Fourth Sunday of Easter
Acts 9:36-43; John 10:22-30
April 25, 2010Grieving for Gazelle
There is no right way to grieve. I tell this to people when they we are planning a funeral for a loved one. There are no “right” things to say, no “right” ways to behave, no “right” feelings to have. Do what you need to do, I tell them. If you need to cry, cry. If you need to scream, scream. If you need to go into a room by yourself and shut the door, do it. There’s no right way to grieve, but there is a wrong way – and that’s to pretend death doesn’t hurt.
That advice would have been unnecessary for the women we just read about in Acts 9, members of the fledgling church in Joppa. Nobody told them to “be brave” or “to be strong for the sake of those around you.” Back in the first century, folks had more sense than that. These women are grieving in the healthiest possible way.
Granny Tabitha has died, you see. Or perhaps they called her “Sister Dorcas.” In English her name would be “Gazelle.” I prefer the Hebrew “Tabitha” to the Greek “Dorcas.” “Tabitha” sounds more graceful, doesn’t it? More like a gazelle. Luke tells us very little about her, except to say that she was a disciple, and it’s very clear that she was dearly loved.
I think of her as “Granny Tabitha” because of all the sewing projects she left behind. “She was devoted to good works and acts of charity,” Luke says. Some of those charitable acts seem to have taken the form of sewing projects – tunics, shawls, dresses, receiving blankets. The widows of the Joppa church were passing examples of her work round the sewing circle when Peter arrived. They were “weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made when she was with them.”
“Just look at the needle work in this child’s tunic. Have you ever seen anything so precise?”
“I remember the day she finished this dress. She took out the hem twice before she was satisfied with it.”
Peter walked in on this scene, and promptly sent all the of the ladies out of the room. What a male thing to do! If you want my opinion, Peter didn’t need to do that. He just felt uncomfortable in the presence of all those women.
I know the feeling. When I’m invited to teach the Bible study for a Presbyterian Women’s circle meeting, a testosterone-induced anxiety arises within me. I’m afraid I’ll drop a teacup or use the wrong fork.
But these women are doing what should be done, what their culture encourages, what our death-denying culture discourages. They are grieving.
There was at time when Americans were allowed to grieve. Back in Victorian times, people hung black drape on their door as a sign to their neighbors, “This house in mourning.” Men wore black arm bands. Women wore black dresses. Nobody said to people back then, “Come to closure; get on with your life.” Back then people didn’t use words like “closure.” They knew better. They gave folks time and they gave them space to grieve.
Our culture lacks patience and wisdom for those old customs, and we probably can’t reclaim them. But there are some things that you can I could do to give people we love permission to mourn. Here are three suggestions.
The first suggestion is this: Resist clichés. You know the kind of thing:
· Tabitha is in a better place.
· Dorcas is happier now.
· There’s a new angel in heaven named Gazelle.
At one level, of course, many of these clichés point to a deep truth: Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ. Christians do not mourn as those who have no hope. But however true they are at some level, clichés like this usually aren’t very helpful. Instead of conveying, “Our hope is in Christ,” they imply, “You shouldn’t be so sad,” or even worse, “If you’re sad, your faith must be weak.”
I think people resort to clichés because they don’t know what else to say, and uttering a cliché makes them feel better. Here’s a rule of thumb for anyone doing ministry: Resist the temptation to make yourself feel better.
There may well come a moment when the person who is grieving will say, “I feel that Tabitha is happier now,” or “I’m certain Dorcas is with God.” At that point you can say, “I am, too!” But don’t rush people in grief. Give them time.
Second, name the saint and give thanks. Some people have the notion that it’s bad manners to mention the name of a person who has died in the presence of a loved one. Wrong! Celebrate those memories.
Remember the time George Meier and Richard Bush dressed up as shepherds for a Christmas program? Those were the two tallest shepherds in the history of Christendom! (Or maybe they were innkeepers. Someone here will remember). I know I’ll never read the Christmas story again without thinking of George, and giving thanks.
Remember the morning I forgot to start the Lord’s Prayer? From the south balcony boomed the bass voice of Jim Sayes. “Our Father . . .” Jim still joins us in that prayer.
We might think that avoiding the mention of a name saves a loved one from pain. What it really does is make the pain worse. It turns the person who has died into a subject we can’t talk about. From a Christian perspective, that turns a saint into a taboo. What’s Christian about that?
My third suggestion is this: Do something useful. Take out the trash. Mow the lawn. Provide rides from the airport for family members. Don’t just say, “Call me if there’s anything I can do.” Do it!
I know a woman whose neighbor died in an auto crash. The man who died was a young father with a four-year-old daughter. His wife was, of course, overwhelmed, not only with grief, but with a thousand tasks she had to get done. The day after the man died my friend showed up at the doorstep with a bag of potting soil, several flower pots, seedlings, and a child’s set of gardening tools.
“I thought your daughter might enjoy planting some flowers with me this morning,” she told the new widow. “We’ll just be in the backyard. You can see us through the patio door.” She spent the whole morning with that little girl. The two of them had a wonderful time while the young mother had an opportunity to take a shower, get some phone calls made, and pull her head together.
As she left, my friend said, “I can come back this afternoon and clean your bathrooms if you like. Or would you rather have a casserole?”
“Bathrooms!” her neighbor said in a flood of tears. “Definitely bathrooms!”
Nothing wrong with casseroles, of course. God loves casseroles – or at least this pastor does. The point is, consolation is often best expressed through tasks which occasion perspiration.
I can’t tell you how many people have said to me at one of the funeral receptions put on by our Congregational Care Council, “I can’t believe your church still does this kind of thing. But it has been so helpful. Everyone in the family is deeply grateful.”
Can the clichés. Don’t push for closure. Do something useful. Those are my tips on how to help someone grieve.
Here’s something you and I can’t do: we can’t do what Peter did. We can’t raise the dead. We can’t say, “Tabitha, get up!”
I’m not really sure what to make of this story, except to say that Luke tells it to show that the God who raised Jesus will most certainly raise us. This story dramatically shows that the power of the risen Christ is alive in his church. It links the church in Joppa to the church in Tallahassee. The widows of Joppa mourned the death of Tabitha, whose life was restored to them by the power of the risen Christ. It will be the same for us.
Consider our Gospel reading. With the gift of faith in Jesus Christ comes another gift: the gift of eternal life. “Eternal life” is not a term that allows precise definition. It’s not exactly the Greek concept of the “immortality of the soul” nor is it precisely the Hebrew concept of death and resurrection. Like a lot of terms in John’s Gospel, it’s a bit fuzzy round the edges.
But this much is clear: In life and death we belong to God. Jesus is the Good Shepherd who knows his sheep and whose sheep know him. Nothing can snatch them out of God’s hand. Not death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation (Romans 8: 38-39).
This knowledge tempers our grieving, but it does not make us invulnerable to pain – nor should it. Something so precious as life in the present is made no less precious by the promise of life in the future. In fact, if I read John’s Gospel rightly, “eternal life” isn’t something we receive after we die. It’s something we receive now. Somehow, we grieve not outside the eternal life God gives us in Jesus Christ, but within it.
In other words, we grieve as Easter people, people for whom death is real, and resurrection has already begun. Remember what Jesus said to Martha outside the tomb of Lazarus? “I am the resurrection and the life.” Not “I will be,” but “I am.”
Our grieving and our rejoicing are one in Christ. There’s no right way to go about grieving, but there are some things we can do to help each other -- without clichés, without pretending, and without making offers we never follow through with.
In helping others grieve, we take our tips from the Good Shepherd. He has a crook to do practical work and broad shoulders to share the burden. Behold his flock: not just sheep, but goats as well, not to mention the occasional gazelle.
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