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He heals the broken-hearted
and binds up their wounds.
Psalms 147:3 (ESV)

Twenty-five years, one month, and twenty days of wedded bliss, on top of nine long years of engagement. At age 50, I lost my darling husband to the dreaded COVID19. I was with him until his very last breath.

Some say I was blessed to be with him because others were not as blessed- they never saw their spouses throughout their final moments. I was advised to say goodbye, but I was full of hope and faith with many people praying and claiming for God’s miracle. I didn’t consider myself blessed then, because I saw him suffer. I know, he was thinking about us, about our two children.

It has been five months since he passed, and the pain is still very raw. Many people already expected me to have moved on quickly because I am a pastor’s wife and were expecting me to have Elisabeth Eliot’s faith, but I did not. My faith was tested and is still being tested. I am still struggling with words and thoughts that are not in, of, and for God. He is still dealing with me until this very day, but I can feel His grace as He has not given up on me yet.

I believe I went through all possible emotions with grief, including questioning God. We had plans for the church. My husband was seven weeks short for his third year as pastor of the church. This is where we got saved, fell in love, got married, and had our children. He was a mission pastor in our country, to the Maximum-Security Compound of the National Bilibid Prison, ministering to the convicted criminals for almost ten years while at the same time also ministering to the largest rehabilitation center for those suffering from substance abuse.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Isaiah 55:8-9 (ESV)

These verses reminded me that God’s thoughts and ways are higher, just as heaven is higher than the earth. I know this is an answer to my “why”, and no matter how much I try to understand, I will not be able to.

My children have been my inspiration and are the ones keeping me from giving up on life. I appreciate how they patiently take care of me and endure my explosive emotions. They remind me of the goodness of God and that I still have them, and they cannot afford to lose me. Their father would be proud of them. He said once, “Many of us may not have possessions for our children to inherit. The best inheritance that we could give them is a godly inheritance.” I can imagine him smiling from heaven.

Grief is selfish. I failed to see my children grieve and suffer. They told me they are trying to be strong because they knew how much I loved their father. I have to acknowledge that I need God. Although I know that he already knows, I need to express it; my feelings are valid, and I must not allow the pain to hide the uprightness of who He is. I must recognize that God, in His mercy, stands by silently as we agonize. He is simply waiting until we realize that we have nowhere to run but to Him.

Every day is different, and that is what I have been dealing with. I need to trust God and cling to Him because, after all, He is our comfort in sorrow, and He absorbs the sting of death because He already paid the price.

I know that I will change and grow from this experience; I do not move on from it but move forward with it. I hope to be smiling through pain in due time as the Lord is slowly dealing with me as I watch our children grow and mature and become independent on their own.

God heals the broken-hearted. Praise be to Him!