Dear Church Family,

What an awesome Sunday to begin our new fiscal year. We celebrated 2 baptisms and if you are on Facebook be sure to watch their testimonies. We also began a new 1/2 semester on Wednesdays with the one of our sent ones who serve in SE Asia sharing. I’m so grateful for a church that celebrates new life and being on mission.

I saw this post about encouraging passages to read when you are grieving. I hope it ministers to you—

The Bible Reading Order for When Someone You Love Dies

Most people get a sympathy card with a verse on it.

Then the casseroles stop. Everybody goes back to work. And you’re left with a Bible on the nightstand and no idea where to open it.

Here’s where. One chapter a night is plenty.

Phase 1: Learn That Grief Is Not Unbelief

Start with John 11. Jesus was on His way to raise Lazarus from the dead. He knew it. And on the way to the grave, “Jesus wept.”

If tears meant weak faith, the Son of God would have skipped them.

Then read these in order:

Job 1 and 2 (ten children dead in one day, and a man face down on the ground worshipping in a torn mantle)

Ruth 1 (a widow who lost her husband and both sons, then told the whole city to stop calling her Naomi)

2 Samuel 12 (a father fasting on the ground until the seventh day, then getting up to wash and eat)

2 Samuel 18 (a king weeping over the son who turned on him)

Lamentations 3 (a man who says God brought him into darkness, and in the same chapter says His compassions are new every morning)

Phase 2: Learn How to Pray It

Psalms 42, 56, and 88.

Tears for food day and night. A man asking God to put his tears in His bottle. A psalm that ends in darkness with no bow on it, and God kept it in the Book anyway.

This is where you learn you’re allowed to tell God the truth. Even the ugly part.

Phase 3: Learn What Comes Next

John 20 (Mary Magdalene crying outside an empty tomb, until the One she’s crying over says her name)

1 Corinthians 15 (the resurrection chapter, where death gets asked where its sting went)

Revelation 21 (no more death, no more crying, and God Himself wiping away the tears)

These chapters won’t rush you.

They teach you:

Jesus cried on the way to a grave

Faith and tears live in the same house

You can get up and eat again without forgetting them

You can ask God why. Out loud.

The grave doesn’t get the last word

Most grief advice wants you over it by spring.

God didn’t answer Job until chapter 38.

Grief isn’t proof your faith failed.

It’s proof you loved somebody.

Save this. Somebody you know is going to need it.

Press On!

Mark