Posted in Uncategorized, tagged brother, death, grief, grieving, hope, pain, peace, remembering, suicide on December 11, 2017| 4 Comments »
I never thought I’d make it six minutes after my brother’s death, let alone six years. But, here I am. Still standing.
I put on my father’s old leather boots, grab my walking stick, and head up the mountain…
By the time I get to the top, I begin to remember the life well-lived instead of only the death that swept me up in its furious agony.
And although I can’t explain it, my heart finds a moment of peace in remembering a day I’d rather forget.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged art, death, God, grief, grieving, healing, hope, Jesus Christ, loss, mourning, pain, sorrow, suicide, trauma, traumatic, traumatic loss, visual arts on June 4, 2015| 2 Comments »
“It’s time,” I said to my husband as we sat together a few weeks ago, talking about the ways grief has touched EVERY part of our lives.
“Time for what?” he responded.
“It’s time for you to film my grief story. So many people are suffering the agony of traumatic loss like we did when my brother took his life. We have to do something to let others know there is help and hope. Will you do that with me?”
So, here it is. If you or someone you love has been touched by traumatic loss…Posted in Uncategorized, tagged bereavement, death, grief, grieving, help, hope, loss, sad, sorrow, traumatic on October 8, 2014| Leave a Comment »
For Those Who Weep–A Grief Response JournalWhen you lose someone you love, your heart shatters into a billion tiny pieces. Grief and pain override every other emotion and peace can seem so very far away. If your loved one died tragically, your grief is amplified by shock and the traumatic nature of your loss. How can you possibly survive such heartache? That is where author, Penny A. Bragg, found herself following her brother’s untimely death.
For Those Who Weep—a full-color grief response journal—contains the author’s raw emotions and sacred experiences which occurred during her journey toward hope and healing. Bragg masterfully integrates her artwork into each of the essays in the book; as she reconciled her loss and her faith in God. For Those Who Weep also invites readers to respond to what they’ve read; applying it to their own pain and healing.
Pastors, lay leaders, bereavement counselors, and friends of those who have suffered a loss will also consider this book a priceless resource as they minister to the brokenhearted.
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ashes, death, grief, hope, lettig go, pain, release, sorrow on September 22, 2014| Leave a Comment »
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged ashes, beauty, Christ, death, God, grief, grieving, hope, loss, mourning, weep, weeping on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged beauty, Christ, death, God, grief, grieving, hope, loss, love, mourning on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »
I wish the sun would stop setting.
If, even for just a moment, God would stop it from going down…
But, the sun will set…
And, tomorrow’s ache will come long before I’ve dealt with today’s.
“Certainly the faithful love of the Lord hasn’t ended; certainly God’s compassion isn’t through! They are renewed every morning.” Lamentations 3:22-23a
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged death, encouragement, friend, grace, grief, grieving, help, hope, loss, mourn, mourning, sorrow, weep, weeping, wilderness on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »
“The people who survived the sword, found grace in the wilderness…” Jeremiah 31:2 NKJV
What does grace in the wilderness look like? It looks like…
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Christ, death, grief, grieving, hope, loss, mourn, mourning, sorrow, weep, weeping on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »
But, I’m not far enough along to agree or pass judgment…
My heart-wound raw and gaping.
Because frankly…if I had my way in the world tonight…
I’d alter the anguish of my journey.
Because on night’s like this…
When all seems lost and dim…
Until I cease my anxious striving…and sit alone with God in the silence of my soul…
Then and only then, do I hear Him faintly whisper,
“Just as it is written, ‘FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE BEING PUT TO DEATH ALL DAY LONG; WE WERE CONSIDERED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED.’ But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.” Romans 8:36-37
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Christ, Christmas, death, grave, grief, hope, Jesus, loss, love, mourn, mourning, prayer, sorrow, weep, weeping on July 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »
Then Jesus shouted, “Lazarus, come out!” And the dead man came out, his hands and feet bound in graveclothes, his face wrapped in a headcloth. Jesus told them, “Unwrap him and let him go!” John 11:43-44
I love the story of Lazarus because, well…Jesus raises a dead man from the grave. I mean …what’s not to love?
But, what should you do when death doesn’t rise? What should you do?
Almost every post I’ve written over the last 9 months has been penned from a place of deep pain and desperate hope. Living in the shadows of Heaven’s silence. Lazarus getting sicker and sicker and still, no Jesus. Mary and Martha panicking and praying their guts out.
Like Lazarus’ sisters, these are the honest questions that I’ve cried out to God and wrestled with everyday. Every single day of my brother’s troubling illness.
While there is much I won’t pretend to understand, this I know: God has used this painful season to teach me to come alongside, more intimately, the suffering of others…those precious ones grieving the loss of a marriage…a dream…a family as family was intended to exist. And, this I also know…my intimacy with Christ has grown in breadth and depth beyond all confines.
These are all good things. I know that. Redemptive things. And, I’m grateful for each one. I am. I really am. But, the reality in which I now find myself is that…
I didn’t get what I wanted for Christmas this year…or the last three years, for that matter. I fasted, prayed, worshiped, wept…even slept with my Bible night after night. For three long years my heartcries only became more dramatic as each day passed and still…no “visible” or “tangible” answers. No healing. Nothing.
We tried everything to save my brother. Did everything. Prayed everything. And, still…so much pain and suffering. Too much. Everyday, his mental condition robbing him of dignity. Stripping him bare.
Every conversation…hearing him slip further away from me, the way a song slowly fades down low, until it comes to a silent end. And then…just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse…Heaven’s silence grew all the more deafening.
Since Jay’s passing, I’ve found myself floundering in a greater measure of grief than I ever thought possible…the loss of his young life sucking the breath from my chest. My heart throbbing hot with the stark realization that his pain became far too much for him to bear, even for one more moment.
God, how can this be? While I know Jay is at rest in Heaven’s peace now, the reality of things gone seemingly awry has turned me upside-down and inside-out. It wasn’t supposed to end like this. His healing was supposed to happen on THIS side of Heaven, not the other.
I share this with you as I weep and grieve and groan–the computer screen blurred by endless tears–only because I know that God never intended us to hide our wounds–as much as we might like to–especially when they’re gaping wide open and bleeding out all over. Jesus didn’t try to cover up His blood. Instead, His blood covered all.
No doubt you’re longing for healing to happen on this side of Heaven too, as were we. That’s what drew most of you to our blog and to our marriage restoration story from the very start. But, as one year closes and another begins, we’re faced with learning to live out the sobering fact that…
Death has come and it is staying and amidst all my fighting and flailing, I know that I know that I know that I will drown in the massive waves of grief unless…
He trains my eyes and I strain my eyes…not to look, but to see. Because when I let God take me beyond the looking and into the seeing, I realize that…
I only know this because in the days since I got the one thing for Christmas that I never ever wanted, I’ve seen Jesus in unfathomable ways:
for those who weep 