The Beginning and the End...

And how time may not be circle but it does end where it began.

Today marks 3 years since my sweet mother passed away, the beautiful Annice Legons. I have never been sure how grief works, but I have learned that it is very good at its job even 3 years in. I have learned that although the form of grief does evolve and adjust according to the season of life you find yourself in, your particular circumstances, or the nature of the relationship with the person or situation that you are grieving, the function of grief stays the same.

“He has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, without the possibility that mankind will find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end”. - Ecclesiastes 3:11

At my job, my friend, Aaron, and I have started a small group for any of the men on staff who are interested in deepening our relationship with God and one another outside of the common work that we pursue day by day. We meet every other Wednesday morning and tackle a chapter of Ecclesiastes each time that we gather. We recently discussed Ecclesiastes 3, famous for its opening remarks that there is a “time for everything”. In the conclusion of this idea, the narrator of Ecclesiastes makes this statement that God has set eternity in the hearts of man and that we are hopelessly unable to know what God has done from the beginning to the end.

Now I accept this as truth, but I do not believe that this statement is all-encompassing. I have come to learn that there are some things that God has eagerly allowed us to see from the beginning for the sole purpose of encouraging our hearts. I am reminded that when Jesus would speak to the people, priests, and pharisees of Israel about society, he would contrast his observations of their situation with this wonderful and hope-filled phrase “but from the beginning, this was not so”.

This is fairly accurate representation of what journey through grief feels like

Jesus saw death, pain, divorce, distance, and broken relationships in his time living on earth and in a way that only he could embody as the eternal one compared it to what he saw in the beginning (captured in the first chapters of Genesis) - life, pleasure, purity, intimacy, and close proximity to the Father. His simple encouragement to us was and is “in the beginning, this was not so”.

He planted eternity in the hearts of men, and because of that we grieve. I now understand grief to be a spiritual experience. This remains true for all of us, if you are reading this, whether you align yourself as a believer in God or not you will find this to be true. Grief, at its core, is designed to be an experience of the spirit.

We grieve because our being acknowledges that truth of “in the beginning this was not so”. When we consider death, suffering, sickness, and pain, there is something within us that awakens to say “this is not supposed to be this way”. When we grieve broken relationships, deception, debt, and poverty, our hearts cannot help but admit “this is not supposed to be this way”.

I have hope for you, which is that “in the beginning it was not so”. The gift I offer on behalf of God today is that the end will look very much like the beginning if we choose to accept it.

The dual ends of grief are both that there is sadness that “this is not supposed to be this way” and that there is the joy of “in the beginning (and the end), this was not so”.

When I think of my mom today, it is with the purpose of experiencing the fullness of grief which causes me to sit with both of those thoughts. The first causes me to reflect and act, while the second encourages me to hope and trust.

“For the scripture says, Whosoever believes and trust on Him shall not be put to shame”. - Romans 10:11

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