Few chapters in Scripture have impacted me as much as 2 Chronicles 20. God has met me, often through tears, in this passage — a passage that continues to show me how to respond in crisis. I’ve learned to throw myself on the Lord in trial, to trust him when I can’t see results, and to worship in the midst of seemingly impossible situations. It also contains one of my go-to verses, words I whisper throughout the day when I feel helpless and unsure, in need of wisdom and help.

This passage first came alive to me after my husband left our family and I didn’t know where to turn. A multitude of issues were at my doorstep, and I had no idea how I would survive the onslaught. And years later, with mounting health issues, I repeatedly turned to this passage when I felt desperate. Even now, each time I reread it, I remember God’s faithfulness in trials, which anchors me again on solid rock.

Embattled and Blessed

The account in 2 Chronicles 20 takes place around 850 BC, after the kingdom of Israel is divided. Jehoshaphat is king of Judah, a faithful king who fears the Lord. Without warning, the king is told that a massive coalition of his enemies is marching toward him. They are already close, leaving little time to prepare.

When Jehoshaphat hears the chilling news, he is afraid and immediately seeks the Lord. Then he assembles a group to pray and fast. He begins his public prayer by proclaiming God’s power and reminding the people of how God had delivered their ancestors. Next, Jehoshaphat reminds God of his promises to Israel — that if disaster should come upon them and they cry out to God in their affliction, he would hear and save them. Jehoshaphat ends his prayer by humbly admitting their utter helplessness, looking to God alone for deliverance.

While they are praying, the Spirit of God falls upon a Levite in the crowd, who says, “Thus says the Lord to you, ‘Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed at this great horde, for the battle is not yours but God’s’” (2 Chronicles 20:15). Then he tells them exactly where the enemy would be and that the Lord would be with them. After the people hear the Lord’s reassurance, they worship.

Early the next morning, after exhorting the people to believe in the Lord, Jehoshaphat appoints a group to sing praises to God, saying, “Give thanks to the Lord, for his steadfast love endures forever” (verse 21). These people, who have no weapon but praise, march ahead of the army to the battle.

As they are singing, their enemies annihilate each other. When they see what happened, Jehoshaphat and all the people take their enemies’ valuables and name that place the “Valley of Beracah” — the Valley of Blessing.

What begins with great fear from an unexpected threat ends with greater joy from an unexpected blessing. Drawing from this story, here are five ways we can seek blessing in our own battles when we feel like a multitude of troubles is pressing in.

1. Seek God first when you are afraid.

In crisis, our minds are flooded with fear, and we must deliberately disrupt our anxious thoughts. Jehoshaphat’s first reaction was fear, after which he immediately sought the Lord. We don’t need to be afraid of the battles that are in front of us, even those that seem insurmountable, because God will be with us and fight for us.

Don’t turn to Google over God or endlessly play out “What if . . . ?” scenarios in your head. Before anything else, ask God for wisdom, resources, and strength — and then look around to see how he’s providing.

2. Remind yourself of God and his promises.

It’s so easy to forget that we worship the God of the universe — the God who simply speaks a word, and worlds come into existence, creating what is seen out of what was unseen (Hebrews 11:3). Everything is at his disposal. Paging through Scripture, we can see how God has worked in the lives of his people throughout the ages. We can also look back and see how God has worked in our own lives — answering our cries, rushing to our aid, and comforting us in sorrow.

“I have no resources, no wisdom, and no hope without God. All I can do is keep my eyes on him.”

God has given us extraordinary promises in Scripture that we can plead back to him, reminding him of what he has pledged. He will never leave or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). He will take care of all our needs (Philippians 4:19). Nothing can separate us from his love (Romans 8:38–39). All things will work together for our good (Romans 8:28). And he has good plans for our future (Jeremiah 29:11).

Jehoshaphat didn’t presume God would save him from disaster, but rather that God would save him in the midst of disaster. He said, “If disaster comes upon us . . .” (2 Chronicles 20:9), implying that they would trust God in their affliction even if the worst happened. They would keep crying out to him, keep trusting him, confident that he would heal and deliver.

3. Keep your eyes on God, not circumstances.

When Jehoshaphat first cried out to God, he ended by saying, “We are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you” (2 Chronicles 20:12). This is my go-to prayer in suffering. I recognize my powerlessness over the situation, acknowledging that I have no resources, no wisdom, and no hope without God. All I can do is keep my eyes on him.

Our part is to tell God our need and to lay our struggle before him. His ways are so much higher than our ways, and he knows what is best. We don’t need to know where help will come from besides that it will come from him. If we keep looking at our problems rather than the presence of God in our problems, we will succumb to fear. So don’t focus on the circumstances around you, the wind and the waves bombarding you, because they are not stronger than our God. Nothing is too hard for him.

4. Worship where you are.

Don’t wait till you are delivered to worship. Jehoshaphat worshiped God before the battle. There was no deliverance, just the promise of God’s presence and his commitment to fight for them. We who know Christ have the same reassurance — if God is for us, no one can stand against us (Romans 8:31).

Jehoshaphat’s battle plan involved a choir going before the army, singers thanking God for his everlasting love. And they thanked him not for what he had done or what he would do, but rather for who he is. God inhabits the praises of his people; we can often feel his presence in a unique way when we worship. Even in the midst of trials, we can worship through simple acts like singing hymns, reading psalms aloud, or thanking God for his love. For Jehoshaphat, praise preceded the miracle, and the same is often true for us.

5. Remember that trials carry us to Christ.

Trials end in blessing as we seek God in them. For the people of Judah, the blessing was complete defeat of their enemies and treasure to carry home. For us in Christ, it will also be the defeat of our enemies. Our real enemy is Satan, who wants to destroy us by tempting us to doubt God in our struggle and to believe that he doesn’t care. Nothing could be further from the truth. God is with you in this trial, and as you cling to him, you will receive more blessings than you can carry. Just as the people of Judah named their place of victory the Valley of Blessing, we too can look for ways God is transforming our valleys of trouble into places of unexpected goodness, especially in giving us deeper intimacy with him.

I once thought that the greatest blessing in trial was deliverance, having my problems disappear and leaving me unscathed. But I have learned that the greater blessing in trial is deeper fellowship with Jesus, knowing his peace that surpasses understanding and his love that surpasses knowledge.

I don’t know where you are today, but if you feel overwhelmed by what you face, my prayer is that God will meet you as he met Jehoshaphat and has met me. Second Chronicles 20 has become a metaphor for my life, and when I look back over my trials, I see God’s mercy and grace written over every moment.

Audio Transcript

What makes someone spiritually dirty? This is an important question, and one born out of our Bible reading together, specifically in three Bible texts that a female listener to the podcast named Ivy is trying to put together and understand, texts coming up for us in the reading. Ivy writes this: “Pastor John, I never saw this connection until it was put together in the span of one week in the Navigators Bible Reading Plan. In Leviticus 5:2 and Leviticus 7:19–21, we read that touching unclean things makes one unclean. But Jesus completely changes this. He later says it is what comes out of us that makes us unclean. He says this in Matthew 15:18–20.

“I’m trying to put myself in a first-century Jewish mindset that was conditioned to think about clean and unclean things, what to touch and what not to touch. This seems like a radical change. Uncleanness is born inside of us! What caused such a major turnaround here, in what seems to me to be a fundamental redefinition of evil?”

I think this question is an example of making right observations from the Bible but drawing from them a wrong conclusion. Sorry about that. Let me see if I could gently nudge a correction.

It is right to observe that in the Old Testament there are laws against touching or eating certain things because they are ceremonially unclean. For example, if you touch a carcass, then you become unclean until the evening (Leviticus 11:24–25). Or, “Every animal that parts the hoof but is not cloven-footed or does not chew the cud is unclean to you. Everyone who touches them shall be unclean” (Leviticus 11:26).

So, there is such a thing in the Old Testament as external ceremonial contamination through the touching of something that is declared in the law to be unclean. That’s a true observation. These laws were one of God’s ways at that time of separating his people from the nations around them and emphasizing his distinctness, his holiness.

It is also true that Jesus spoke about becoming impure because of what the heart produces from within — for example, Matthew 15:18: “What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person [makes them unclean].” So, that too is a true observation. So far, so good.

Purity Across the Covenants

But the mistake is in drawing the conclusion that in the Old Testament impurity was only external, while in the New Testament impurity is internal. That’s a mistake for two reasons.

In the first place, it contrasts the wrong things. Instead of contrasting Old Testament ceremonial uncleanness with New Testament moral uncleanness, the contrast is between Old Testament ceremonial uncleanness and the declaration by Jesus that there is no ceremonial uncleanness anymore: “He declared all foods clean” (Mark 7:19). In other words, Jesus does away with the Old Testament ceremonial cleanness and uncleanness. It’s not replaced by internal moral cleanness and uncleanness, but rather by the removal of ceremonial defilement entirely. It doesn’t exist in the church anymore.

“There was a real faith, a real obedience of faith, a real holiness in the saints of the Old Testament.”

The other reason it’s a mistake to say that the Old Testament impurity was external while the New Testament impurity is internal is that already in the Old Testament there was internal purity and impurity. It was already there. In both the New and the Old Testaments, there is internal moral purity or impurity. That’s not a contrast between the Old and New Testaments. So, in the Old Testament, there was both ceremonial external uncleanness and moral internal uncleanness, whereas in the New Testament, the ceremonial aspect of uncleanness is done away with, and the moral dimension is what’s left.

Now, that may seem like not a big deal, but it is a big deal because of the implications of it. Let me try to draw them out.

Spirit of Old Testament Saints

This is a bigger deal than we might think, because what it implies is that, already in the Old Testament, before Christ had died for our sins and before the unique outpouring of the power of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the forgiving work of the cross and the transforming work of the Spirit were already active in the saints of the Old Testament.

That’s huge for the way we read our Bibles, the way we appropriate patterns and commands and illustrations and so on. Let me say it again: the forgiving effect of Christ’s death and the transforming effect of God’s Spirit were already at work in the saints of the Old Testament. In other words, the reality of internal purity or impurity was known, and the purity was required in the Old Testament — internal purity, not just external ceremonial purity.

The Old Testament knew about the deep internal reality of original sin, for example. David says, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 51:5). In other words, the saints of the Old Testament knew that their bad behavior came from inside, not outside. So, Proverbs 4:23 says, “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.” That’s just like what Jesus said.

And David prayed, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10). He expected that to happen. It did happen. And Psalm 24:3–4 says, “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart.” Now, that did not mean nobody. It was possible through prayer, through repentance, through forgiveness, through sacrifice to get a pure heart before God.

Born Again Then and Now

God was at work in the Old Testament among the faithful remnant of Israel, transforming their hearts and leading them in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake (Psalm 23:3). For example, in 1 Chronicles 29:17–18, David says, “Now I have seen your people, who are present here, offering freely and joyously to you. O Lord . . . keep forever such purposes and thoughts in the hearts of your people, and direct their hearts toward you.” That’s amazing. That’s exactly what he does today for the saints and what he did then for the saints.

So, here it is again in 2 Chronicles 30:12. It says, “The hand of God was also on Judah to give them one heart to do what the king and the princes commanded by the word of the Lord.” In other words, God was at work in the hearts of his people to give them the kind of disposition and heart to be trusting and obedient toward him.

This is why Jesus — at least, this is my interpretation of Jesus in John 3 — was amazed in speaking to Nicodemus that he didn’t understand that you must be born again to see the kingdom of God. Well, people saw the kingdom of God in the Old Testament. They saw God; they knew the reign of God; they walked in holiness before God — the saints did. That was true in the Old Testament (“You must be born again”) and in the New Testament.

Nobody can overcome their unbelief, hardness of heart without the sovereign work of the Spirit, whenever they live — four thousand years ago or twenty minutes ago. So, Jesus said, “Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again’” (John 3:7). Nicodemus says to him, “How can these things be?” (John 3:9). And Jesus — I can see him rolling his eyes or throwing up his hands and saying, “Are you a teacher in Israel, and you don’t understand what I’m talking about when I talk about the new birth? What have you been reading?” (see John 3:10).

That’s my paraphrase of Jesus. In other words, “Surely you see that this is how spiritual deadness was overcome among the saints in Israel.” They can’t do it themselves. It had to be done for them, just like today.

Old Patterns for Today

We can see, then, that there’s more riding on this question than it seemed at first. There was a real faith, a real obedience of faith, a real holiness in the saints of the Old Testament. And that is not possible (Romans 8:7) except that Jesus died for their sins in the future, counted backward, and the Holy Spirit was at work overcoming their sinful bent.

So, when we read the beautiful statements — for example, in the Psalms — of genuine love for God, obedience to God, delight in God’s word, we don’t have to deny any of that, as though such things were not possible in the Old Testament. We can take these saints as wonderful patterns for our lives and be stirred up by them to love God the way they did.

Has your desire for God withered? Is your affection for Jesus a fading flame? In the fight of faith, have you been mostly in retreat? Let me tell you a story.

In a house with three kids under three, few things happen the same way every day. Scheduled flexibility is the name of the game. Yet a few things happen so consistently they might as well be natural law — meltdowns moments before getting in the car, blowouts in brand-new clothes, senseless and ceaseless crying at the witching hour. And this.

My three-year-old son enjoys playing with blocks. He builds with the razor attention of an architect — for about ten minutes. Then interest wanes, and he wanders in search of new adventures.

However, without fail, the more fiery of my ten-month-olds finds her way to those lovely white pine blocks, picks a random one, and begins trying to gum the thing to sawdust. When Strider sees his sister holding that block — a block that failed to hold his attention moments earlier — well, I’m sure you can guess what happens next. The rivalry is real. And for a time, that pine square becomes more valuable than a hoard of gold beneath a dragon, and the war that ensues only slightly less intense than those in Middle-earth.

Now, how does this dynamic work? And more immediately important to you, what do toy blocks and tyke battles have to do with your dimmed desire for God?

You Imitate Someone

To answer the first question, Aurora’s desire for the block inflames Strider’s desire because we inevitably imitate those around us. Man is a mimetic creature.

Man is made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27). We reflect God in his world, in part, by mimicking him. Paul makes the connection explicit: “Be imitators [mimētai] of God” (Ephesians 5:1). Man is an imitative creature all the way down. It’s what we were made for.

But God designed imitating others to be a means of imitating him. Holy imitation is a community project. Paul in particular loves godly copycats: “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:11; 4:16). Because Paul shows us what it looks like to mimic Christ, we should mimic Paul. But he doesn’t stop with apostles. In Philippians, he exhorts his readers to imitate him and all who imitate him (Philippians 3:17). The writer of Hebrews doubles down on this mimetic chain, calling us to imitate godly leaders and all who walk by faith (Hebrews 6:12; 13:7).

A biblical principle serves as the concrete beneath these exhortations: when it comes to imitation, the question is not whether but what. John warns, “Do not imitate evil but imitate good” (3 John 11), implying that imitation is inevitable. Again, the question is not whether you will imitate — you will. But what will you imitate? Evil or good? Or better yet, whom will you imitate?

Mimetic Desire

We need to add one more piece to this puzzle before we return to our desire for God. From what I’ve said, you might imagine that imitation is always intentional and mainly pertains to actions. But we are far more imitative than that.

Proverbs especially emphasizes that we imitate others unconsciously. Thus, virtues and vices are contagious. To paraphrase Proverbs 13:20, wise he ends who wise befriends, and Proverbs 14:7, from a fool flee or like a fool be. Why? Because you cannot avoid imitating. “Bad company . . .,” as they say (1 Corinthians 15:33).

But the mimicry goes even deeper. We imitate the desires of others. Catholic philosopher René Girard calls this mimetic desire. After assiduously observing Scripture, society, and literature, Girard noticed that almost all our desires are suggested, given, mediated by others. We look at what others desire to learn what we should desire. So, we want most things because others want them first. In short, Girard concludes that desires require someone to model them.

Modern advertising exploits that insight. By showing an appealing person valuing some product, they model a desire for you. But this tactic is as old as the garden. Satan — the first advertiser — leveraged contagious desire to get Eve to ape his own serpentine lust for divinity. Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery because he made Daddy’s favor irresistibly attractive. And, of course, Strider, like a moth to flame, was drawn to Aurora’s block because her desire transformed it into the world’s most desirable block.

These examples show that when the object of mimetic desire cannot be shared (or is perceived to be withheld), envy and rivalry result. However, if it can be shared, mimetic desire forges deep friendships and reinforces our loves.

Company You Keep

Now, I hope you see how our irrepressible impulse to imitate — especially to mimic desires — connects with desire for God. If mimetic desire shapes our lesser longings — what we wear, what we drink, what we drive, where we eat, where we go to school — why would it not affect our longing for God?

“Perhaps you don’t desire God because you rarely see anyone else who desires God.”

Perhaps you don’t desire God because you rarely see anyone else who desires God. Just maybe, the pine block has lost its luster in your eyes because no one is trying to chew on it. To put it another way, the company you keep will significantly shape what you long for. You will look like whom you hang with. What you want is a function of whom you observe.

C.S. Lewis identified this principle as the very heartbeat of friendship.

Friendship arises out of mere Companionship when two or more of the companions discover that they have in common some insight or interest or even taste which the others do not share and which, till that moment, each believed to be his own unique treasure (or burden). The typical expression of opening Friendship would be something like, “What? You too?” (The Four Loves, 83)

For Lewis, friendship flowers from a shared love — like soccer or storytelling or theology. When that love is recognized and expressed — “What? You too?” — the shared desire is mutually reinforcing, multiplied and galvanized. Yet Lewis warns that this mimetic effect has a double edge because “the common taste or vision or point of view which is discovered need not always be a nice one” (100). The N.I.C.E. shared an urge that would loose the very gates of hell.

Yet the danger arises precisely because of the staggering goodness of friendship — a goodness that can give us more of God. When you surround yourself with those whose love for God burns bright, the desire for him is contagious. Stand near fire, and your clothes will catch. And with each friend added, the conflagration grows into white-hot worship because every person has unique kindling to contribute. Christian community is a mutual adoration society. You need other toddlers to cherish the block.

Show me the company you keep, and I’ll tell you what you soon will want.

Spotlight Your Models

So, saint, whom do you surround yourself with? Who shows you desiring God? Who are your models?

Luke Burgis (another philosopher) warns, “There are always models of desire. If you don’t know yours, they are probably wreaking havoc in your life. . . . Models are most powerful when they are hidden” (Wanting, 21). For the sake of your joy in God, put a spotlight on your models. Interrogate the source of your desires (or lack thereof).

To help you name your models of desire — both good and bad — consider these four categories.

1. Digital Company

Where do you hang out in Internet land? Who are your digital models? Who’s in your ear, and what gets your eye?

The Net acts as a mimetic amplifier. Instead of two toddlers desiring the same block, digital media enables thousands, even millions, to fight over the same status. The only difference is adults try to mask the mimesis my children do not.

Social media, especially, is an engine of desire. Perhaps your joy in God feels diseased because digital envy is rotting your bones away (Proverbs 14:30). Perhaps you don’t desire God because the podcaster you spend hours with each week doesn’t either.

2. Dominant Company

Who gets the lion’s share of your time? What friends are you around most often, and what is your common bond — your “You too?” Lewis not only knew but demonstrated how soul-shaping a pervasive coterie of friends can be. His group, called “The Inklings,” shared two loves — Christianity and imaginative writing — and the world still rocks in the wake.

Who are the most present models of desire in your life? Family, coworkers, classmates? Do they sharpen your ache for God or dull it? Is the dominant company in your life co-laborers for your joy, “exhorting one another every day” to treasure the triune God (Hebrews 3:12–14)? Mature men and women are models who show us not only how to live but, more importantly, what to love. And these models are not limited to the living.

3. Dead Company

Do you keep company with the dead? And if so, who and what desires do they model? If you are a reader, dead company matters immensely. Books put us into conversation with their authors, and many of the most important books put us into conversation with authors no longer living. They teach us — often explicitly — what to yearn for.

The great benefit of the dead is they often desire differently than modernity. And their deep longings can expose our own as tumbleweeds. Here’s Lewis again: “The real way of mending a man’s taste is not to degenerate his present favorites but to teach him how to enjoy something better” (Experiment in Criticism, 112). The likes of Augustine and Austen, Bunyan and Bavinck, Dante and Donne, Calvin and Coleridge tutor our tastes — and preeminently, that inspired cohort of the dead who penned the Scriptures.

4. Divine Company

Speaking of taste, if you want to develop a hunger for God, nothing will stoke that desire more than keeping company with God himself. The triune God is the ultimate model of our desires, and no one can love God more than God loves God. Unlike all other forms of mediation that work on us externally, God mediates his own desires to us from within. He gives us “the desires of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:17).

But the process is not automatic. We become like God as we see God, and we see God most fully in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18–4:6). We are made and remade to imitate him (Romans 8:29). His desires for God and good are perfect, clear, fiery — and contagious. Jesus is our great mimetic model. As we learn to fix our eyes on him, his joy will kindle ours (Hebrews 12:1–2) and start a wildfire of holy desire.

For weeks, our two kids practiced reciting verses for the National Bible Bee’s Proclaim Day. When they finally took the stage, their hands trembling and the high ceiling dwarfing them, the sound of Scripture on their voices moved us to applause and thanksgiving. As the clapping died down, however, our 11-year-old son, Jack, surprised us by climbing onto the stage a second time.

“I want to share a verse that I find very comforting,” he said. “We read this a lot when we had a friend who was passing away.” He then recited 2 Corinthians 4:16–18 from memory:

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

My husband and I stared at one another in awe. We hadn’t practiced these verses with Jack. Rather, we’d read them during family worship as a dear friend of ours was dying in hospice, and by God’s kindness, Jack had harbored them in his heart. God had worked through a moment of heartache in our family to strengthen our son’s faith, and in doing so, he reminded all of us of his grace amid loss.

Guiding Children Through the Valley

When a loved one dies and grief swallows us up, we may struggle to discern how to guide our children. Their hearts are so tender, we think. Won’t the harsh realities of death bruise them? We wonder if we should suppress our own sorrow to avoid upsetting them. How much should we say? How much should we conceal?

As a retired trauma surgeon, I have sat beside dying friends and loved ones with unusual frequency. Walking through those experiences while raising children has highlighted the need for discernment and sensitivity in such delicate matters. Kids’ hearts are vulnerable to breaking, and we need to handle them gently. We must follow our Lord’s leading not to break a bruised reed or quench a smoldering wick (Isaiah 42:3; Matthew 12:20).

And yet, while our natural instinct as parents is to shelter our kids from pain, shepherding rarely means sequestering. Our kids will experience death at some point in their lives. Their time with us in the home provides a precious opportunity to give them a Christian framework for death and to model a response that emphasizes our hope in Christ. God can work through death and grief to draw his beloved closer to himself (Psalm 34:18; Romans 8:28) — even the littlest souls entrusted to our care.

How do we navigate the shadowy valley with our kids? How do we raise their eyes to the things that are unseen and eternal? Time and again, I’ve seen God’s grace and mercy at work in my kids’ lives during times of loss. Drawing from those experiences, I humbly offer the following five suggestions to help guide you as you shepherd children through loss.

1. Create space for discussion.

Jack was four when our friend David entered hospice, and before bed one night, I could tell his thoughts troubled him. When I inquired, he asked how David had developed emphysema and why death happens. Then he requested we see David every day until his passing — which we did.

Meanwhile, after the funeral of our friend Carolyn, our nine-year-old daughter, Christie, seemed uncharacteristically quiet. With some gentle prodding, she admitted that standing in the cemetery during the interment scared her. We had a long discussion afterward about how popular culture falsely portrays graveyards as places of horror, and we emphasized the truth: Carolyn was with Jesus, and only her body remained on the earth.

“The problem of sin has a solution. For now we groan, but Christ has swallowed up death in victory.”

As these anecdotes reveal, children wrestle with big questions and bigger feelings. After a loved one’s death, they may not voice troubling thoughts right away, but their silence doesn’t mean they aren’t wrestling. To best love your children during moments of loss, create space for them to talk with you and to share their fears, sorrows, and concerns. Check in with them before bed. Pause during family worship. Above all, invite them to talk with you and to ask questions. Give them permission to explore their complex thoughts and feelings with you. Assure them no questions are shameful and that their concerns won’t worsen your grief. Create opportunities for open dialogue in a loving context.

2. Normalize grief as a time to weep.

As parents, we rush to comfort our children the moment waterworks start. Given such a tendency, when kids see us crying, they may feel the same impulse and experience distress when our tears don’t stop.

Rather than suppress your tears or abandon your kids to process their emotions alone, walk them through the process of grief. Help them understand that sorrow and crying are normal God-given responses to the death of a loved one. To help cement your words into their minds, tie them to God’s words. Discuss how there is “a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). Review how Job tore his robes and fell to the ground in mourning when his children died (Job 1:20), how David wept over Absalom (2 Samuel 19:4), and how even Jesus wept when Lazarus died (John 11:35).

Validate your children’s feelings as they grieve. Especially when they’re young, children may not feel sorrow at the loss of a loved one and worry their response is somehow wrong when everyone else is sad. Come alongside your kids and help them understand that grief is complex. It ebbs and flows, affects everyone differently, and stirs up emotions that may vary dramatically. Normalize confusion, sorrow, and tangled feelings — all of which we see in the psalms of lament (such as Psalms 22, 77, 130) as believers struggle with their grief.

3. Frame death as a consequence of the fall.

No matter the age of the person pondering them, questions about death cut to the heart of our fallenness. Illness afflicts us because sin stains all of God’s creation (Genesis 3:17–19). Death is the wages of our sin and comes to all (Romans 5:12; 6:23). It is grim, dark, and painful because it reflects a corruption of God’s original design (Genesis 2:9).

Speaking openly about death as a necessary consequence of the fall helps kids to cope when it strikes their own circles. They learn that death is a part of life in this fallen world, something to accept rather than to fear. Most importantly, when we explain death to our kids in the context of the fall, we can point them to Christ. The problem of sin has a solution. For now we groan, but Christ has swallowed up death in victory (1 Corinthians 15:55–57).

4. Model trust in God.

When possible, reflect with your kids on God’s sovereignty and provision in the face of death. Model trust in him even when understanding fails. Lean into the truth that his ways are higher than our ways (Isaiah 55:9).

Psalm 23 is an excellent passage to read together. Although we all will walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we need not fear because God will be with us (Psalm 23:4). Elsewhere, he has promised never to leave us or forsake us (Deuteronomy 31:8). Our times are in his hands (Psalm 31:15). His word assures us that nothing — not even death! — can separate us from his love for us in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:38–39).

5. Point to our hope in Christ.

For the believer, Jesus’s sacrifice and resurrection have transformed death from the last enemy (1 Corinthians 15:26) to the path to our heavenly home. “I am the resurrection and the life,” Jesus told Martha. “Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” (John 11:25–26). Although we are all wasting away, our sufferings and death are but a light momentary affliction preparing us for our eternal dwelling with God (2 Corinthians 4:16–18; Revelation 21:3).

Point your kids to this truth early and often. As you wipe the tears from their cheeks, remind them that although it’s right to cry after loss, we also cleave to joy. We cling to the truth that a loved one with faith in Christ has quit the travails of this sinful world and now rejoices before God’s throne, where death, pain, and crying are no more (Revelation 21:3).

Some children worry that loved ones who didn’t attend church or profess faith in Jesus will not be in heaven. In such moments, point them to God’s faithfulness, mercy, and sovereignty. Teach them about the thief on the cross, to whom God granted salvation even in his dying moments (Luke 23:43). Remind them that while we may be uncertain about a loved one’s faith, God is faithful, just, and forgiving (1 John 1:9), and we can trust his good and perfect will wholeheartedly, no matter what questions trouble us.

After our Bible Bee experience, Jack elaborated on his fondness for 2 Corinthians 4:16–18. “It helps me to remember we have hope because of Jesus,” he said. His words capture the answer for all of us — from age 0 to 99 — when death strikes: faith in Christ. Solace, peace, and rest reside in him (Matthew 11:28). Even as we weep in the face of death, by Christ’s wounds we are healed (Isaiah 53:5).