Grief and the Christian hope

If you are grieving, you are free to grieve. Christian faith has never asked mourners to hide their sorrow. Jesus wept at the grave of his friend Lazarus, and Paul wrote that Christians grieve, though not “like the rest, who have no hope.” A Christian funeral proclaims the resurrection of Jesus, and the same service makes room for tears, because the love people have for one another brings deep sorrow when death parts them. Grief is the price of love, and God does not ask you to stop loving the one you lost.

If your grief has brought you to thoughts of ending your life, call or text 988 in the United States to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, or find a helpline in your country at findahelpline.com.

Is it wrong for a Christian to grieve?

The shortest verse in most English Bibles answers that question. When Jesus came to the tomb of his friend Lazarus in Bethany and saw Lazarus’ sister Mary weeping, John says that “he groaned in the spirit and was troubled” (John 11:33). Then:

Jesus wept. The Jews therefore said, “See how much affection he had for him!”

John 11:35–36

In John’s account, Jesus had already told his disciples that he was going to wake Lazarus (John 11:11). Jesus wept anyway. Knowing the end of the story did not stop him from feeling the loss, and it need not stop you. On the night before he died, Jesus told his friends, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death” (Matthew 26:38). In the Sermon on the Mount, he blessed mourners:

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

Matthew 5:4

What does it mean to grieve with hope?

Paul wrote to the church in Thessalonica, where some believers had died, “so that you don’t grieve like the rest, who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13). He assumed that Christians would grieve. What he offered was a hope to grieve with: that God, who raised Jesus, will raise those who have died, and that the living and the dead will be together with the Lord.

Hope and sorrow can share the same heart on the same day. A widow can believe that her husband is safe in God’s keeping and still find his empty chair unbearable. For more on that hope, see Reunion with those we love and Life after death.

What do the Psalms teach about grief?

The Psalms give grieving people words when they have none of their own. Psalm 13 begins with complaint:

How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart every day?

Psalm 13:1–2

Psalm 13 turns to trust in its last two verses, but Psalm 88 never does. “My eyes are dim from grief,” its author prays (Psalm 88:9), and the psalm ends in darkness. Both prayers belong to Scripture, so both are fit to pray. Psalm 56 says that God keeps account of every sorrow: “You put my tears into your container” (Psalm 56:8).

Faithful Christians have often written frankly about grief. After his wife, Joy Davidman, died in 1960, C. S. Lewis kept a notebook that he published the next year as A Grief Observed, under the name N. W. Clerk. It begins, “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.” Lewis recorded anger and doubt as well as faith, and many grieving Christians have found company in it.

How does the church pray for those who mourn?

Christian funerals pray both for the dead and for the living who mourn them. The Orthodox funeral sings a short hymn, the kontakion for the departed, that asks Christ to give the one who has died rest with the saints, in a place with no pain, sorrow, or sighing, but life everlasting. The hymn echoes Isaiah’s promise that “sorrow and sighing will flee away” (Isaiah 35:10). Orthodox families also gather for memorial prayers on the third, ninth, and fortieth days after a death and on its anniversaries, and the prayers end with the hymn “Memory eternal,” asking that God never forget the one who has died.

Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Episcopal funeral services likewise pray for those who mourn. This prayer from the Book of Common Prayer can be said at any time by anyone who mourns:

Almighty God, Father of mercies and giver of comfort: Deal graciously, we pray, with all who mourn; that, casting all their care on you, they may know the consolation of your love; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Book of Common Prayer (1979)

Jewish tradition gives the first week of mourning its own shape. Mourners “sit shiva” at home for seven days while friends come to them, a custom that recalls Job’s friends, who “sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great” (Job 2:13).

How can I help someone who is grieving?

Paul’s instruction is short: “Weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). Job’s friends did their best work in the first seven days, while they kept silent. The trouble began when they started explaining why Job suffered.

• Show up. Go to the funeral, sit with the family, and do not worry about finding the right words.
• Help with ordinary tasks. Bring a meal, mow the lawn, drive the children to school, or help with paperwork.
• Say the name. Many grieving people long to hear the name of the person they lost and to share stories.
• Do not explain the death. Sayings like “God needed another angel” or “everything happens for a reason” usually wound. See Does everything happen for a reason?
• Remember later. A call on the anniversary of the death, or at the first Christmas, often means more than anything said in the first week.

When should I see a grief counselor?

Grief comes in waves, and there is no correct timetable for it. Many hospices, churches, and funeral homes run grief support groups, and a priest or pastor will visit and pray with you. A counselor can help at any point, and seeing one is part of caring for the life God has given you, as seeing a doctor is.

Seek help soon if you cannot sleep, eat, or work for weeks at a time, if you are relying on alcohol or drugs to get through the day, or if you are thinking about ending your life. In 2022 the American Psychiatric Association recognized prolonged grief disorder as a diagnosis. For adults, it describes grief that, at least a year after a death, still involves intense longing for or preoccupation with the person nearly every day and causes serious distress or keeps a person from functioning. Prolonged grief can be treated. For more on faith and mental health, see Anxiety, depression, and faith.

If you are in crisis, call or text 988 in the United States, any hour of the day or night, or visit findahelpline.com outside the United States. If you are struggling with alcohol or drugs, SAMHSA’s National Helpline is 1-800-662-4357.

What hope does the Bible give to those who mourn?

The Bible ends with a promise for every grieving person. In John’s vision of the new heaven and the new earth, God comes to live with people and comforts them himself:

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more. The first things have passed away.

Revelation 21:4

Until that day, your tears are not wasted. The psalmist trusted that God keeps every one of them, and Jesus, who wept at his friend’s grave, is with you in your sorrow.