The first time my husband was deployed to Iraq, I was felled by grief. Once we could no longer talk every day, I sought anything that could make me laugh or distract me briefly. In those moments of distraction, I felt shamed for being able to have a moment of joy.
Driving down the highway one day, I had a hard epiphany. I realized that my grief had become a kind of idol. But grief is not my God. To move out of the horrible spiral I was in, I began to sing the hymn “My Hope is Built on Nothing Less” every day. I conceived of Jesus grieving with me but keeping me afloat. “All other ground is sinking sand, all other ground is sinking sand” (ELW 596).
For God’s children who identify in word and deed as Christians, Jesus is our solid rock.
This message is an excerpt from the Bible study “The Apostles’ Creed” by Julia Seymour in the October 2017 issue of Gather magazine.
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