01 - Speaker 3
Right, you know, I had an older daughter. I had a 16-year-old daughter my 13-year-old was the one that passed away and my wife and as men, I couldn't fix it and I couldn't fix myself without the Lord's help, and so I had to quit asking why and what, what can I do with this? How can I minister to my wife, how can I minister to my older daughter in this and give me direction? And when I started asking what, it built hope in me Because I was looking for something down the road and just little by little in the grief process, I became a servant to my wife and to my daughter. And when you help others, you help yourself.

06:50 - Speaker 2
So what you're saying, because I want to make sure that our audience understands the difference. There are those groups you mentioned the word group. There are those groups who come together and they, because they don't know Christ or they're not applying Christ to the issue, because they don't know Christ or they're not applying Christ to the issue, they come together and somebody might say it's nothing but a wine session Wine, I mean whining not drinking.

07:15
Crying. It's nothing, but, you know, stuck in the past kind of a thing. I don't want anything to do with a group like that. But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about people who that you minister and lead and guide through the grief process and, rather than you enabling their grief, you teach them how to identify the grief. Loneliness is part of the process, but this is where we're going. It's not we're going to stay back here and and be locked down. I this picture, brad, you've probably seen this a thousand times. I've seen it so much in my life. Where, here in the LA area, you know, we often do our funeral services at places like Forest Lawn or Rose Hills, and these are world-renowned places and I get it. But you can't go there and do a service and drive out because it's miles driving out, and drive out because it's miles driving out, without seeing people sitting at a gravesite with a table, an umbrella, coffee. They're living among the dead because they're so alone. True, and what would you say to somebody who might be going through?

08:46 - Speaker 3
that we get that question asked quite a bit. You know, is it okay to go to the cemetery? Is it okay not to go to the cemetery? I think it's based on what your need is at the time. If it helps you process and remember the blessings you'd had with that person to sit at the grave site for a period of time. I think that the grave site for a period of time I think that's key for a period of time. It's a period of time that's probably okay. If you don't want to go, that's up to you, based on the relationship you had with that person. When my daughter passed away, my wife and I just to get out of the house so we didn't isolate ourselves. We went to the cemetery on the weekend for a period of time. We haven't been there in years because she's not there. I know where she is.

09:32
She's having a great day right now, exactly, and I know where she is right, that's right, but in that period of time we needed that number one to kind of console one another, number one to kind of console one another and also to get us from isolating ourselves and moving out and doing activities.

09:50 - Speaker 2
What's the hardest lift for you? Ministering to people who have suffered loss. What's the hardest part of your job?

09:59 - Speaker 3
Oh gosh Is to try to give them hope, his hope, because it's hard, because they're so internalized and devastated, usually because they've lost a mom or dad or even a sibling or a wife or husband, and it's to get them to look outward that that's not the end, that God has a purpose through this and he's going to use you some way or another. But you have to. You have to move forward, you have to take those steps we call it. You have to lean into your grief. In other words, you have to push through it and you have to deal with it. You can't put it on the shelf and leave it there.

10:47 - Speaker 2
It's so sad because the world's way is, um, just just draw another line of cocaine, take another drink, yeah, get a, get some bourbon or whatever the thing is. And it's so, it's so well, the word's pathetic, because you're going to wake up out of that stupor Actually worse off because you've tried something of the world which isn't even a bandaid, it's actually a razor that you're getting relief. But you wake up out of your drunkenness and you have just, in your mind, exhausted what you thought would bring you hope. And it does the opposite.

11:41 - Speaker 3
And now you're really you can't numb the pain because when you come out of it it's still there. You still have to deal with it. Often said, we get people that say I'd like to go to sleep around Halloween and not wake up until January 2nd. That's right, that's right. You know well, when you wake up January 2nd, your grief is still there, doesn't?

12:02 - Speaker 2
change a thing.

12:03 - Speaker 3
second, your grief is still there. It doesn't change a thing. It doesn't change a thing. You still have to deal with your grief to be able to move through your grief, to heal.

12:09 - Speaker 2
So walk us through maybe some highlights that people can have takeaways of. If you're experiencing grief and loss and the holiday season, like you just mentioned, from October to January, what are some takeaways that you would say to someone right now? You just bumped into me probably good chance, we'll never see each other again. You just discovered in the grocery store line that I lost my wife and you feel, because you're a Christian, you have compassion for this individual. I am that individual. What would you say to me if I were to say yeah, you know what. I haven't been the same. My wife passed away a couple of months ago. I don't even know what I'm doing, even shopping. I don't even know what I'm doing at the store.

13:02 - Speaker 3
Yeah, I'd kind of ask them how are you going to deal with the holidays? Have you made it?

13:07 - Speaker 2
I don't even want to think about the holidays, yeah.

13:10 - Speaker 3
Well, keep it simple. I mean, basically we get in a lot of things for decorating. Do I do the same traditions? Do I do this? Do I do that? It depends on the family. It's good to If you've lost let's say you've lost your mom and you've got kids Sit down as a family we call it a family huddle and discuss what's important to get through the holidays. Keep it simple if you can, but don't, don't hide from it. Um, because eventually you're going to have to deal with it. And um, so it's, it's, it's just good to to talk to one another.

13:52 - Speaker 2
And and so you don't create additional issues within the family uh, because of you're not doing something that mom would have liked, or it's really great, you guys, what he's saying because's saying because he said simple and you might, as soon as he said simple, you might have said for you, well, that was not always the case for him. Let me share this with you. I know of a family who lost the mom, a young couple, several kids. She got cancer, she died in her mid-30s. Um, what they did in part of their grief process was the dad had them. Uh, write out something of that. You remember about mom, absolutely, absolutely. That's good. And so that sounds kind of heavy, oh my gosh. But here's what happened and it was brilliant because the dad saw through this and I think God led him through this. So, for example, the kids would say I miss the smell of her hair or the sound of her shoes on the wooden floors at home. They would put that out there and he would get the conversation going so he'd open it up. So the sound of mom's shoes on the floor, yeah, what did that sound like? Oh, it sounded like this. Yeah, it did kind of sound. Yeah, you know what? Um, what were some of the funny things about mom? You see, he, he used the door to challenge.

15:26
The grief begins to insert Can you remember, kids, some of the funny things that mom would do? Yeah, mom would do this. Sometimes they'd laugh about it and then start crying Right, this has got to happen, absolutely, it has to happen. Then the dad had the confidence to say what were some of the things that you'd say that just drove you crazy about mom. Because, you know, we have this tendency as humans because we headbutt each other in life and then so-and-so grandma, grandpa, son, daughter, husband, wife pass away, son, daughter, husband, wife pass away, and there's almost an unwritten rule of memorializing them to where they actually they should. They should, you know, have Peter, james, john and Wilma installed up there with the saints, because, but the reality is and this is the power of this, this dad, he said at the proper time, as time went on, went on hey, can you tell me, tell which one of you three what did mom say or do to drive you just crazy?

16:30
It drove you crazy and they would say something like she wouldn't let you know, remember, dad, she wouldn't let me leave the table until I ate that broccoli. Yeah, and I think I'll hate broccoli forever. And then the other one says the other thing why is that important? It's because you're actually processing through and truly remembering her in all these aspects. That helps their process. It's not. It wasn't always roses. There were times when I got in trouble, when I painted the garage door black that day and mom was furious and I'll never forget it because she threw her shoe at me. They start laughing.

17:08 - Speaker 3
Yeah, absolutely yeah.

17:10 - Speaker 2
And so, at this time, if someone finds themselves alone for the holidays and I'm talking alone, I'm talking about somebody. They don't have a church, maybe they're not even Christians, they don't have family. They're watching this right now, or they're hearing this right now what should they do? How do they not be alone for the holidays?

17:40 - Speaker 3
One of the things that we, if you can journal, you write about that person or you write a specific letter to that person what you've been up to, what you miss, to make that connection, and the One that really does hit home is a personal letter to that person that you're missing. Wow, all the things, whether it's you're talking about regrets, whether you're talking about what you did yesterday, or if you didn't do anything yesterday because you missed them, or whatever, you have to get those emotions out. When you brought it up there about the dad with the kids, it's so important to talk about it in their timing because it's different for everyone and but you have to talk about it. Talking about that is part of the healing process and you have to get that out. If you clam up and hold it back, you don't you just stay stuck. Yeah, stay stuck.

18:38
In my situation afterwards I traveled quite a bit, and back east a lot. So you know you get up early in the morning, you get on a plane, all day trip, all day trip. And I always had a connector because it was easier to fly out of Ontario, and so I'd sleep the first half. Well, after my daughter passed away, god put a talker next to me on that first half and you know the saying goes is where are you going? Business pleasure? Do you have a family? Do you have kids? Yeah, I just lost one. If they have kids now they want to know what happened. Can I ask you what happened? It got me to talk about it and most men want to stuff it, and so that talking about it really, really, really helped me a lot.

19:24
And it's the same thing in our group and if you are totally alone, again writing a letter to that person talking about your day or talking about what you miss about them is so important.

19:35 - Speaker 2
Getting back to that father, the end result, end conclusion, was this he said it worked out great for the kids Over time it worked out great. And he said for me it worked out even better. And I said how so? And he said because I did not realize, I underestimated the healing process in my own grief of listening to the kids describe their relationship with her, how they viewed her. He learned so much about his kids, he said I would not have known them. Those are additional blessings. Well, that's what he listen, that's what he concluded. Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God Right. So he sought out to comfort the little ones. They wound up participating. He went away healed the most because his attempt to comfort God used them to wind up comforting him.

21:04 - Speaker 3
Look at the additional impacts that she had on those kids that he knew nothing about, he didn't even know, right, and what a blessing for him to say, wow, my wife, I knew she was a super mom, but, oh my gosh, it's funny you should say that, because Lisa and I were wondering what are?

21:27 - Speaker 2
we don't call funeral services in the Christian faith funeral services. We call them graduations or celebrations. I like graduation even better than celebration, because a graduation includes graduation and graduations have celebrations. So we've wondered you know what's it going to be like when our grandkids find out? You know when, for example, our oldest, when Emmy, goes to the podium to say I miss my Mimi and my papa and I was their favorite grandchild? Well then the next in age would be Ollie, and he would get up there and he would say wait a minute, they told me that I was their favorite grandchild. And then the third, ames, would get up there and say forget all you guys. They said I was the and that's how we want to love. Yeah, right, we want to love that way to where, with what you have now, with those that are around you now, to leave a mark. You're going to leave a mark anyway. Right, it's great to leave a mark. You're going to leave a mark anyway. It's great to leave a mark that has that beautiful aspect of how that father pointed out the stuff that mom drove us crazy about. But the stuff, the sound of mom coming down the hallway or the smell of her hair. Those are things that help in the grief process beautifully.

22:57
But you've got to go beyond. You've got to press into the promises of God. And let's remember this Jesus said if somebody dies believing in me, though he may die yet, he shall live, and that even everlasting. So you might say well, yeah, but Jack, my nine-year-old died. I believe personally in the sovereignty of God, knowing this that Paul the Apostle said there's no appointment of law. Where there is no appointment or knowledge of the law, there is no knowledge of sin. So you think of a five-year-old? How big can a five-year-old sin? They're not knowledgeable of the law. Are they sinners? Yes, but will God hold them accountable? I don't believe so. They're not at the age of accountability. Whatever that age is, it's later on, for sure.

23:45
But you're going to see your child again and in the meantime, for those of you who have your husband, your wives, your kids, your parents, you're going to want to pay the expense to tell them now, do things now. And I think I speak for everybody when I say we don't need a gift we're not talking about. I don't need a watch. I either want your time right or just a note, just a note. So love on the people who are in your life now, don't wind up having to live a regretful life once they're gone. It's risky, it's expensive, it's costly, and I'm not talking dollars, I'm talking about your emotion. Love is very expensive because you put yourself out there, man, and yet you were designed to do that, and nobody exhibited that greater than the creator of love himself, god. And so what would you add to someone that you know is facing loneliness?

25:00 - Speaker 3
someone that you know is facing loneliness.

25:08 - Speaker 2
No, the difference between isolation and, you know, getting alone with God.

25:11 - Speaker 3
Explain unpack. Isolation is you don't want anything to do with anybody, you don't want to move, you don't want to go out and get out, you basically stay, become a shut in. You know solitary is different when you want to. You know, solitarily, get by yourself, get with the Lord, get with your grief. You do have to deal with that and to me, that is dealing with your grief. To me is remembering the blessings you had. Every good and perfect gift comes from above. Being thankful, yeah, comes from above, says in James, james 1.17. And it's to get away from the negative and remember the positive, that that person impacted you and impacted others, and that was their purpose. And so now, what are you going to do? The what question comes on. What do you want to do? Let me get out and try to impact others with that, whether it's helping holiday season, whether it's helping at a shelter, whether it's helping whatever. When you help others, again, you help yourself, and it's 100% true. And you help others, again, you help yourself, and it's 100% true, and you realize that you know what I do have a purpose, moving forward.

26:28
I can affect people around me, whether it's family or, if you don't have family, the stranger at the grocery store. Many times I've come into the grocery store and seen somebody that's hurting, and when I'm bold enough because not always we're human and I'll walk up and say are you okay? I'll give you an example and this wasn't the holiday season, but how you can be bold. When I had my heart surgery and I'm laying in bed I can't get out of bed the nurse came in and had a weird look on her face and I asked her are you okay? And she goes no, not really. And I said can I pray for you? And she said she just hesitated and looked like shocked and said yeah. And so I prayed with her. And you know God, you know the details and you know just bless her and bless her day, that her day, and let her come out of it and gave it to Jesus, amen, right. And she looked at me and she goes I've been a nurse 14 years. You're the only person that's ever asked to pray with me.

27:32 - Speaker 2
That's almost always the response and and I.

27:34 - Speaker 3
And so what was it? I got blessed Right. So now my mood I'm laying there, can't move and my attitude changed. It's the same thing in the grief in the holiday season, it's the same thing you bless somebody else and your day just rises you know what Brad's talking about is Jesus said if you forget your life, you'll find it.

27:57 - Speaker 2
That's exactly what that means. He just gave a commentary on the meaning of that passage, or that verse that Jesus gave. And then, and conversely, jesus said if you hang on to your life and try to preserve it, you're going to wind up losing it. And wow, you're making me think I will. I'll change the name to protect the guilty, so let's call him Fred. So we knew Fred and his wife, susie, and Susie got cancer and several years of battle and all this stuff and she died. And it turns out that when she passed, as is normal, his faith was tested, okay, and she was the one that had the foundation. He pretty much stood on her foundation mostly, so he had to grow up real quick. The problem is he did.

29:05
Listen, friends, please. I'm telling you a story that's almost 20 years old now and the guy never recovered to this day. Here's the reason why recovered to this day. Well, here's the reason why everybody in his life, including Lisa and I, said you know the drill. Right, the drill is in your grief, don't make any big decisions, right, in fact, run them by your family, which he didn't have one. So run them by us, run them by your church family, but in your grief, because he was really having a hard time, don't make any decisions.

29:51
This couple had a marvelous, to say the least, home, paid for in Orange County, spectacular, and we heard he had sold it. What's going on? I just everywhere I turn, every room. Listen, this is a month. Every room, I think of her. Every room I think of her. Listen, friends. He didn't listen to what Brad's talking about. He didn't process the fact that you're going to have to go through grief at times. So he starts making decisions, thinking if I get rid of the home that we built, what? She'll be gone? What are you attempting to do? Every room I see her, every room, I think. And that decision led to another bad decision.

30:50 - Speaker 3
Snowballs from there.

30:51 - Speaker 2
And then, rapidly, he was remarried, and that was a bad decision. And on and on why what happened was a bad decision. And on and on why what happened is that the grief took over, so much so that emotions, which are just emotions, are just blood red all the time. Right, think about it, emotions. Um. One day his emotion said this I gotta shut down uh, our, our music room because she loved to play the piano. I got to lock that door. You go around and you shut down all the rooms and what do you have?

31:29
You have this form of isolation, yeah, where you are alone with nobody else but you. Versus, what was the word you used? Versus isolation versus solitary, solitary, solitary or being alone with god. When you're alone with god, the word alone actually is impossible. It's an oxymoronic word in that sentence. When you're with god, you're not alone. It's impossible to go through grief without God if the Lord, jesus Christ, is the Lord of your life. Christians are not exempt from difficulty, it could be argued. Christians have it more difficult in life because God is testing and purifying our faith. But today, if you find yourself suffering at this season or anytime you see this broadcast, you need to ask yourself first of all, do you know the Lord Jesus personally, in other words, in your grief? Has God been speaking to you? Be honest? Has God been speaking to you words like and we'll do this together. This is unrehearsed. In your grief, god would speak and he has been speaking things to you like you'll get through this or what, what? What are the words we hear from him in grief?

32:58 - Speaker 3
I have a purpose through this, um, my, you can rest on me, my hope. I'll give you the hope that you need. I'll give you the strength you need. Let me be your refuge in this time.

33:12 - Speaker 2
How about this? Yes to that, by the way. How about this? This is, this is the one that's when God says to our why I don't understand, and God answers back in our hearts and we know it's him, because we wind up having an argument inside of our head and we're not arguing with us because the arguer you can tell he's bigger than us and he says things like this to us. You can tell he's bigger than us and he says things like this to us. I didn't ask you to understand it, but I don't understand. You're not going to understand it. You've got to be able to have a relationship with God that when he says you don't understand this, because you're not supposed to understand this, I'm asking you to trust me. If you understood it, you wouldn't trust me. I'm asking you to trust me and don't get caught up in the understanding.

34:24 - Speaker 3
Because even if he were to tell us what he's doing, we still wouldn't get it. When we started the ministry, my wife and I, some 25 years ago now, when God put it on our hearts because we couldn't find anything around here, and when he said you know, maybe you should provide it here, and I said Lord, I'm not good enough.

34:40 - Speaker 2
And he says you don't have to be.

34:41 - Speaker 3
I am Iimi. He said I am, and it was like okay. So we jumped in the deep end and I'm still treading water. But he guides through and half the time I don't know what I say. And that's a good thing. To tell you the truth, because it's him, it's not me.

35:06 - Speaker 2
Well, when someone's grieving, the last thing that they need to hear from is a pre-packaged prestomatic, cookie-cutter answer that you've just regurgitated to 10,000 people. People need to know from you, hear from you. In the moment we're going to start to wrap this up, brad is the overseer of a ministry that is acknowledged. I say acknowledged because it happens everywhere there's humans. But because of Brad's passion and what he and his wife have gone through in learning to embrace the suffering and the hurt that God's got the plan to this, he ministers to so many people and tell the viewers a little bit about the ministry and I hope it winds up causing your church, or wherever you're at, to do such a thing. But in wrapping up, talk about the ministry, what you've seen happen. Give us a day in the life of what you do.

36:16 - Speaker 3
We call our ministry Seasons of Grief because it is a season. I love that. You go through different seasons and grief is definitely one and probably the heaviest one, depending on your relationship with the person you lost. But it's done through Grief Share. They're out of North Carolina. They have a video series.

36:34
It's biblically based and it's a program that we use and it's a video watch and then discussion groups afterwards and that's where the synergy and the dynamics come, especially for those that are bold enough to share, and it's available all over the country and churches can get the curriculum and get the videos and start a grief group at their church and basically that's what we modeled our group after. That's the group we went through and we couldn't find anything and we just modeled it after that. But it's a video series and a discussion group and then we make contacts and the fellowship that happens in between the people that attend you talk about alone. We split off in different groups. So, like widow and widowers are a separate group because it's a different dynamic, the relationship you had with that person, and then everybody else, whether you've lost siblings or parents or grandparents or friends or whatever. Our group tends to be rather large, so we usually split in multiple groups of that and basically lead those discussion groups and we have some additional facilitators and stuff like that.

37:49 - Speaker 2
I would imagine, because of the way the body of Christ works. Do you see people loving on one another without prodding or without you having to exhort them?

38:08 - Speaker 3
Absolutely, absolutely Powerfully, huh, because people that attend the group, they're at different spaces on their grief journey. Some are just entering, some have traveled the road a little bit but still dealing with some additional things, and so it's really they're lifting one another up and it's powerful to see and we had some people will come in and they won't say a word in the discussion group but yet they'll get one-on-one with a young mother that's just lost a child because they've lost somebody you know many years ago, and they'll lift them up and the sharing that goes on in that aspect is really quite remarkable, wow, yeah, and to see that, you know, it's pretty neat and you know, and other ministries have spun off of ours too. Widows of Worth is one too, just for widows. Even the breast cancer ministry came off of ours.

39:09 - Speaker 2
Isn't that something? Yeah, I love what he's saying. He's reminding me of what's going on around here on campus, where there were these, the world would say there was this problem, there was this horrible situation, there was this terrible issue. Well, through the scriptures, through Christ's eyes, when we hear, oh, she has cancer and we need to lay hands on her, we need to pray for her, we need to anoint her with oil, we need to come alongside her, we need to ask her husband if that's the situation, how can we help? That's just church being church. But what's amazing and I think this is actually the word of God at work within someone who has cancer, remember the spirit, the soul, the eternal part of a human being never gets cancer, never gets sick. Their body gets sick, so they feed off the word, so they're hearing the word, they're hearing Bible study, or they're going to a small group and they're growing, even though they're technically dying. They're growing. And what happens?

40:18
And what Brad is referring to widows of worth and what is the breast cancer thing? Not Alone. Not Alone when these ministries were created by people who were going through grief? Yeah Right, absolutely. And they came and they said, hey, can I start a ministry to women who are battling breast cancer, to women who are battling breast cancer.

40:44
And normally you know, normally you don't look at a church's website and say you know. It says you know, contact us directions, breast cancer group yeah, but when you get down through it all, you discover, wow, well, we're simply announcing to you that your suffering, your grief, is normal in this fallen world. However, it's not over for us. It's not over this. Listen, if you're, if you are a follower of Jesus, if you're a born again believer John, chapter three go read it. This is as close to hell as we'll ever get. Yeah, and I love that understanding, because the scripture says eye has not seen, ear has not heard, nor has it entered into the minds of man the things that God has prepared for those who love him. It's incredible. So I'm going to ask Brad to pray us out, knowing that you could be watching right now and you could be alone. So you think. But the Lord in Joshua, chapter one you should read it later over and over again tells Joshua be not afraid, be not dismayed.

42:21 - Speaker 3
Be of good courage, for the Lord, thy God, is with you wherever you go. Remember that. Will you close us in prayer? Sure, absolutely Awesome, thank you, heavenly Father. We just thank you for this time that you've blessed us with. We thank you for all the blessings you give each and every one of us and for those that are grieving, father, we just ask that they would feel your comfort. If they don't have a strong relationship with you, father, let them run to you, because that's where their peace and comfort will come from.

42:43
In the midst of their grief, father, don't let them isolate. Let them reach out, yeah, let them reach out to, to, first of all, you, and if not you, father, then then someone that maybe has traveled the grief journey and that they can. They can be lifted up and encouraged from that, from that journey. And so, father, we just ask that our heart goes out to those that maybe have recently lost a loved one, and this holiday season is especially heavy, father. They will get through this With your help and your guidance, father, they will. And so I just lift this up this time, up to you now, and just ask that you would just, please, just touch each and every one that might have a broken heart. You're the one that heals broken hearts, father, and you save those who are crushed in spirit. So, father, we just look to you and we just give it in Jesus' name. Yeah, amen, amen.

43:41 - Speaker 2
Amen. Well, it's an awesome thing that we have a God who writes to us in his book so much about suffering and healing and restoration and eternal life. It's awesome, brad. We love you, we love what you're doing. Thank you, brad, we love you, we love what you're doing. Thank you. And if somebody, are you even able to be able to take a phone call or something? Do I dare say if somebody out there they'd like to reach out to you, to reach out for Brad Styler? Brad Styler here, and I have no idea what our phone number is. Do you know what our phone number?

44:27 - Speaker 3
is 909-373-7100,. I believe no, excuse me again 909-393-7100.

44:38 - Speaker 2
We don't even know where we work.

44:40 - Speaker 3
How did we get here today? You can call the church office. I'm here Tuesdays and Thursdays in the morning and I do take phone calls. You can call the church office. I'm here Tuesdays and Thursdays in the morning and I do take phone calls. You can definitely reach out. You can also email our Seasons of Grief website, which is SOG at CalvaryCCHorg.

44:57 - Speaker 2
Very good, that would be really good.

44:59 - Speaker 3
Yeah, so you can email me and I do get my. We'll get back to you.

45:03 - Speaker 2
That might be a great idea. Email, because I know that sounds impersonal, but it allows Brad, by the way, to respond to your email in such a way that maybe he's not the guy to connect with you, but much better that this woman, who just went through exactly what you're going through, might be better.

45:20 - Speaker 3
And we do that. We have a network of people that have different skills and different losses and stuff that, uh, that they can relate to. I can't relate to the loss of a spouse, but we do have people that that's right.

45:32 - Speaker 2
That's right. Well, listen on you. You know unusual uh podcast, but not everything that we fly under the banner of uh life and we just discussed what happens in real life. So, friends, listen, as always, we believe that it's time for you to live out what you believe in, that it is time for real life, and we encourage you to do that very thing. Seek God, seek his word, matthew 6, 33. Seek him first in all things, and he will add to your life what is needed. And so God bless you until we get back together again next time.

46:17 - Speaker 1
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