You feel guilty inside, wondering if maybe there was something you could have done to prevent your loss. You regret that you didn’t spend more time together. The things you wish you had said to them … now you’ll never have the chance. The pain is so deep, you almost feel like you’ve lost your whole life. Crying has become your daily cleansing. You’re broken, and it hurts. You think you’ll never be happy again. Sleep is not the same. Life is just … not fair.

You have good days -- but the bad days far outnumber them. Why would God let this happen? Why did He take them away from you? Every day you pray that He heals your heart, because you know it’ll take a miracle.

You don’t know if you can handle the changes you’ll have to make in your life now. You ask yourself over and over again, What on earth am I going to do?

Whether you’ve lost a loved one to death or divorce, either one can be a traumatic experience. You feel like a part of you is gone. Click on the reason for your loss and you’ll find that understanding is closer than you think.

Whether you’ve lost a spouse, a child, a sibling, a companion, a friend, a relative, or even a pet, you CAN be happy again. There comes a time when people come face to face with the fact that they can’t do it alone, and that’s probably why you’re here. We reach a point where we’re … helpless. We don’t know where to turn or which way to go. That’s when it hits us … our only hope is in the Lord. He’s the only one we can truly trust. We need Him. But where do we start?

How about by asking yourself what Jesus would say to you. He doesn’t want you to be sad and mourn. One of His disciples once said to Him:
 

You may have given up on trying to understand why your loved one has been taken from you, but understanding may just be the answer to mending your heart. God wants you to be happy again. He hasn’t forgotten you. He’ll never forget you.

I’d like for you to open your mind and heart to some things that may bring you closer to the understanding that can heal your fragile heart. We know that God has reasons for what He does, and we have to trust that the things that happen in our lives, though they may seem tragic, may be His will.

Understanding, believing, and trusting that your loved one is truly in a better place now is vital to healing. The life we hope for as Christians, the life we long for and await every day of our lives is the life that your loved one is beginning now. To grieve for them, is to grieve for their receiving the reward … the promise, that we all live for.

While this TRUTH is known to us down deep, our hearts still search for reasons why. Why did God have to take them now? If we could just understand why now … we feel like we could accept it better and our delicate heart could be on the mend. Let’s look at some reasons why.

It may be that God didn’t take your loved one from you, but perhaps He set them free from something that they were suffering or that might have happened if He didn’t.

Only God knows what the future holds for us. If there was something that God didn’t want your loved one to experience, that may be the reason why. People always try and console others who lose a loved one by saying “They’re in a better place now.” Nothing could be closer to the TRUTH.

If your loved one had a lengthy illness, it’s easy to be misguided into thinking that God just let them suffer. I have to tell you a little story about the Apostle Paul. You know how much our Father loved him, yet Paul had some kind of physical illness that he prayed would be removed and God said no. Why? The Lord told Paul:

In our weakness, God becomes stronger in us, so if your loved one suffered from illness, God was working in them, strengthening them through every moment of their illness, not physically, but Spiritually. Sometimes when we wonder why God “lets” people suffer, maybe we’re just looking at it wrong. Maybe we need to look at it like this, He’s not letting them be weak, but becoming stronger in them because when we’re weak, we turn to Him for strength and comfort and we should rejoice that He gives us the opportunity to be “made perfect” before He frees us from our earthly bodies to become His Angels.

There’s also the possibility that through this loss, there is a blessing. That blessing may be that by taking your loved one, it was the only way for God to bring YOU closer to Him. Maybe God wants you to return to your first love … HIM! If you put your loved one before God in your life, is it unthinkable that God would remove them to become first in your life again?

God uses everything in our life -- both good and bad -- to build our character and strengthen our Faith in Christ. The loss you’re facing may be God’s way of helping you to learn to depend on Him and to trust His leading in your life. It’s not His will for us to weaken when difficulties confront us. He wants us to be strong. If we’re committed to Him, He’ll give us the strength we need to face whatever comes our way. As we rely on HIS strength, our soul will become stronger and more conformed to His image. He doesn’t give us things that are too difficult for us to handle.

If none of these reasons for your loss gives you any closure, there’s another thing that it could be. The best way to describe it is “The Test and Trial Factor.” Have you ever read the Book of Job?

Job was a righteous man, who loved the Lord. One day when the Angels were in line, waiting to talk to God, satan was with them (because he is an Angel himself). God said, Have you seen my servant Job? There's nobody like Job on all the earth. He loves God and turns away from bad. Satan said, of course he does, because you spoil him, but if you didn’t … He’d curse you. God allowed everything to be taken from Job, except his wife and his life. Job lost quite an estate … and TEN children. Job, was tested beyond imagination, and although he questioned why he suffered so much loss, never once did he blame God. In the end, God talks to Job out of a whirlwind and makes him see that He is so magnificent, that man doesn't have to know or understand why God does what He does. He can do anything and He doesn't have to explain it to any. Job told God that he knew that nothing was impossible for the Lord, and that he was sorry if he ever doubted His power. Job proved his love and devotion to the Lord, and in the end, the Lord rewarded Job with ten more children and twice the blessings that he had before.

The things that happen to us and to our loved ones sometimes don’t make sense to our human minds, but there are sometimes reasons beyond our understanding that explain why. We may never know those reasons, at least not while we’re on this earth, but we must remain Faithful to God and trust in His will.

If you’ve lost a pet, and you’re wondering what happens to animals when they die, consider this, the very last verse of the last Psalm in the Bible says:
 

God created every living creature, so anything that our God created glorifies Him.

Another thing to remember is John’s description of God’s throne in Heaven.

It sure sounds like animals become Angels too, doesn’t it?

Don’t lose the joy that your loved one had given you by being overcome with grief. Instead of being sorrowful for the time that you didn’t have with them, be thankful for the time you did. Count the blessings that they brought to your life … remember the good times. Share the gifts that they brought to you from God, with another. Celebrate the life they had, and the new, eternal life that they’re beginning.

Even with the understanding of why God has chosen this time to bring your loved one on their way home, there still remains a part of you that is missing. So how do you fill your empty heart and your empty home, now that your loved one is gone? Fill them with God! Bring Him into your life like never before! Get to know Him better. You keep asking yourself, What am I going to do? Find out what it is that HE wants you to do.

Ask Him to show you something that you can do for Him … something far outside of your comfort zone that will make you feel complete again. Not something simple, but something you can lose yourself in. Did you get that? Lose yourself! Find HIM!

Maybe you could write a book about your experience to help others who are going through the same thing, and maybe you’ll even save others from the same heartache before it happens to them.

Every day, God has a plan for us … people He wants us to serve, words of comfort to say, acts of kindness to perform. There are places He wants us to be just when someone needs us. You can go through life seeing everything as routine … just another day … or you can keep your eyes open to the opportunities that God sets up for you. Then, you can see God working through you, making your life truly valuable.

Healing a broken heart takes a long, long time without understanding. The more you understand, the faster you will heal. There’s a program that you can use to help you turn your mourning into rejoicing. It will help you to discover God’s plan for you, fill in the void, and continue your life in happiness. It will bring you back to your first love. Your loved one would want that for you too. It’s a program for Christians with problems of all kinds, and you will discover THE PATH to healing.

Christian Divorce is a difficult issue ... Being divorced does not mean that you’re a failure. IF you checked out the Christian Divorce study you understand some of the complexities and found some TRUTH. Now we’re going to look a little deeper into the emotional side of divorce.

Divorce can be just as devastating as the death of a loved one. There’s even one thing that can happen, that may be even more tragic about divorce. You can become lonely and LONELINESS can cause you to lose Faith in yourself, others and even in love itself. To put your complete trust in someone and then to have it betrayed, is indescribable. So you take your fragile, bruised, and bleeding heart and build a twelve inch thick steel wall around it so that it never happens again.

You just can’t believe it’s happened to you. You have so many questions inside that you can’t even think straight. You drive yourself crazy asking them … or you may ask them, but never look for the answers because they may be too painful.

There comes a time when people come face to face with the fact that they can’t do it alone, and that’s probably why you’re here. We reach a point where we’re … helpless. We don’t know where to turn or which way to go. That’s when it hits us … our only hope is in the Lord. He’s the only one we can truly trust. We need Him. But where do we start?

You may have given up on trying to understand your loss, but understanding may just be the answer to mending your heart. God wants you to be happy again. He hasn’t forgotten you. He’ll never forget you.

I’d like for you to open your mind and heart to some things that may bring you closer to the understanding that can heal your fragile heart. We know that God has reasons for what He does, and we have to trust that the things that happen in our lives, though they may seem tragic, may be His will.

You thought your marriage was meant to be. What about the children? What about the vows … ’till death do us part? What about all that you shared together? Does it all mean nothing? Is it all just thrown away?

You blame your ex-spouse. You blame other people. You blame work. You blame yourself. One thing’s for certain … and it’s the reason for most every divorce that happens … the world has come between you.

There’s no delicate way to approach the issues of divorce. In the next paragraph, you’re going to read some things that may be hard to consider, because the road to understanding is sometimes a rocky road … but the destination is worth the trip.

Maybe your marriage wasn’t made in Heaven after all. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe the death that parted you and your ex-spouse was the death of the marriage? Perhaps you were never joined together in God’s eyes, and that’s why this has happened. Does the Lord have other things in mind for you? Can you ever forgive your ex-spouse and get on with the life that God intended for you? Let’s look at some of these maybes.

Let’s start with the children, because from one side or the other … or both, they can be adversely affected and the damage can be irreversible. Honor thy father and thy mother is one of the Lord’s Commandments. In selfishness, we tend to forget that our children have emotions too, and we don’t hesitate to speak adversely toward the other parent during or after a divorce. Generally speaking, people don’t divorce their children, but we can cause bitterness in them that is not of God. Not only your words are heard but your actions are seen by the children and if the divorce was God’s will, (which is very possible, but may not be apparent yet) you’re speaking and acting against God. Anger, hate, jealousy, pride … these things are against God, and not what He wants us to teach the children.

If your child saw that through this extremely emotional time in your life, you demonstrated these qualities instead of vengeance toward their other parent, wouldn’t you be teaching them a godly lesson and teaching them the righteousness that God wants them to learn? It may be difficult with all the confused emotions that you’re dealing with, but if you keep reminding yourself that your children are God’s children too, it will be much easier.

Be careful of holding on to the hope of reconciliation. If it’s God’s will for you to take a different direction in your life, you don’t want to be working against Him. You’ll be setting yourself up for more heartache.

Destiny is something that was meant to be … something that God determined beforehand for your life. Fate is the road we choose to take on our way. Your marriage was fate … and it may have taken you out of your way for a while, but now you get to choose another road to your destiny.

Now what about that huge possibility that what’s happened in your life is God’s will? Make no mistake, you’re at a vulnerable period in your life and some people, after being hurt and left alone in the world, choose the path of pride, anger and bitterness and make foolish choices, which causes more pain, sorrow, and even shame. The world (that came between you and your spouse to begin with) offers MANY lures for those who are experiencing loneliness and loss.

In our effort to avoid feeling so lonely, many times the first thing that people do is seek to replace their lost love. The problem is when we do, most of the time they appear to be what we seek at first, but soon they change and we find ourselves starting over or even worse staying with them out of some sort of convenience, obligation or habit. Then, after wasting months and even years of our life ... THE RELATIONSHIP ENDS ANYWAY.

So what do you do next?

Before you decide whether or not to seek for a relationship with another person, I’d like to suggest that you strengthen your relationship with the Lord first.

There’s a possibility that through this loss, there is a blessing. That blessing may be that by taking your loved one, it was the only way for God to bring YOU closer to Him. Maybe God wants you to return to your first love … HIM! If you put your loved one before God in your life, is it unthinkable that God would remove them to become first in your life again?

God uses everything in our life -- both good and bad -- to build our character and strengthen our Faith in Christ. The loss you’re facing may be God’s way of helping you to learn to depend on Him and to trust His leading in your life. It’s not His will for us to weaken when difficulties confront us. He wants us to be strong. If we’re committed to Him, He’ll give us the strength we need to face whatever comes our way. As we rely on HIS strength, our soul will become stronger and more conformed to His image. He doesn’t give us things that are too difficult for us to handle.

Even after you do find the understanding of why you've experienced this loss in your life, there still remains a part of you that is missing. So how do you fill your empty heart and your empty home, now that your loved one is gone? Fill them with God! Bring Him into your life like never before! Get to know Him better. You keep asking yourself, What am I going to do? Find out what it is that HE wants you to do.

Ask Him to show you something that you can do for Him … something far outside of your comfort zone that will make you feel complete again. Not something simple, but something you can lose yourself in. Did you get that? Lose yourself! Find HIM!

Maybe you could write a book about your experience to help others who are going through the same thing, and maybe you’ll even save others from the same heartache before it happens to them.

Every day, God has a plan for us … people He wants us to serve, words of comfort to say, acts of kindness to perform. There are places He wants us to be just when someone needs us. You can go through life seeing everything as routine … just another day … or you can keep your eyes open to the opportunities that God sets up for you. Then, you can see God working through you, making your life truly valuable.

Healing a broken heart takes a long, long time without understanding. The more you understand, the faster you will heal. There’s a program that you can use to help you turn your mourning into rejoicing. It will help you to discover God’s plan for you, fill in the void, and continue your life in happiness. It will bring you back to your first love. It’s a program for Christians with problems of all kinds, and you will discover THE PATH to healing.
 

Check out this study if you are lonely