Grief Has Many Faces
“You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book.”
—Psalm 56:8 (NLT)
Grief has many names. Some losses announce themselves loudly, unraveling life in a way that everyone can see—a funeral, a hospital bed, a goodbye at the airport that lingers too long. Other losses slip in quietly, like a whisper in the night, stealing something you once held without ever making a sound.
We often reserve grief for death, but loss comes in many forms. Job knew this well. His story is a masterclass in suffering—wave after wave of loss crashing down on him until he hardly recognized the life he once knew. His children. His wealth. His health. His reputation. Even his own friends sat with him in stunned silence because sometimes words fail in the face of sorrow.
Our own losses may not come all at once like Job’s, but they accumulate over time. They take shape in ways that often go unnoticed, even by ourselves. The friendship that slowly faded until the silence between you was louder than any words spoken. The dreams that once burned bright but have dimmed with the passing years— dreams of a family, a career, a calling that never quite became reality. The sense of home that vanished when you packed up your life and started over somewhere unfamiliar.
These losses may not come with a eulogy or a memorial, but they still leave empty spaces in our souls. And yet, how often do we dismiss them? We tell ourselves, “It’s not that big of a deal,” or “Other people have it worse.” We silence our grief before it has a chance to speak.
But God—God does not measure loss on a human scale. God does not rank sorrow. Every tear, every disappointment, every ache of the soul is seen, held, and counted.
So today, let’s name our losses. Not to dwell in sadness but to honor what was and to recognize that even in the grief of what is missing, God is present.
Prayer:
Take a deep breath and bring to mind the losses in your life—the ones you’ve ignored, the ones that still sting. Write them down. Sit with them for a moment. Then pray:
“God, you see what I have lost, even the things I struggle to name. You hold every sorrow, every disappointment, every unspoken ache. Today, I acknowledge my grief over _______. Help me to honor this loss, not by clinging to it, but by offering it to you. Heal what feels broken. Restore what still lingers in pain. And remind me that I do not grieve alone. Amen.”
Today’s Practice
Name three losses you’ve experienced that are not related to death.
For each loss, write one way it has shaped you—for better or worse.
Share one of these losses with a trusted friend, mentor, or counselor.
Find a psalm that resonates with your grief and meditate on it.
Closing Thought
Loss does not need permission to be real. It does not require a funeral to be felt. God’s presence is just as near in the quiet losses as in the loud ones.
So, let’s honor them. Let’s hold space for grief—not as something to fix but as something to acknowledge. And in that space, may we discover that we are never alone, even in the emptiness.