Folgen
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In Step 6 we discussed the difference between running from sinful anger and running to the life God desires for us. This final chapter is devoted to the subject of “running to” God’s design. You will do most of the writing in this chapter. It is your life that is being stewarded for God’s glory.
The goal is that you would find things that you could give yourself to more passionately than you once gave yourself to your anger. But not just temporal, slightly healthier things that would quickly become the next edition of ruling desires; and not things that you give yourself to in private so that they foster selfishness and excess. Rather, eternally significant things that you give yourself to in a community of faith to maintain endurance, temper desire mutation, and become an example to others.
As you read through and answer these nine questions, remember God’s patience and timing. There will be some aspects of God’s design that you can engage in immediately. There will be ways you want to serve God that will require you to more mature or be equipped before you are prepared to fulfill them. The main thing is to begin to have a vision for life that involves being God’s servant and actively engaging that vision where you are currently equipped.
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Are you enjoying where you are? Even if you are not “there yet,” can you identify aspects of this part of your journey that make it significantly better than where you’ve been? Unless you can answer “yes” to this question and take delight in that answer, perseverance will be grueling. Striving without delighting is exhausting.
One of the keys to persevering, especially with a struggle as recurrent as anger, is the ability to enjoy an imperfect, in-process life. God does not just delight in you at the culmination of your sanctification. God delights in you right now. He invites you to agree with him; where he has you in this process is good. This provides the emotional stability and security to persevere in your journey.
With that as our starting point, let’s ask the question, “What does it look like to continue to follow God from here?” Chances are that you’ve put so much energy into getting “here” that it is not entirely clear how to prepare yourself for life after an intensive focus on change. What do you do when your life is not focused on overcoming anger? That is the topic of this step and the next.
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Fehlende Folgen?
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We are now squarely in the present tense. Admitting, acknowledging, understanding, repenting, and confessing were all focused on things we had done or experienced (past tense). Restructuring life was all about what we intend to do (future tense). In the first six steps we were protected from dynamic things like the pressures and nuances of daily life. To this point, we have scripted and rehearsed our social interactions but now we are leaving the scripts behind.
In order to engage with implementation effectively, we must have our perspective on temptation transformed. There is a tendency to view temptation as failure. If our plan is merely to avoid or prevent temptation (irritating situations), then we will fail and think, “What’s the use?”
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As we get to the most “practical” part of the study, hopefully you are at a better place spiritually, relationally, emotionally, and in terms of self-understanding than you have ever been before (or at least in a long time). This foundation allows you to enact the plans you are about to make in a way you could not when you felt distant from God, isolated from people, emotionally frazzled, and your self-understanding was filled with lies and distortions.
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If we became active in Step 4, then we are going public in Step 5. Confession that is less public than the sin which prompted its necessity promotes short-lived change. Confession is when our new allegiance (from self to God) becomes public. Confession is to sanctification what baptism is to salvation – public evidence that a change has occurred and is impacting the core of our identity and how we relate to the world.
Confession is often hard for someone who struggles with anger. Anger is about being strong. Confession feels weak and vulnerable. Anger is bold and in control. Confession is humble and patient. Anger intends to make certain things happen. Confession does not know what response it will get. You are being asked to buck this trend in ways that may be scary or unnatural, but that is what change is.
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This material is not another trip around the “try harder” merry-go-round!
It is at Step 4 that you begin to experience the difference. Hopefully, you have a more complete understanding of your struggle with anger than you’ve ever had before. You probably have more ongoing Christian support than you’ve had in previous attempts to control your anger. But understanding, the absence of blame-shifting, community, and direction are not the source of change. God is.
Change doesn’t involve white knuckles; it requires the empty hands and bent knees of humble repentance.
In order to see the relevance of repentance you must see your sinful anger the way that Bible does – as an offense primarily against God. We don’t view most sins this way. We see that we hurt other people with our sin and assume that God is disappointed in us for failing to love our neighbor (i.e., wife, kids, co-workers, etc…). But we do not think we have sinned against God.
Until we see this reality we will not realize that we have voluntarily unplugged from our source of love, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23). Further, we will try to produce these qualities in our own strength and character not realizing how futile and silly those efforts really are (John 15:4-17). We become like the person flipping switches in their breaker box during a power outage. The solution makes sense but there is still no power even when we have taken all the right steps.
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It is unfortunate that this step will likely not be as satisfying as we would like. We often fall into the trap of thinking that if we understand the “why” better, then the “what” will be easy, or at least easier. There are at least two realities that disrupt this seemingly sound logic.
First, sin is not rational, so it refuses to play by our rules of logic. Sin is not a simple behavior that plays by single-variable motivations. Rather sin is a condition and a predator. Sin has its roots in our fallen human nature. Sin is aided and abetted by an enemy who desires our destruction (I Peter 5:8). This means that sin both has the home field advantage and is willing to cheat to win. This is why simple, temporary measures will never be sufficient.
Second, our goal must be effectiveness-at-change rather than ease-of-change or our best intentions will lead us back into destructive anger. Satan is always willing to wait for a more opportune time (Luke 4:13) if its interests are not best served in a given moment. The moments when we let our guard down are the times when our intelligent adversary will strike. Anything that undermines our vigilance is an asset to our adversary.
But these realities do not make an examination of the history and motives of our anger fruitless. It just means that what we intuitively want from this examination is overly optimistic. What we can gain is a better understanding of (a) what motives drive our anger, (b) the context in which those desires became excessively dominant, and (c) how those desires began to take on a god-like function in our lives.
The more honestly and accurately we are able to make these assessments in real time, the more effectively we will be at relying on God and reaching out to our support network for help. The more “foreign” or “crazy” our motives feel to us, the less likely we are to tell others what is going on. The more these things make sense to us, even if we disagree with the values behind the motives, the more willing we will be to ask for help.
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It is hard to admit how “off” we get when we are angry. One reason is because we often get angry for right reasons or legitimate causes. We must start Step 2 by admitting that a legitimate trigger is only the first test of righteous anger.
Below are seven test questions for righteous anger taken from David Powlison’s article (bold text only) “Anger Part 1: Understanding Anger” from The Journal of Biblical Counseling (Fall 1995). The journaling tool provided in Step 3 will include these seven tests, but only use the words in parenthesis to reference each test. Your goal here is only to understand each test, so you can use them later to evaluate your anger.
1. Do you get angry about the right things? (Right Trigger)
2. Do you express anger in the right way? (Right Response)
3. How long does your anger last? (Duration)
4. How controlled is your anger? (Controlled)
5. What motivates your anger? (Motive)
6. Is your anger “primed and ready” to respond? (Primed)
7. What is the effect of your anger? (Effect)
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Do you hear yourself in any of these statements?
I’m not angry! I’m just frustrated!But if you don’t stop asking “what’s wrong” I may get angry.Why can’t I have a bad day without it being a big deal?Your family was just perfect and didn’t do conflict, so that’s why you’re so sensitive.You knew I was this way when you married me. Am I not good enough for you anymore?So you’re saying I’m just a lazy idiot and you’re life would be better off without me.[Silence] Fine! I just won’t say anything if I’m so sensitive!How many times have I told you not to do that?! Are you stupid or just don’t care?!Oh, and I guess you never make a mistake.I’m sick of being the only one who ever says “I’m sorry”You’re not going to talk me like I’m a child. I left my parents house a long time ago.Get outta of my face. Get away from me. Shut up.You’re disgusting. You’re lucky I am willing to put up with youWe’re done! It’s over! I’m finished with you! You’re dead to me!Why do you make me talk to you this way? Do you think I enjoy being angry?I don’t care who sees me or hears me. I’m mad. I’m not going to be fake about it to suit you.If you didn’t want to know what I thought, why ask questions? You’re just setting me upI’m only interrupting you because what you’re saying doesn’t make any sense.Why would you think like that? That’s just dumb!We’ll just see what happens the next time you need help from me.You needed me there at 9:00, huh? Guess I just forgot because I was so hurt from last night.I just don’t want to talk about it. You figure it out.Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t. It’s none of your business.[Looking away obviously not listening]I’m just a loner. Get away from me.I’ll try not to be such a screw and interfere with your life again.Don’t you walk away from me. We’re going to finish this conversation [blocking door]…See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
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At the end of chapter 8 we began to discuss the question, “What am I living for?” That is an essential question in our grief journey. Unless we answer it, our past will remain brighter than our future, and we will be set up for despair. With a question like this, however, you will be doing most of the writing in this chapter.
The goal is that you would find things that you could engage as passionately as you engaged your loved one. This is not a form of replacement, but a necessity of enjoying life. Being passionate about something now does not in any way diminish your love for them then. In effect, you are unleashing more of what they loved in you. You can rightly imagine your loved one with God in heaven saying, “See, that is what I loved about then all along. Now they are getting more of an opportunity to impact the world with the gifts and passions You put in them. I love getting to watch them serve You in Your presence. It is glorious!”
As you read through and answer the next nine questions, remember God’s patience and timing. There will be some aspects of God’s design that you can engage in immediately. But there may also be ways you want to serve God that will require you to be more mature or be equipped before you are prepared to fulfill them. The main thing is to begin to have a vision for life that involves being God’s servant and actively engaging that vision where you are currently equipped.
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New and normal are words that do not belong together. But that is precisely what step eight is all about, establishing a new normal. For most of us, at this stage in our journey, we still do not want a new normal. The residual grief in our heart still longs for the old normal. If this conflict exists within you, do not let it pull you backwards on your journey. It is not hypocritical to pursue a new normal against your heart’s desire when reality insists that you must.
Even if you are optimistic about this new normal, a new normal is scary. It is unknown. It is relatively permanent. It soon will be the part of your life that occurs without thought or reflection. The disruption of this new normal will be what triggers your next pilgrimage through grief. If you are intimidated by this step, do not let that convince you that you have not completed the prior steps adequately.
The phrase “new normal” seems to imply more intentionality than it actually requires. You do not need a spreadsheet with seven columns and twenty-four rows to itemize and color-code what your expectations of life will be by activity, relationship, and season. As you grieve well and clean, a new normal will happen. A big part of this chapter will be devoted to identifying the defining marks of this new normal so you can be comforted as this occurs.
The chapter will also include two other sections. First, we will look at how this new normal assimilates into your life story. This will be a place for you to summarize what you learned and how you have grown over the course of this study.
Second, guidance will be provided to help you think through how to prepare to transition from your current Freedom Group, counseling relationship, or mentor relationship into general small group ministry of the church for continued encouragement and growth. You are about to enter a new season of transition: from healing to living. These materials are meant to provide guidance on what “healthy” looks like after grief.
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Goals and grief can be hard concepts to mesh. We wish they got along better. We want to be able to say, “I have Saturday open so I plan to get half my grief out by journaling, looking at pictures, having an extended time of candid prayer, crying several times, and then updating my good-bye letter to capture the progress I’ve made during the day.” But thinking of goal setting as a time table or schedule, will become extremely frustrating and ineffective.
Also, if we think of goal setting as “overcoming” grief, then we will have a sense of failure whenever grief returns around special occasions, triggered by a song or quote, or randomly interrupts our day. This is why we say we are identifying goals to “combat the impact of my suffering.” Grief is something we experience rather than conquer. Therefore, we will grow from it rather than eliminate it.
We did not cause grief, so we cannot “uncause” it. Grief is not a character defect or sin, so we cannot “put off” grief. Grief is part of our story and because of that there will be times when its significance continues to impact our life. Our goal in this chapter is to further understand what healthy grief is, what healthy grief looks like, and what we can do to “grieve well” during some of the difficult times ahead.
The material for this chapter will be divided into three sections: (1) What does it mean to “progress”? (2) How to prepare for predictably hard times? (3) How to respond to unpredictably hard moments?
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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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No matter how “clean” our interpretations or how pure our story, the sadness of grief will remain. It will hurt because someone precious is missing. Mourning (which has been happening before we named it as “step five” and will continue to happen through step nine) simply acknowledges that we will never “master grief” to the point that it does not hurt.
Sometimes Christians can believe (or at least feel) as if any negative emotional experience is a lack of confidence in God or a violation of the command to rejoice always (Phil. 4:4). We know this is not true because the sinless Son of God wept at the death of his good friend Lazarus (John 11:35). In addition to Jesus’ example we have commands to weep with those who weep (Rom. 12:15).
In this chapter we are going to examine the sadness of grief, the painful sense of unchanging absence. In this step, we are going to explore what it means to walk through this sadness (Psalm 23:4) rather than around or away from it. In many ways the first four chapters have prepared you to mourn your loss in its entirety (both physical and symbolic aspects of the loss) with less emotional distractions from unhealthy themes. But even “clean grief” is not a muted grief.
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At several points in the study you have probably begun to question God, doubt Him, be angry at Him, or wonder if what you think about Him really makes any difference. We’ve brought many painful pieces of grief to mind. When we look at it, we naturally ask, “Where does ‘the buck’ stop?” It stops with God (or whoever, whatever is in control… if anything is).
It has been said that animals divide between herbivores (those eating plants) and carnivores (those eating meat), but the humans are verbivores – we live off of words, or, more accurately, off of the meaning we give to life through words. This is why we’ve emphasized the themes of story, journey, and identity so much. They are how we “digest” life.
“No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do. You are in an unending conversation with yourself. You are talking all the time, interpreting, organizing, and analyzing what’s going on inside you and around you (p. 56).” Paul Tripp in A Shelter in the Time of Storm.We are now going to explore how we give meaning to all the facts, experiences, influences, and changes we have unpacked in the first three chapters. It is by giving meaning to these things that we will “process” our grief – for better or worse, healthily or unhealthily. Trying to make meaning of death requires that we wrestle with things beyond this life. Just as making sense of a tadpole becoming a frog requires considering things outside the pond.
“The life of the most insignificant man is a battlefield on which the mightiest forces of the universe converge in warfare—this elevates the status of the lowliest and least person on earth (p. 108)!... Suffering has no meaning in itself. Left to its own, it is a frustrating and bewildering burden. But given the context of relationship, suffering suddenly has meaning (p. 127).” Joni Eareckson Tada & Steven Estes in When God Weeps.But we must not think that this requires us to think only “nice,” theologically precise thoughts about life, death, and God. We do not approach this search for meaning as an academic exercise – like a scientist looking for the cure for cancer – but in an intensely personal way – like a cancer patient asking, “Isn’t there anything that can be done?” In order for the meaning to be satisfying or healthy it must emerge from asking the question as we are living the question – raw.
With this in mind, this chapter will ask dark questions; questions for which there are no “good” answers, only honest answers. Recognize that it is not irreverent to ask God painful questions full of honest emotion when a storm of suffering engulfs us. The fact that we bring God our questions honors Him. God knows the limitation of our mind, heart, and body. God hears them like a parent whose child is screaming because of a doctor’s shot – while the scream may sound and be meant as defiance and doubt it is an expression of faith in the parent’s love and the parent’s willingness to help if something could be done.
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The most common way to “understand” grief is to think of it in terms of stages (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance) developed from the research of Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. While useful, stages miss much of the personal significance that is present in grief. Stages may prepare us for what is probable (which means not everyone will follow the same path), but they do not help “me” understand or process that pain of “my grief.”
In this study we will focus more on story and journey than stages. These concepts are meant to capture more of the personal, messy, and non-sequential nature of grief. Grief changes the way we view life, interact with people, the meaning we attach to things, our levels of trust or security, and our sense of identity. When people or things that we love and rely on can be removed from our life, we can begin to question everything.
This changes the way we commonly classify grief. Grief is more than an emotional struggle (like depression, anxiety, guilt, etc..). Grief contains so many changing emotions that the experience itself has to be more than an emotion. Grief is more foundationally a struggle of identity. Who am I now? How has my loss changed me? How will I relate to other people? What is different about me and what is the same? Notice how Winston Smith describes one element of the story-change that occurs during the grief of a divorce.
“Your marriage gave you a roadmap for the future. Your life seemed predictable (p. 6).” Winston Smith in Divorce Recovery: Growing and Healing God’s Way
As you seek to understand the impact of your grief in this chapter, the discussion will focus upon how different factors can influence the meaning you place on your grief. In chapter four we will examine common ways these factors can be tailored into a destructive story—one that is emotionally or relationally crippling and makes God seem mean, powerless, or irrelevant. In chapter six we will examine how the Gospel gives healthy meaning to your grief without minimizing its pain.
It is here we will begin to introduce a phrase that will capture much of our objective in this study: clean grief. With this language we are comparing grief with a physical injury comparable to a cut. We cannot make such a wound heal, but we can keep it from becoming infected and, thereby, assist the natural, God-ordained healing process. The “infections” that can come with grief are the destructive interpretations we place on the experience. In this chapter we will begin to ask the kind of questions from which we make these interpretations.
“Understand”: It is important to clarify what “understanding the impact of my suffering” does and does not mean at this point. Understanding will not mean knowing “why” you experienced this loss. It does mean that you can see the number of ways that this loss is affecting you, grasp how those influences are connected with your loss, and continue to trust God as you see how He will bring comfort and redemption in the midst of your grief.
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Too often we hear the word “denial” and we think it means simply the willful resistance to acknowledging an obvious fact. When you’re in the midst of denial, you wish it were that simple and overt. The question, “How do I live as if they are really gone?” is not a simple question.
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Even though it is only the beginning of this study, thank you for getting this far. It is a testimony to your strength and courage that in the midst of your loss and pain you have not abandoned the search for hope. You may not feel strong or courageous at this point. In reality, you probably feel numb, weak, afraid, intimidated, or overwhelmed. But the mark of courage is not the absence of fear, but continuing on in the face of fear. That is what you are doing. It is commendable and good. We are praying for you and trust that God will bless this step of courageous faith with the hope and peace you desire.
The fact that you are at this point is also a testimony to God’s faithfulness and presence. You feel like your loss and circumstances could crush you, and you are right. It is an interesting study to consider how the phrase “my strength” is used in the Psalms (18:1, 22:15, 28:7, 31:10, 32:4, 38:10, 59:9, 59:17, 71:9, 102:23, 118:14, 138:3). It is as if they alternate between cries of desperation and pronouncements of praise. Grief is an experience that causes me to find the end of my strength (my abilities or emotional resources) and realize it is only My Strength (God) that can sustain me in the painful moments when death touches my life.
The goal of this study (and the relationships in which you will go through this study) is to help you access Your Strength (the one true God) in the midst of your grief. God loves you (1 John 4:19). God longs to care for you and is not just waiting for you to “get it together (Psalm 147:3).” God is not offended by your tears, but values them (Psalm 56:8). God is not repelled by your questions, even if they are angry ones (Psalm 44:23-26). God does not intend to leave you alone in your pain (Joshua 1:9). God will be patient while you grieve (2 Peter 3:9).
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If the law of God can be summarized in a positive command, then we must end this study talking about how to “run to” God rather than merely how to “run from” sin. Life is not about what we avoid, but what pursue. How we run to God’s design for our life finds a unique expression in each person’s life. For this reason, you will do most of the writing in this chapter. It is your life that is being stewarded for God’s glory.
The goal for this chapter is that you would find things that you could give yourself in a way that is more emotionally captivating than your depression-anxiety was. But not just temporal, slightly healthier things that would quickly become the next edition of ruling desires; and not things that you give yourself to in private so that they foster selfishness and excess. Rather, eternally significant things that you give yourself to in a community of faith to maintain endurance, temper desire-excess, and become an example to others.
As you read through and answer these nine questions, remember God’s patience and timing. There will be some aspects of God’s design that you can engage in immediately. But there will also be ways you want to serve God that will require you to mature more or be equipped before you are prepared to fulfill them. The main thing is to begin to have a vision for life that involves being God’s servant and actively engaging that vision where you are currently equipped.
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Are you enjoying where you are? Even if you are not “there yet,” can you identify aspects of this part of your journey that make it significantly better than where you’ve been? Unless you can answer “yes” to this question and take delight in that answer, perseverance will be grueling.
Striving without delighting is exhausting.
One of the keys to persevering, especially with a struggle as recurrent as depression-anxiety, is the ability to enjoy an imperfect, in-process life. God does not just delight in you at the culmination of your sanctification. God delights in you right now. He invites you to agree with him; that where he has you in this process is good. This provides the emotional stability and security to engage a struggle like depression-anxiety.
With that as our starting point, let’s ask the question, “What does it look like to continue to follow God from here?” Chances are that you’ve put so much energy into getting “here” that it is not entirely clear how to prepare yourself for life after an intensive focus on change. What do you do when your life is not focused on overcoming depression-anxiety? That is the topic of this chapter and the next.
In this chapter we will look at post-temptation temptations—those temptations that uniquely arise when we’re doing “better.” In order to help you finish strong, we will look at three subjects for this stage in your journey.
Common Lies and DistractionsVictory Changes TemptationPreparing for TransitionSee acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
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