There are two competing narratives for our grief: God’s and Satan’s. Every experience surrenders to an interpretation. Our interpretation of grief will influence how we understand past, present, and future events. It reinterprets the past when we think things like, “Maybe God is not who I thought he was. Maybe life does not operate the way I thought. If I had [blank] to do over again, I would do it differently.” It reinterprets the future as we apply what we learned (accurately or inaccurately) from our grief experience to make “wise” or “common sense” choices.

As we enter into this chapter, however, we have to be careful to understand what we are seeking to accomplish. Challenging wrong interpretations of grief will not end grief or make it go away. In this case, right “answers” will not necessarily result in pleasant emotions of relief and joy. It will allow for a clean grief preventing your loss from becoming an entry point for foundational lies that change your identity, definition of safety, or sense of purpose in unhealthy ways. These are the changes that would result in a residual disruption of life after the sorrow of grief has passed.

In this chapter we will look at five questions that shape our suffering story: who am I, who is God, what is death, is love worth grief, and what am I living for? We will look at them in light of grief. Our goal is not to provide a comprehensive theological answer, but to provide the foundational framework for a healthy understanding of grief.

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