Fear of the New Year
You made it to the end of the year, dear ones. You may not have thought that it was possible. You may not have wanted to even, but here we all are.
We stand on the precipice of a New Year. A year our beautiful child will never see. A year they never lived in, walked in, laughed in. A year we have to live without them.
We want to freeze time. We want to go back. This year we are leaving may be full of the worst pain we have ever known, but if it was a year where our child still lived, we would happily stay. We could play our “Groundhog Day” card and start again on January 1st … even knowing what the year would bring. Even knowing the ax would fall.
At least we would have the gift of time for one more minute, one more moment.
And yet, as we all know painfully well, time marches on. Perhaps at first, this brings relief. We think, “Let me just get through this pain. Let me survive until this agony is over.” But as time continues and hours, days, weeks, months go by, a terrifying possibility sinks into our bones:
What if this agony doesn’t leave? What if this hole blown into the center of my heart is here to stay? What if there is no amount of time that will take away the pain of grieving my child?
I may fear the new year because there is just. more. pain. And because my child is not there, I feel like I am leaving them behind. It is my job – written into the fiber of my being – to stay with them and protect them, and I can’t. There is no way to stop the forward motion that pulls me away from when we shared the present moment together.
This is a complex agony:
I feel guilt. I feel sorrow. I feel crushed. I feel scared. I feel angry. I feel confused.
I feel afraid that as I enter 2024 without them, I will move farther from the place where our love lived. Where our relationship was. Where I could find and feel and touch and remember them.
And yet …
These are two of the most beautiful and important words in scripture and they can help us in this terrible pain of missing our child. The definitions of “yet” are vast:
in addition, even now, on top of everything else, eventually, still, at the same time
And yet …
The book of Habakkuk offers us hope in the midst of our torment, fear, loss, and destruction:
For though the fig tree blossom not nor fruit be on the vines,
Though the yield of the olive fail and the terraces produce no nourishment, Though the flocks disappear from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls,
Yet will I rejoice in the Lord and exult in my saving God.
God, my Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet swift as those of hinds and enables me to go upon the heights. (Habakkuk 3: 17-19)
Yet.
The author of Sacred Scripture lays out a pretty bleak scenario: No figs, no fruit, no olives, no nourishment, no flocks, no herds.
Remember Psalm 128:3? We are told our children are like olive plants.
No olives means no more children. This passage speaks directly to the heart of a grieving parent who has lost not just the life of our child, but the life of our own spirit in our devastating grief.
It is directly into this dark, terrifying place that the Lord brings that tiny, powerful word: YET.
Even Now.
On top of everything else.
In addition to your grief.
At the same time.
In precisely this place of destruction and loss, we are invited to rejoice. We are given the promise of strength. We are given the prophecy that there will be “heights” in this new year coming my way, whether I like it or not.
And remember, YET doesn’t take away our grief and sorrow and confusion. It speaks hope and strength and promise into the MIDST of it. At the same time. Even now. On top of everything else.
Whatever the place you find yourself, poised on the brink of a new year, cling to the promise that you are not alone on the precipice. You are not alone in the grief. You are not alone in struggling to find anything to look forward to.
It is precisely in this place of want and need that Jesus, our loving Lord, comes with his comfort, healing, and hope. He comes for you and your broken, weary heart. He comes with the promise of restoration, in his time and in his way. He comes with the presence of your child tucked into his Sacred Heart. He comes to remind you that he is always making all things new, even your agonizing grief. With this promise, may we allow the new year to wash over us, knowing our grief and love for our child will never leave us but will be redeemed before our very eyes.
