Separation Anxiety
I literally couldn’t breathe. It was an overwhelming feeling. It came at a place and in a time I was not expecting. This is just how grief goes.
It was a Wednesday morning and I was in the Kroger supermarket in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee. I had gone back for a visit to see my mom and grandparents. It had been at least six months since my father had been taken from us by a sudden and unexpected death. But I was reliving the anxiety of the separation all over again.
If you are not a spring chicken you probably know about the senior discount at Kroger. If you are sixty or older it used to be that on Wednesdays you could receive money off on groceries. My parents always believed in getting the best deal for their money. So Wednesdays became a day on which they would shop together.
I don’t even remember why I went in Kroger on that day. But I do remember walking down the aisle and seeing all of these older couples together buying groceries. I had a brief and instant moment of realization that almost made me fall on the ground. My parents were supposed to be one of those couples! My father was supposed to be here and be with my mother together in our family! They were supposed to grow old together and he was supposed to be here for us! But he was gone. It took my breath away. I gasped. I could not get any air. I began to cry. And it had been six months – six months!
Recently one of our friends experienced the death of two siblings within a short time. To her they were more than siblings, they were like two of her parents. She lost her mother when she was very young and these older siblings basically raised her from infancy. Her grief is great because there is true anxiety in being separated from the people you don’t know how to live without.
As we talked in the church foyer I could sympathize with the feelings she was experiencing. That person you loved and were so close to is gone. You talked to them every day. You keep picking up the phone to call them but then you remember you can’t. They are not coming back. The feeling of emptiness and loss is powerful and overwhelming. This is the true definition of bereavement.
As I continued to talk with my dear friend I remembered the experience in Kroger. And then I came to a deeper and more meaningful understanding of a truth that was both spiritual in nature and certainly more important. In this life we have time to cope with the grief. We have a hope of heaven. We have a knowledge of the rest and comfort of our departed loved ones. By the grace of God we have the promise of an eternal reunion.
But hell will not be this way. We will be separated from God, from our family and friends, and from every ounce of joy that we have had or could ever know. The anxiety of this separation is a large part of what makes hell so unimaginably terrible. The moments of loss we experience in temporary seasons here will in hell be an eternal reality that never lessens in its sting and in its sorrow.
Our physical death is not a choice. Sin has sealed its coming since the fall. We can do nothing about it. The seasons of grief that will come to us because of physical death are a part of life. But to be spiritually dead, this is our own predicament. To be separated from God is a reality no person should ever want to experience. It leads to a whole new and different kind of anxiety that desperately calls for a solution.
This is why Jesus came. This is why He died and rose again. This is why His sacrifice demands a response.
“…when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” – 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9
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