Have you ever sat quietly and thought, “This is not where I expected to be”? It’s a hard feeling any time of year, but it becomes especially heavy during a season described as “the most wonderful time of the year.”
Grief doesn’t take a holiday. In fact, there’s something about really good times that makes really hard times feel harder. For many people, grief sharpens during the holidays.
Maybe it’s family conflict or an estranged child. Maybe it’s financial pressure, disrupted routines, loneliness or exhaustion. Perhaps it’s the ache of divorce, the death of someone you love, a miscarriage or infertility.
Grief has a way of turning “merry and bright” into “heavy and quiet,” and Scripture gives words to this reality. Solomon writes, “There is an occasion for everything … a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:1, 4). Grief isn’t a glitch in life — it’s part of life in a broken world.
So what is grief? It’s the emotional pain that comes from losing something or someone important. It can show up as sadness, anger, numbness, anxiety or even physical fatigue.
The Bible also recognizes grief — and reveals a paradox: grief is not only inevitable, it’s indispensable. Painful as it is, it does necessary work in the soul, producing something in us that celebration never can.
Grief clarifies what matters most. Funerals are better than festivals because they wake us up, sharpen our priorities and remind us that life is fleeting — and precious (Ecclesiastes 7:2).
Grief deepens our character. Sorrow has a strange way of strengthening the soul. It makes us more compassionate, more prayerful and more aware of the pain others carry (Ecclesiastes 7:3).
Grief produces seasoned wisdom. Wisdom grows in the soil of honest sorrow — not in denial or distraction (Ecclesiastes 7:4).
And this is where many of us struggle. The holidays tempt us to pretend — to decorate the outside while hurting on the inside. But pretense doesn’t heal. It silences the very grief God invites us to bring to him. When we refuse to acknowledge our sorrow, we don’t become stronger — we become divided.
This is why the gospel is such good news. Jesus was “a man of sorrows… acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3), not because he avoided joy, but because he refused to avoid pain.
Jesus said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). The promise is not that lament will erase our wounds, but that God himself will comfort us in them — and often use our wounds to comfort others.
So this season, honor your grief. Bring it honestly before God. Let Jesus meet you in the ache and deepen your joy — not by avoiding sorrow, but by transforming it.
Because celebration isn’t the absence of grief. It’s the presence of God in the midst of it.
In your corner,
Andrew
Andrew and Kristy Miller, along with their seven children, live in Sterling and serve at Sterling Baptist Church located at the corner of Swanson River Road and the Sterling Highway. Family worship is at 11 a.m. on Sundays.
