"Grief: Denial, Bargaining, & Anger"

Grief: Episode 1 of 2. This is probably the most real, genuine, and honest conversation we've ever had on our podcast. It's about to get intense! In this episode we're talking about Grief. Specifically, three of the five stages of Grief.

What does it look like? Is it okay to grieve? Should Christians normalize Grief? These are just some of the topics we cover here...and we're not holding back!

Transcript

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what's up everybody Welcome to the Churchosity podcast if you're looking for a place to have fun and edifying conversations about church culture then you have landed in the right spot my name is Heath Brady and I'm Andrea Brady and we are your Church aity podcast Personnel coming at you coming at you how are you today I am doing exceptionally well exceptionally well well that's impressive it's it's good to be up yeah that's true yes yeah we started watching this show called The Chosen yeah and we've waited a very long time to watch this show for lots of reasons but we won't get into that but some close friends of ours have been pestering me for like 4 months that's about right to watch the show and so finally I cave and was like all right Andy you want to watch it with me and in case any of you have been living under a rock for the last 3 years The Chosen is a biopic tale about the ministry and life of Jesus Christ and I have probably mentioned this before on our show but I'll say it now that I tend to shy away from these types of things because I find most of them to be either really corny right or poorly done yeah or unbiblical yeah bordering heretical border yeah sometimes even borderline heretical uh because you know I'm a theology guy I'm a Bible student that stuff all matters to me mhm right yeah so so we started watching it and 2 minutes in I'm hooked it's good isn't it it's really really good yeah so needless to say in like a week's time mhm I think you and well we finished season 1 and started season 2 let's just say I can't watch an episode without having a tissue box nearby cuz I will cry every episode there's it's tugging at the heartstrings right I mean and not in a weird way but just kind of really feeling the emotions of it it's really good so this isn't like a plug for that show or anything like that but um if you're looking for something edifying yeah check it out yeah I give it a thumbs up yeah yeah don't want to say too much about it but we're only in the first season yeah well we're in season 2 now oh we are yeah we started season 2 with our last episode oh okay perfect there's three season Seasons that are streamable and supposedly season 4 is like in the theaters or going to be in the theaters or something I don't know all right that's how far out of the loop I am on the chosen but anyway as I said If you're looking for something edifying check it out if you don't like it send us a message and let us know why yeah there you go but yeah anyway how are you doing Andy I'm good I have some news uh-oh you have news mhm do share well we uh pulled the trigger and launched our

website it's kind of been a work in progress for a while and now we have churchosity.com yes church.com where you can find all things Churchosity related all things all the links are there for all of our socials and for our podcast episodes and blogs we just started doing that so yeah mhm it's pretty exciting stuff yeah yeah we wanted to make sure that before we dive into our conversation on this episode that we encourage all of you go check out our website Church o.com as you said Andy it is the home for all things churchosity not just podcast episodes right so give it a gander hang out for a while and enjoy we also want to remind everyone if you would be so kind give us a rating and leave us a review because ratings and reviews not only help popularize churchosity but also make us a heck of a lot easier for other people to find

us well Andy yeah on this episode it's going to be a

downer sorry I laughed yeah well not really it doesn't have to be a downer but we're going to cover a very important topic that yes we are we don't talk enough about I agree well we've never really talked about it at all on our show no we haven't that would be the subject of grief yes grief grief good grief good grief Charlie Brown yeah grief MH it's it's a very real thing and uh this isn't a conversation about like depression and anxiety and stuff like that although those things are definitely related to grief mhm and we have much to say about that relationship but I want to preface the conversation with a couple of things first of all neither Andrea nor myself are psychologists no we are not licensed practitioners in the medical field of any sort but we do have experience both in Ministry and personally in dealing with the subject of grief M whether that's our own personal experience or walking through that experience with others as well yeah and so we have some observations we have some concerns and we have some helps yes we do I think that will be concern destructive for this conversation I don't know if we're going to be able to fit all of that into one episode so we might have to have a couple of episodes for all of that it's totally fine because as you said Andy I don't think that the subject of grief is something that is talked about nearly enough right especially in church culture so that's what you got us for ladies and gentlemen we talk about the tough stuff sometimes and the subject of grief is definitely a tough subject to discuss isn't it yeah it is I I wanted to kind of kick off the conversation by suggesting that especially because it is so directly related to depression and anxiety that the concept of grief or grieving is possibly a really tough subject for not just our church culture to handle but our culture in general yeah it would seem that as a whole in our culture in our society the way that things are structured grief is something that is kind of expected to be a one-size fits-all process for everybody especially like I'm thinking along the lines of employment right oh like you only get one week or 3 days and you got to be over it and come back yeah like I worked for a large Aerospace company and you know if there was for instance a relative passed away you got 3 days of bement leave and then you had to be up and Adam and right back at it like nothing ever happened right and you know then they would have the audacity to wonder why you're so quiet you're so detached you're so Etc you know what I'm saying mhm yeah but I also think that that type of insensitivity to the whole aspect of grief and grieving is something that in the church culture we've kind of adopted the same type of practices MH and I'm not just talking about like mourning the loss of death of a relative or friend or anything I'm talking about grief in general yeah there's a lot of things that can cause you to grieve and it's not just um death right yeah and it's kind of sad to me that in our culture we primarily associate the mere concept of grief with mourning the loss of life of someone there's a like you said there's a whole like spectrum of reasons why we grieve and we could do a Year's worth of podcast to address each one that we could come up with but let's come up with a few examples let's unpack some examples okay how about grieving as we age like maybe you've been diagnosed with some kind of a non-curable disease and you can't change it it's you have to your life is going to be impacted and quality of life might be impacted for the rest of your life because of this diagnosis so I'm sure there's a grieving process that you go through mhm um or a loss of a job yes um when you leave leaving anything like you could be moving you could be you know relocating um you don't get to see your friends and family as much um you could be leaving a church and you're grieving that loss because it's you're losing your community and maybe even friendships yeah yeah and kind of along those same lines if you had a Ministry and you had to leave that Ministry for whatever reason mhm um those people those lives those families that you were so closely intertwin with and serving and loving on uh you don't get to be there with them anymore right and that that definitely is something that is Grievous mhm mhm I think you know even if you're like maybe you graduated like maybe from high school or you can grieve something like that even though it's supposed to be a joyous occasion which it is yeah I mean that write a passage is something to celebrate yeah but yeah that whole that whole kind of shift into quote unquote adulthood yeah and leaving all of the Innocence and easiness of life behind so to speak and facing the world mhm and you know the uncertainty of it all mhm the overwhelming change of context like if you go away to college yeah and you're just like one warm body in a sea of thousands right and you're forced to have a roommate that you a total stranger I mean I you know as as I'm talking about it I'm starting to get some anxiety here yeah but yeah that's definitely a good example that's very familiar with our culture or even just you know growing up and leaving home or um if you're an empty nester your your children not not being at home anymore and or move your children move away and go to college or your children get married and move away and right um there's a little grief in that yeah you know and everybody's different but but um there's there's the emptiness syndrome that's a real thing yes I agree mhm yeah I think of you know because we're genxers I there's a famous episode for me H from the old show Family Ties oh yeah when uh with Michael J fox yes and Alex Keaton the the son the oldest child he's going away to college like he's moving out and going off to college and like the whole week leading up to his moving out his mother is like avoiding him huh and uh by the end of the episode she's like in total denial that he's actually leaving like it it's like this whole syndrome that she's in if you will mhm this like denial phase that you know her her first born you know the child that made her a mom in the first place is going going off to college and won't be there anymore wow and and I have referred to that in in some counseling sessions as as the Elise Keaton syndrome right you know the reality is Andy is that grief can be for a myriad of reasons and everybody Grieves differently mhm and that is such a deep and difficult conversation because let's face it there is no one size fits all it's true for a grieving process it's true yeah although some of the experts quote unquote experts have identified like five stages of grief oh yes I don't know if you've heard of that yeah I have um I mean I know it's different for everyone but universally it just kind of seems like that these five stages are pretty common yeah that they're pretty common MH yeah do you want to hear what they are yeah okay well one thing I want to make clear is that even though I'm listing them off it you can jump back and forth between them it's not necessarily a linear progression but the first one is denial the second one is anger the third one is bargaining and the fourth one is depression and the fifth one is ex acceptance wow I'm sure that there's more than five in my life but well I'm sure you could throw in a few others but those five man they really hit home yeah yeah like I I thought of examples of my own personal grief as you mentioned each one of those five mhm I I think I think it's safe to say that those are common yeah in one degree or another mhm yeah well I think one of the times in my life when I've grieved the the most was when my father passed away and I think about the stages of grief that I went through after he died and it's hard to say how long I grieved I don't think I really had an appropriate supportive environment in which I could grieve so I don't know some of my healing from the grief probably took place years later but in the moment right after he passed I was definitely in denial and I went back and forth between denial and bargaining yeah that bargaining one can can you unpack that a little bit because I have a whole slew of ideas of what that means and I want to make sure I'm thinking of the right one well I think that in the bargaining stage a lot of people try to negotiate with God or make deals with him if you just get me out of this then I promise I'll fill in the blank yeah yes in order to reverse it or um to alleviate the pain that you're

experiencing cuz you want to go back to the way things were right so I remember I know this sounds really terrible but at my father's funeral I remember looking at his casket and thinking Lord if it's your will you could just raise him up like Lazarus and I know that's illogical and I know that it's impo well not impossible but unlikely but in the moment you start bargaining like Lord I know you're capable why why don't you or why did you choose to take him and um I don't think that my feeling at that moment is an uncommon one sure because um even up to the point we know when they buried him I was still hoping for something I don't know why but um and that's a part of denial ALS so but going back and forth um I think I was bargaining when I knew that he was um terminal you know that he was going to die sure and I was bargaining then too um that makes sense yeah yeah I I've I've tried to I I I would go so far as to say that I haven't just tried to bargain but I've Bartered with the Lord I've haggled with the Lord oh yes haggling like Abraham what if there's just one one righteous man left will you will you save the city yeah that's so true so true yeah yeah the denial of it yeah I think that one's pretty common yeah it's definitely you know like the protective mechanism in your mind to try to get over the shock of your loss um or that you're going through something mhm like I I think that with with the stage of denial that can present so many different ways in and of itself you know like I can't believe that I'm going through this right now yeah and you just kind of stuff it and you know push that off the plate you know and like I don't want to deal with it I don't want to deal with this right now yeah I think that that's really common yeah because there's so much feelings involved emotions involved decisions involved action that needs to be taken to either resolve it or go through it and fear oh yes yeah yeah that's tough it is that's tough yeah yeah definitely I I'm more of a dener a dener a dener you dener dener better to be a dener than a [Music]

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and a bargainer and I think they go hand in and a lot you yeah yeah I could see that for me personally yeah cuz like I see the relationship between those two yeah for sure yeah cuz if I'm going through something like that and I'm constantly bargaining with God you know trying to you know figure it out sure you know cuz you got these verses like you know if you have faith this the size of a mustard seed you can move mountains asking it will be given to you you have not because you ask not yeah things like that and you know those come to mind and you're like okay well you know help me out amen but you know we have to realize that when we ask we have to ask in accordance to God's will yeah and uh be okay with that yeah we've certainly had conversations on our show about knowing God's will too mhm that finding God's will for your life you know part of that is trusting in his sovereignty exactly and remembering that on this side of Eternity there is Brokenness MH there there is imperfection and that's not a cop out it's just the reality because of the consequences of original sin right yeah we have sickness and disease and death and calamities and natural disasters and you name it right yeah but also remember that there is going to come a day where Jesus makes all things new that's true and he will wipe away every tear as it says in Revelation 21 and if there's any little glimmer of hope to help get through any form of grief it's remembering that Jesus is the maker of all things new mhm and that Jesus is the restorer and whether it be in this life or in the life which is to come there will come a day when there will be no more mourning no more grieving no more evil no no more he will do away with with it all right and in the moment we do get to cling to the promise that he's with us yes Emmanuel mhm God With Us right amen you know Psalm 23:4 even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil for you are with me your rod and your staff they comfort me amen you know David you me you mentioned the Psalms David Mr Man after God's Own own heart had a lot to say about the subject of grief even even about depression uh huh oh yeah depths of sheol yeah all all over the Psalms you mentioned the depths of sheol that's that's from Psalm 139 mhm verses 7 and 8 David writes where can I go from your spirit or where can I flee from your presence that's like you said that God is always with us right right verse 8 if I Ascend to Heaven you are there if I make my bed in Shel behold you are there now you read that verse and you and it's like well obviously because God is everywhere but what you need to understand listeners is that this is a Hebrew metaphor for being exhilarated and being thoroughly depressed because on the one hand ascending to Heaven is a beautiful metaphor for like everything is Fantastical I'm flying on on cloud n everything's going great your Mountaintop

experience but then I dare say that our grieving processes our depression our anxiety feel like a living hell mhm if I make my bed in the depths of sheol behold you are there as you said Andy God is with us all of the time we're never left alone and what what fascinates me about this verse and several others that I could read there's a myriad of verses in Scripture that that deal with the reality of grief and depression and anxiety David was a man after God's Own Heart and yet he authentically experienced bouts of depression anxiety and grief yes he writes in Psalm 34:18 the Lord is near to the Brokenhearted and saves the crushing Spirit mhm now what I like about that verse is nowhere does it say that a person who is brokenhearted or crushed in spirit is condemned for it no is to be chastised for it right right uh Psalm 147:3 he heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds again no condemnation no critic ISM for being brokenhearted well that's a a a verse of Hope yes and I think you know we really need to cling to those verses of Hope when we're going through it I mean we may not feel it in the moment but we can definitely acknowledge that God promises these things and we just have to hold on 100% uh Psalm 73:26 My Flesh and my heart May Fail but God God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever M my portion yeah Psalm 31: 9 and 10 be gracious to Me O Lord for I am in distress my eye is wasted from grief oh gosh yes my soul and my body also for my life is spent with sorrow and my years with sighing my strength fails because of my iniquity and my bones waste away boy if isn't a description of what grief and depression looks like yeah I've I've definitely felt that you know crazy huh I can really feel it when I when I hear those words I'm like oh yes and the I just you know the Psalms are so comforting yeah yeah so we've dealt with let's see we've talked about the denial and we've talked about the bargaining but I skipped over anger o we could do a whole episode on anger probably probably a lot of people say that you know when the denial stage begins to fade away that you start to feel the raw intensity of of pain and it becomes anger and you can have all sorts of emotions like from uh frustration to resentment and you just have to recognize that it's a normal response to loss and it doesn't mean that you have a lack of Faith or that you're weak or you're not resilient and you just need to um lean into that yeah cuz it's a part of the healing process I think also in addition to that remember that scripture says to be angry yet do not sin exactly Ephesians 4:26 right yep mhm so no condemnation or criticism for being angry it's what you do with that anger right I I wanted to make sure sure we made that point cuz I love how you mentioned Andy that it is a natural part of the process of grief to experience anger about something yeah and you know depending on the situation there's some fairness and equality in the anger that we feel you know yeah I'll tell you right now I've mentioned my grandfather so many times on our podcast and when he passed away I didn't get to say goodbye to him M because he passed away while out of town mhm mhm I was so angry about that one thing I mean it it was no secret that he was getting up there in age and that his health was failing and everything but I did not get to say goodbye to I I I wish you know talk about bargaining I would do anything if I could just have one more conversation with my grandfather oh and it's not like it it holds me hostage from the grave or anything I'm just identifying with the reality of the anger portion of grief that I was angry for quite a while that you know my most favorite relative of my entire life the godliest person I'd ever known the man who was probably the most proudest of me out of every other human that walked the face of the Earth was taken from me oh that's how it felt yeah because I if I I felt like if I had had the chance to say goodbye to him it wouldn't have felt like he was taken from me yeah does that make sense yeah totally of course I mean I'm over it now yeah trust me well do we ever really get over it 100% I miss my grandpa so much I miss him so much I know and it's been a long time since he passed away yeah but I get that I I get that anger phase a lot I mean it might just it hurts a little bit Yeah you can get over the anger part but you know it's still it's always going to hurt a little bit Yeah if I had a nickel for every time I was going through something and I and I'd be like man if my grandpa was here he would know what to say I know I know what that feels like yeah I miss there's also that anger or resentment that might exist because whatever it is that you're grieving is the result of being done Dirty by somebody yeah vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord you got to give it to him somehow that might that might be one of those verses that Christians don't like to hear when they're grieving something no they don't but it's it's so true yeah so true yeah well yeah so what what do you do do you think when when you're in that anger phase of your grief Andy I mean it's not like you can just be like take two Psalms and call me in the morning well prayer yeah you know and you can be honest with God like Lord I'm angry yeah but the word says be angry but do not sin mhm so help me cuz I'm weak and you are strong mhm I mean it could just be that simple to help a little yeah trust in him and just talk to him in prayer honest prayers sincere honest prayer yeah amen yeah I think that's that's a great place to start it kind of sets it kind of realigns the heart with the Lord yeah in that moment doesn't negate the fact that you're grieving but it's bringing it before the Lord like in Proverbs 3 in all your ways acknowledge Him you know bring it to his attention submit to him literally in the Hebrew and he will make your path straight M think that's part of it that submission to the Lord cuz ultimately even in the midst of our grief we still should strive to please the Lord with our life exactly to give him glory and I know that that almost sounds like an oxymoron that grief that within a grieving process the Lord can somehow be glorified mhm but it is possible especially if we go through our grieving process from the vantage point of trusting in the Lord with all of our hearts and not leaning on our own understanding of it yeah you know mhm I think that we're going to have to definitely continue this conversation on our next episode cuz this is some really good stuff amen yeah but I I wanted to kind of draw this episode to a close with something pretty cool okay maybe a little controversial uhoh about why I believe it's totally okay and totally natural for grief and sorrow and depression being a real thing and and I and I stress that especially in church culture we need to address the reality of this instead of just brushing it off right you know Jesus experienced grief he did like severely mhm and I can think of two major examples of this the other one I will address on our next episode what's the first one well the first one is is found in literally my favorite chapter in all of scripture oh which also contains my favorite verse in all of scripture John 11 John 11 exactly John's my favorite book John 11's my favorite chapter John 11:35 is my favorite verse Jesus wept mhm now first of all let me just say for those who don't know Heath Brady is a very emotional guy I cry yeah and I have been embarrassed about that virtually my entire life so much so that there was a period in my 20s where I literally went before the Lord and begged him to take it away H because I was so ashamed because that's the culture right yeah uh not to drift off into the weeds but I'm a guy you mean man up man up culture yeah okay you can't get emotional you're a guy yeah you know what I'm saying mhm especially in church culture so there's this shame and embarrassment that come along with the grief right yeah well one day my baby sister who I believe was probably in like the second or third grade at the time oh we were I was crying and she came up and she sat with me and she said heathy now none of you get to call me that she said heathy it's okay to cry because Jesus cried oh and if Jesus cried then anybody can cry that's right and it changed my perspective mhm but in context of John 11:35 is the telling of Lazarus mhm Jesus's best friend dying yeah and when Jesus goes to handle this situation he comes into the City and Martha comes up to him like she runs to him on the outskirts of the city and is like Lord if you'd been here my my brother wouldn't have

died blame play the blame game well no no let me correct you there because most people look at this as a confrontation yeah it's an it's no it's not a confrontation in the Greek it is not a confrontation it's an acknowledgement of the obvious well it's true if You' been here you would have healed him yes because the next verse 22 says even now I know that whatever you ask of God God will give you oh and then Jesus says your brother will rise again but then further down in the chapter Mary is still back at the house she hasn't come out to see Jesus so he go he goes to the house and then Mary gets up and comes outside with all of the other people that are around her mourning the loss of Lazarus yeah it says in verse 31 the Jews who were with her in the house and consoling her when they saw that Mary got up quickly and went out they followed her supposing that she was going to the tomb to weep there therefore when Mary came where Jesus was she saw him and fell at his feet saying Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died same conversation yeah same statement uhhuh but catch this verse 33 when Jesus therefore saw her weeping and the Jews who came with her also weeping he was deeply moved in spirit and was troubled and in the Greek it literally says grieved oh Jesus experienced grief mhm because his best friend had died right so then he says Where have you laid him meaning Lazarus and they said to him Lord come and see so when he sees where the tomb is John 11:35 Jesus wept verse 36 so the Jews were saying see how he loved him oh Jesus's best friend had died mhm and in his Humanity he experienced grief to the point of shedding tears weeping in the Greek it's like sobbing so I say to you ladies and gentlemen grief is real yeah it is not a madeup thing it is symptomatic and it contributes to various conditions but I want to encourage all of you not only did Jesus our lord and savior experience grief but he is with us while we are going through our own grief and that's all we have to say about that thank you for listening to the Church oity podcast on our next episode we're going to dig a little deeper into this conversation about grief and talk a little bit about depression and anxiety over to you Andy be sure to check out our website that's Church o.com there you can follow us on all the socials become a church osity patreon and drop us a message and give us your feedback because we'd really love to hear from you and don't forget to spread the word about Church ocity podcast by just simply telling a friend to tell a friend what we're doing here yeah let them be a part of the conversation too but always remember that the goal of our instruction Is Love from a pure heart and from a good conscience and a sincere Faith so we thank each and every one of you again for listening and we hope to catch all of you on the next episode of Churchosity podcast [Music]

peace

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