How Close is God in Your Grief? 4 Ways He Shows Us He’s Near

There’s a verse that has played a pretty important role in my grief journey. Once you read it, I’m sure you will probably agree. It’s a promise that we can hold on to when we’re broken, when we’re grieving.

But recently, I heard a different take on this verse that just blew my mind. And I can’t wait to share it with you. Let’s begin exploring how God is close to you in your grief.

How Close is God in Your Grief? 

Psalm 34:18 says “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted.” 

That’s the scripture that has really ministered to me in my grief because I have felt it. I felt how close God got to me in my grief when my heart was broken, when I was hurting. 

He was closer to me after I lost Sam than before, and I never really thought about that. I just knew it was true because it was true in my own journey. 

I’ve used this verse to help other people who have lost someone close to them, and I tell them, “God is close to the brokenhearted. He is.” I have felt it in my own journey. 

But recently, I heard a pastor talk about this verse, and it kind of blew my mind because, like I said, I never really thought about it before. I just knew it was true. But what he said made so much sense and really even ministered to my heart.

So let’s dive into this new revelation of this verse and 4 ways we can know God is close to us in our grief.

Would You Rather Listen To This Post?

APPLE // SPOTIFY // ALL OTHER PLATFORMS

We know God is omnipotent, right? That means he’s everywhere. 

Psalm 139:7-10 says, “Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend into heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there; if I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me and your right hand shall help me.”

So, no matter where we go, God is there. We can never get away from God. He is everywhere. 

If He is everywhere, if He’s omnipotent, if He’s in all parts of His creation…

How can He be closer to us when we’re broken and grieving? 

He’s already everywhere. If someone is everywhere, how can they be closer? If God has filled every part of this Earth, how can He be closer to us? 

Could it be that He reserves a little part of Himself just for us when we’re broken and grieving? Something we don’t see when we’re not hurting?

When I heard the pastor say this, I lost it. I just cried and cried because that was it. That was what I felt after I lost Sam.

After I lost Sam I felt that part of God that He holds in reserve for when we’re hurting, when we’re broken, when our hearts are shattered. 

That’s when He pulls us a little bit closer to Himself because He knows that we need that specific part of Him – the part that says, “I am here. I know you’re hurting, but I am here.”

I have felt that nearness of the Father. Close to me, close to me in my pain, in my grief. 

When I looked back, there were four things that I saw in my own journey – ways that He has shown me that He is close to me. I wanted to bring you those today in this post as an encouragement to you, in case you needed it, to know that He is with you. He’s extra close when you’re broken, when you’re hurting, when you’re grieving.

His Kindness

The first way that He shows us that He is near in our grief is through His kindness. Psalm 17:7 says, “Show your marvelous loving kindness by your right hand.”

How does God show His kindness to us in our grief? 

I believe it’s not the really huge, big signs of His kindness. I believe it’s in the little ways throughout our day-to-day life that He shows us His kindness. 

>>It’s in that beautiful sunrise or sunset that paints the sky in orange and pink and takes your breath away. 
>>It’s that breeze that blows when you’re outside and you’re so hot, and it refreshes you. 
>>It’s when you’re out to eat and you go to pay for your meal, and you’re told that someone has already covered it for you. 
>>It’s that call or that text from a friend exactly when you need it.

All of these little ways, I believe, are God showing you His kindness in your grief, in your pain.

Kisses From Heaven

The second way I believe that God shows us that He’s close to us in our grief is what I like to call “Kisses from Heaven.” It’s those little signs that happen throughout your days that show that your child is still with you. 

I have had a lot of these little Kisses from Heaven throughout the past 7 years since we lost Sam.

Here are a few:

My lineage is Irish, and Sam latched on to my Irish heritage. He had white skin, red hair, and freckles. 

One of the things that you think of when you think of the Irish people are clovers. We lost Sam in July, so that next spring, I went outside my house one day, and our entire yard was full of clovers.

I mean, we’ve had a few in there, but I’ve never seen that many clovers, and I have not seen them since that year. That was our first spring season after losing Sam, and I believe that was just a sign, a little sign, a little kiss from Heaven that Sam is still with us.

Another thing that happened right after we lost Sam is I saw his name everywhere. There was one time we went to Cracker Barrel to eat, and the kids got a kids’ menu that had little pictures of cartoon kids. One of those kids on that sheet was a little boy with red hair, freckles, and the name underneath was Sam. 

I can’t even make this stuff up. 

This is just another way that God shows us that He’s near.

He Understands

The third way that God shows us He’s near in our grief is the fact that He understands. Jesus understands our grief. 

Isaiah 53:3 says, “He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” 

You see, Jesus understands how we feel. 

When Jesus died on the cross, the very people that He took that sin for, that He died for, turned their back on Him. They’re the ones that betrayed Him and crucified Him.

While He was here on this Earth, Jesus experienced grief. When Lazarus died, that was Jesus’ friend. Mary and Martha, those were His friends. When Jesus went to go see Mary and Martha after Lazarus had died, He went knowing that He was going to raise Lazarus from the dead. He was going to solve all of their problems.

I used to wonder why He cried because He knew, “I’m about to come raise him from the dead. He’s about to come back, and all of your grief, all of your pain, all of your sorrow will be gone.” 

So why did He cry?

This was one of the revelations that God gave me after I lost Sam. He cried because His friends were crying. He hurt because they were hurting. He grieved with them. 

And so, you see, Jesus understands. He understands how you’re feeling because He too has felt it.

His Love

The fourth way that God shows us that He’s close is through His love. You see, circling back to the verse about God being close to the brokenhearted and how He reserves a little piece of Himself just for people who are grieving and broken, I believe He also reserves a part of His love that we would never see if we weren’t going through pain and grief so deep. 

I believe that He matches the depth of our grief with that same depth of His love. That’s the only way that we will ever heal from what we’ve had to go through, that our hearts will ever be put back together.

I know you feel this. When I lost Sam, my heart wasn’t just broken, it shattered into a million pieces. There is NO.WAY. that my heart could have been put back together enough to where I could keep living, where I could love again, if it wasn’t for the strength of God’s love. 

He was not afraid to get down with me in my brokenness, in my grief, in my sadness. He got right down there with me, and He sat with me, and He held me while I cried, while I grieved, while I was broken. He sat there and held me. 

But then He didn’t leave me there. He picked me up, started carrying me through day by day. And as He was carrying me, His love was picking up those millions of little pieces of my heart. And day by day, as I kept walking and living, he was slowly healing my heart. 

All these ways that I’ve talked about that He shows us that He’s near is just another piece of our heart that’s put back together. It’s only through Him. He is the only way. His love, His faithfulness, His kindness, His goodness, His strength, it’s the only way that our hearts could ever even remotely come close to being put back together again. 

Now, I know my heart will never be whole again. There will always be a Sam-sized piece of my heart that’s missing because he’s not here. 

The only way my heart would be completely whole again is if I had him here, and I won’t have that until heaven. So, there is hope. You will have your entire heart put back together again when we get home, when we get home with Jesus and our babies who are there waiting for us. 

But your heart can be healed and put back together enough where you can keep living, you can love again, you can laugh again, you can feel joy again. And the only way that’s possible is through God and His love. 

So, it is my prayer that right now, in the middle of your brokenness, in the middle of your grief, in the middle of your pain, that you feel how close God is to you. 

That you feel His kindness, you feel His goodness, you feel His strength carrying you, and you feel His love putting your heart back together, piece by piece. 

He will never leave you. He will walk with you every step for the rest of your life until we get to heaven. That glorious day where we can see our child again and that final piece of our heart will be put back, and we can exhale… 

Because we’re home.

More Ideas for Healing From Grief

PIN FOR LATER ⤵️