Beauty From Ashes: Finding Hope in the Midst of DevastationSample

Sometimes life hurts. Sometimes life is hard. Sometimes life can be dark. And it leaves its mark—like ashes of grief—in the deepest parts of our souls, where no one but God can really see.

You may have felt that way if you have ever experienced the loss of a loved one, been betrayed, mistreated, abused, or walked through the fire of hard situations and wondered if you’d come out the other side. So many of us have wondered if we would come out the other side of our loved one’s addiction.

Yes, it’s true: life is not always happy. It’s not always easy. It deals harshly sometimes; it seems unfair, and we may wonder where God is or why He didn’t stop that difficult event or illness from happening.

Job knew this feeling. This righteous man who loved and honored God yet lost everything. He lost his children, his possessions, everything he had … even his health. It crumbled around him, all he held dear. And he knew without God, he was nothing. So we find him in the beginning of the book of Job: “...he sat in the ashes.” (Job 2:8)

Daniel knew this feeling. He and his people had suffered under captivity, so he prayed to God on behalf of his people, that God would have mercy. He repented, and confessed his own sin, his deep need for Him. He knew where true strength came from. “Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes.” (Daniel 9:3)

Tamar knew this feeling. She had trusted and yet was betrayed. David’s own daughter had been taken advantage of, assaulted, and left on her own—alone, with no hope for her future—to pick up the broken pieces of shattered life. “And Tamar put ashes on her head and tore the long robe that she wore. And she laid her hand on her head and went away, crying aloud as she went.” (2 Samuel 13:19)

In the midst of knowing this feeling, all three of these saints may have wondered like we sometimes do.

Where was God in it all? Where is He now, among our deep grief, crime, captivity, illness, disease, death, shattered hope, and broken dreams?

I have felt all those things throughout my life. I have overwhelmingly felt them as the daughter of an addict and then later as the wife of an addict. After I lost my mom to addiction, I lived life in that grief for years. Then when addiction took over my husband’s life all the dreams I had envisioned for our family were broken and all hope was lost. I felt like God had forgotten me and left me in the middle of it all. But, as we journey together for the next few days, we’ll see there is still beauty from the ashes of shame, heartache, grief, and the unknown.