Empathic Silence

A sister in Christ sent me the following message:

“I have never experienced anyone close to me passing. However, sadly this year I've already experienced two people gone. I read your blogs all the time and I see that you're so strong and still living life to the fullest. I just want to know, "Why does the Lord take the good people?" The innocent?" My fiance’s closest relative just lost his wife to cancer too. She was 60 years old. They were married for 38 years with no children. How does he continue to live life? What do you tell him? I am just asking you because I know you would be the number one person that would know. I admire you each and everyday. May the lord keep blessing you and Cyan. Take care =)”

Thanks for the question. I’ll start by straightening some understandings and sharing some of my personal experiences in going through my own life challenges.

First of all, the Lord never takes. God is Love and love is always giving. He even gave His only begotten Son to die on the Cross that we are now able to enter eternal life!

Let’s ponder about that for a moment.

So, for us death is no longer the end. It’s actually the beginning of the fullness of everlasting Life. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and Life Himself. As we say yes to enter our passing to Heaven, we are saying yes to God’s calling to be with Him forever. I can assure you, there is no better place other than being one with the Heart of God. That is our home. That is why we were created, to experience this fullness of Love.

Let’s bring ourselves to that moment of falling in love with someone; how beautiful, how timeless, how every cell in our body blooms with roses, those experiences are. What if I can tell you that there is a place, there is a space, where those experiences are going to be ten times better than any falling in love experience one can ever have. When we are one with the Heart of God, it is not just ten times, but that experience is multiplied beyond infinity. I am ecstatic just writing about this.

So, no, the Lord does not take good people. Everybody will experience death, both good and bad people. Even Jesus, Life Himself, died on the Cross. But just the way Jesus showed us that He conquered death by rising again, we too will rise from death to eternal Life when we are in Him and He in us. Everybody will experience eternal life. The question is, where?

I was cleaning up my kitchen when flashes of my wife, who is currently my personal saint, appeared in front of me. The first thing I felt was sadness from the separation I went through. That was very human and I needed to embrace that. But when I lifted up my heart and looked up to Heaven, there she is. She is experiencing the fullness of Joy. She is one with Jesus day and night. As the result of that understanding, I became joyful. I am happy that she is happy now. There is no way in the world as a human being I can create that kind of happiness for her. No way.

There are two sides of love. The first is I love you so much that I want you to be here with me. The second is I love you so much that I want the best to happen for you that you may experience happiness. These two sides need to go hand in hand. One without the other is going to cripple our understanding of love.

Regarding your fiance’s relative, what should we tell him? Nothing.

Really? Yes. When I say nothing, I don’t mean “nothing” because we don’t care. When I say nothing, I mean there is really nothing we can say to comfort him. The one and only thing we can do for him is to be there in empathic silence. Just be there and feel whatever he is feeling. Experience whatever he is going through the best way we know how. Cry when he cries. Laugh when he laughs. Dance when he dances. Nod in agreement when he achieves a glorious victory in God.

Words are cheap at this point. The last thing we want to say is “been there done that.” Only God earns the right to say that to somebody.

Regarding what he should do next, I’ll quote as close as possible a very beautiful passage from Pixar’s “Up” when the man reads a passage from his deceased wife’s memoirs, “Thank you for the adventure, dear. Now go get a new one.”

Glory to the Most Holy Trinity,
Bro Chan