Right now, I’m walking through probably the second hardest season of my entire life. One that’s rivaling the number one spot from the very incident that led me to write an entire book on anxiety and depression. Except this season, unlike the other, was brought on by someone else’s decisions, which somehow makes it harder than a battle that’s solely internal. Regardless of the nuances of it, I just know it hurts. A lot.

Pain is real. Heartbreak is real. Tears are real. Hopelessness is real. Doubt is real. All of that and more are real things that happen for us in our lives whether we want them to or not, and grief is such an interesting phenomenon because all of those things happen simultaneously. The problem is that so many of us try to regulate the time frame and acceptability of such things which is incredibly harmful for our healing.

I’m talking about the nagging feeling within you that says, “If you were stronger, you’d be over this by now,” or, “You’ve cried about this already, you’re being dramatic,” or, “Why are you grieving like this? You didn’t even date them for that long,” or maybe even, “You guys weren’t even that close, why are you so sad that they’re dead?” Whatever it is, we try to regulate the time frame and conditions by which it’s acceptable to feel pain and it’s crap. It’s complete and utter crap. And what annoys me about it is that we are fighting those thoughts within us because they come from somewhere. Whether it’s a comment made in passing, a sneer, or an ill-timed joke, people as a whole are not great about handling pain well. It’s uncomfortable for both the person feeling it and those around them. The alarming thing is, the Christian community isn’t much better about it than the world is.

It’s become the norm in the Christian community where it’s not so much, “Give yourself grace, take the time you need to heal, and let me walk with you,” but rather, “Stop holding on to it and give it to God," which is really just a nice Christianese way of saying, "Get over it." Both feeling pain and letting God heal your pain are valid concepts, but they’re also not at odds with each other.

You see, the thing about pain is that it demands to be felt. Even if you suppress it, it has this nasty habit of coming back to the surface in the future. Suppressing pain is like trying to keep a beach ball underwater; it always comes back up. So thus, the only true way out of pain is through it, and sometimes that process is long. Sometimes that process is messy. And sometimes that process is a lot of work. Are we going to be willing to walk alongside people in their pain for all of that? Or is it easier for us to just pass them off to God and wipe our hands clean of the responsibility that God has called us to?

This is not to say that God should not be part of the healing process. Far from it. But I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that God’s word is very clear about the purpose of human relationships on the earth. That’s why Galatians 6:2 says, “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ,” (ESV). The direction there is very clear; we must walk with each other through our deepest pains no matter how long it takes and no matter how messy it is.

God’s plan for humans’ freedom on the Earth is you. Plain and simple. That’s why relationships are so important and why they’re so deeply attacked. It’s also why Jesus didn’t roll the stone away from Lazarus’s grave or “un-mummy” Lazarus himself; he made people do it. Why? Because Jesus does what he can do, and leaves the rest up to us.

But what’s the first thing they said when Jesus told them to move the stone? “He smells.” Yeah of course he does; he’s been dead for 4 days. They were more willing to save themselves from their friend’s stench than to get in there and do what needed to be done to bring him back to life. How often is this our answer to God as well? How often do we move away from people when their mess gets to be “too much” for us instead of doing what needs to be done to bring them back to life? Of course they’re in pain, someone close to them just died. Of course they're in pain, they just lost everything they worked for. Of course they're in pain, their dream is dead. Roll away the stone anyway.

One of my closest friends has told me time and time again that it’s an honor to walk with me through this season and I think she’s right. Bearing with one another’s burdens is an honor which is why God lets us do it rather than doing it all himself. We get to watch God work through impossible and painful circumstances and to say, “Remember when you were there? Look where you are now.”