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Starting with Jesus

Heather Bennett

Katie Chitwood

Reflect and Renew March 2023

Blessings From Heaven

A Faithful Slave

Our son was three-and-a-half when he breathed his last breath in his fight with leukemia. I struggled wondering where was God when we needed Him. It was so silent, so dark. Had God been evidently present with us? Absolutely. Welcome to Reflect and Renew. Hey, I'm Katie. I'm so glad that you'll be joining me today. We will be learning and growing together in our walk with Jesus. You will surely be encouraged and challenged as we study week by week and hear from the experiences of others. Our Bible story this week is an amazing one. In fact, it's definitely one of my favorites. There are so many little details that just jump out at me as I read through the story and it really helps to give us insight into the faith of the woman of Shunem. What does faith look like even in the midst of grief, in the midst of sorrow? There are just so many lessons that we can learn today. Before we get started, I want to encourage you to check out our devotional for this week. Go to our website startingwithjesus.com and then you can read the devotional. There's a PDF that you just click and you can read through. Merle Poirier has done a fantastic job. She takes a closer look at the lesson and I know that this week you're really going to enjoy the digging deeper section because she's brought out some amazing parallels from these stories that I had never thought of before. So go to our website startingwithjesus.com and you can follow along. I don't read it word for word, but I use it as a springboard for our discussion today. Let's go ahead and turn in our Bibles to 2 Kings chapter 4. 2 Kings chapter 4, it tells us the story of the woman of Shunem. It's such a neat story and I can relate to her on so many levels because there have been times where I feel like, oh, I wish I could provide a place for someone to stay. I wish that I had a place for someone to be able to rest, to be able to relax. And actually this year on our property here in Arizona, on the church property, we are actually building a tiny house, like a cabin. It's not a room on our house, but it is a small place where people can come and be able to stay when they record for our radio program that we are starting here on the Navajo Nation where they can stay like student missionaries. And so we have been fundraising and we are in the midst of building it when this podcast will air. So it's pretty exciting and I can see a lot of things that the woman of Shunem, what she went through with a building project and what we've been going through with our building project. So here in 2 Kings chapter 4, we have the story of the woman of Shunem. The Bible tells us that she was notable. People knew her. She was probably really wealthy and she would always, as he would pass through, ask him to stop, feed him, make sure that he had what he needed. And it ended up that he ends up coming by so much that finally she looks at her husband and she says, you know what? Let's build a place for him. He comes by consistently. This is kind of the road that he goes on when he goes to the different towns to go and visit. Let's make a small room for him. Let's put a bed in it, a chair, a lamp stand, so that whenever he comes, he has his own space. She recognized the need for the man of God to have his own space, that he needed a place for himself. And so one day as he comes through, she has built him a room and he is just, wow, this is amazing. He wanted to do something for her. So he tells his servant to go ask her, what does she want for reward? Something as a thank you. And what does she say? She's 13. She's like, I'm happy. I dwell among my people. I'm good. But Elisha still wants to do something for her. And so he talks to Gehazi, his servant, and he says, what can we do? And Gehazi's like, you know what? She has no son. Her husband is old. Gehazi doesn't say anything more. Elisha gets the hint. And so he's like, okay. So he goes and calls the woman to where he is and he tells her as she's standing there in the doorway of his new room, he says, about this time next year, you shall embrace a son. Does she believe it? No. In fact, verse 16, she says, no, my Lord, man of God, do not lie to your maidservant. In other words, if it were us today, it'd be like, nah, don't tease me. Don't joke about a thing like that. But you know what? She conceived and she bore a son. There are a few things that stand out to me from this story. One of them is hospitality, kindness. She built a room for the prophet's comfort. There's cost involved. There are building plans that need to be put together. There are workers to hire and to oversee. There's a lot of work that she did, but she did it for the prophet. And something else that stands out to me is the contentment that she had. She was told she could have a reward. What can it be? I'll even talk to the king or the commander of the army, but no, she has no need. She's content with what she has. Gehazi's perception is just amazing to me. And he sees that she could use a child, that that would be a beautiful gift for her kindness. But then what happens? Years go by. She's enjoying the son that she has. And then one day he complains about his head. And by noon, what happens? He's gone. Tragedy strikes. In the midst of her sorrow, in the midst of this tragedy, she picks up her lifeless son, carries him up to the prophet's room and closes the door and then leaves. She has a plan. She has a mission. She asks for a donkey and her husband says, why, where are you going? And she said, I'm going to see the prophet. And he's like, that's really weird. Why are you going to see the prophet? It's not a festival. And what does she say? Verse 23. This is something that we're really going to think about and focus on this week. She tells him it is well. But it's not well. Her son is dead. But in her heart, it is well. She has faith. There are two different times that she says it is well. Both times she is in deep distress. The Bible says so. So you would expect when she reaches the prophet and falls at his feet, the first words to come out of her mouth would be, why, why? Or maybe come in with demands. I need you to come do something about this kid. He's dead. Do something. But she doesn't come in with demands. Only two simple questions. She says, did I ask a son of my Lord? Did I not say, do not deceive me? Basically, she is implying you are the one who prayed for me to have a son. I was afraid that it was too good to be true. In this story, we do have a happy ending. The woman's faith was rewarded. Her son was given back to her that very same day. But what happens in our lives when our faith is not rewarded right away? What if in God's timing, raising a child to life isn't in his plan at this moment? Can we still trust? Can we still find our strength in Jesus? The beautiful thing about Jesus is that he meets us in our despair. As the devotional says, we can fall weeping into his loving arms of protection. There we find safety. There we can completely let go. In his arms, we find security and hope. When we are in this situation, that is when God holds us a little tighter and whispers in our ears, it is well. He holds us close and that same still small voice lingers. It will be okay. What is lost will be restored, if not now, soon in his time. I have never experienced the kind of loss that the woman of Shunem experienced that day. So today we're going to hear from a family friend of ours, Karen Nicola. She and her husband live in Northern California and they have experienced the sorrow that the woman of Shunem did. The journey that Karen has traveled led her to become a grief coach. She's written a book and travels around sharing her journey and helping others to navigate their own journey of grief. So let's listen as she shares with us her story, what she has found to be helpful in her sorrow. I share my story not because my son Dawson died, but because God heals broken hearts. Our marriage was eight years young. Our second born little girl was one and a half years old. I was 28. My husband was 28. Our son was three and a half, Dawson Tesla Nicola, when he breathed his last breath in his fight with leukemia. It happened on a Friday morning during that season of the morning when it's darkest just before dawn. Our pediatrician had come in the middle of the night to be with us, to comfort us, to support our son. She sat in the corner of his bedroom while Steve and I kneeled beside his bed. The moment he breathed his last breath, I had anticipated knowing that God would be present with us in that time. I had expected some physical form of display of his presence, whether it was just that sense of a warm shoulder hug or the possibility of angel wings just brushing our face or some glow or light that came through the window. There was nothing, no sound, no touch, no visual effect that God was with us. And I tucked that in my heart and wondered about it for a long time. Meanwhile, my husband and I held each other. We wept, we prayed, and eventually the day came with the light and you know if you've lost someone you love dearly, someone has died in your presence, you know the fogginess of mind and yet all the things that still need to be attended to. So our pastor came to be with us and as he arrived, our pediatrician was leaving. They had a brief conversation outside by her car of which he told me about several months later. In the meantime, I struggled. I struggled wondering where was God when we needed him, when our son died. It was so silent, so dark. And like I said, a couple of months later, our pastor mentioned to me that Dr. Sarah, as she was leaving that day, informed him that she had been with many parents and families as babies and children had died, but she'd never been with a family that had been as peaceful as Steve and Karen. When I heard that part of the story, the dots, the missing dots began to take shape. And yes, I had to fully witness the event that our hearts were at peace. It was well with our soul, even though our hearts were broken. And that peace that God had given us was nothing we could have conjured up on our own. Jesus tells us there's no peace that the world can give you that's anything like the peace that he gives us. And so yes, had God been evidently present with us? Absolutely. But I hadn't known it. I hadn't noticed that it came with that peace. You know, death happens to others, but I didn't think it would happen to me until I was reminded of something Jesus told his disciples not very many hours before his death. He assured them, I've told you all these things because I want you to have the peace that they bring you. In this world, you are not going to have peace. It's a troubled world. This world, you will have trouble, he says. But I've overcome the world, so take courage. As I remembered and put into practice that Jesus directly said, in this world, you are going to have troubles, I began to understand that my son's death was a part of living on this planet. It was a part of the crossfire action that's taking place between good and evil. And while our hearts were torn open because we could not be with our son any longer, we were at peace knowing that God wins this conflict between good and evil. And good overcomes evil. And a spoken word from God Almighty opens up graves and resurrects his loved ones. So we grieved with hope that we would see and hold our dear son again. But there was another level of hope that we needed to grieve with. And that was the hope of the assurance that God can heal broken hearts. Psalms 147.3 says, I heal broken hearts and bind up their wounds. I had to ask myself, is this true? Is God just saying something fanciful here? Or is it real? I discovered it is real. I leaned hard into my pain and hard into my grief, as well as leaning hard into God, knowing that he would show up with me through that pain. He promises you and me both that he walks with us through the valley of the shadow of death. Now, sometimes we think that if we grieve, if we feel the experiences of grief and loss and loneliness and regret and blame and shame and anger and isolation, if we grieve, then it must be a lack of our faith. I'd like to suggest that it is not a lack of faith to grieve. The Shunammite woman told those along the journey to Elisha that day, it is well, it is well, until she met Elisha face to face, where she fell apart, as it were. And all I know is that my God is acquainted with grief. This is something he's experienced, well, long, eternally long before I've ever known or tasted of it. And so my grief is not something unfamiliar to him. It does not offend him. In fact, I see him rather as a God with such a big chest that I can beat on it and pound on it with my pain and my confusion and my questions. And he keeps holding me strong, doesn't push me away in that condition. Neither will he push you away. And so when we feel the waves of grief overtaking us, what are we to do? What would be a biblical principle by which we can handle and deal with these waves of emotional grief, physical grief, mental grief? Well, God showed me a couple of things that made a huge difference. The first one was that I could not contain all of those thoughts, feelings, questions, fears, anxieties inside my body. They needed to be released. And so I put a pencil in my hand and my hand to paper, and I poured out my pain on paper. I wrote them daily as letters to God, dear God, and I would tell him just what it was like for me. And by the time I had released that all on paper, there was space in my heart for his Holy Spirit to come back into that place and assure me and comfort me and give me hope that it was well with my soul. And so sometimes, two or three times a day, you would find me with my pencil in my hand and my hand on paper, pouring out my grief on paper. I also discovered that there were so many beautiful scriptures that actually spoke to my broken heart. One week, five weeks, five months, five years out in my grief, there was still scripture speaking to the places that still needed healing in my journey of grief. God is faithful to bring us healing, and he walks with us through this valley. It's a journey. It's not an overnight skip. But in that journey, my friend, we learn much about ourselves and much about God, and the healing is real. And so we grieved with hope in the healing that God had available for us right now, until that day when we will see our loved ones face to face. I want to encourage you that there is hope in the healing. There is hope in the second coming and the resurrection. There are principles that we can apply to our grief that cooperate with God's healing. As we apply what this lesson has been about, it's my prayer that you will take away the hope that comes. The Shunammite woman received her son alive again right then, right there. I did not, and you have not. But it does not mean that they are not yet to be made alive. Our prayers for their healing and their resurrection are still answered yes, yes in Jesus. It's just a different time frame. Please live today and each day forward with your hope completely in the arms of God, so that it may be well with your soul. Amen. Isn't that powerful? So often people feel guilty when they're experiencing grief, but the stages of grief are normal. God is right there through our grief. We may not see it in the moment. Karen and Steve, did they see it at that moment when their little boy took his last breath? No. But when they looked back, when we look back, there we can see the evidence of God's love of his care. Did you catch what Karen said near the end? There are some principles that we can apply for walking through our grief that end up cooperating. They go hand in hand with God's healing. So Karen, I know you just barely, barely scratched the surface, and there's so much more to learn about grief and those principles. Can you tell us how we can learn more, where we can find your materials on grief? I serve as a grief coach and a grief support to those who are supporting someone else in their grief. And I've written the book, Comfort for the Day, Living Through the Seasons of Grief, so you can find a place to put your pain on paper, so you can discover scriptures that are available for your broken heart, so that you can be in a place where God can bring you healing. You can find us at comfortfortheday.com on our website and on Facebook, Comfort for the Day. My husband Steve has joined me in this work, and together we are here to be in the place where people's pain exists. So please find the resources that are available to you at comfortfortheday.com. Thank you so much for sharing. We will also have that information in the description box below, so be sure to look and check that out. Each week we have a challenge from our devotional, and this week we're challenged to listen to the song, When Peace Like a River Attendeth My Way. I want you to Google the writer of that song. His name was Horatio Spafford. Want you to learn why he wrote the hymn. What were the circumstances that led him to write the hymn, When Peace Like a River? You might also know it as It Is Well With My Soul. What are the similarities between the tragedies of Horatio Spafford and the Shunammite woman? What are the things that are similar, and what are the things that are different? In what ways are they different? This week it gives us a lot to think about, and it's a very heavy topic. But I'm so thankful that you journeyed with me today as we explored this topic of grief, as we explored trusting in God. And I want to close with a word of prayer. Lord, each one of us experience tragedy. Each one of us experience different ways of grieving. But through it all, I am so thankful that you are right there beside us. That you stand there, you hold our hand, you comfort us. Thank you for the peace that you've promised that surpasses all understanding. I pray for each person listening right now that you will reach down and give them that peace today. In Jesus' name, Amen. This podcast is sponsored by Starting With Jesus. To find out more about other programs, or to find out the links that were shared in this podcast, just check out the description box below.

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Reflect and Renew March 2023

Blessings From Heaven

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