How can I care well for someone who is grieving?

Of course, that's a very important question. It's something we all want to do with those that we love, but we also know that we and other people have said such unhelpful and discouraging words to grieving people. So the question is, How can we do it better? How can we care well and wisely for those who are grieving? Let me prepare you with two questions, very simple questions. The first one is this: Do I love this person? Well, of course you love this person. You wouldn't even be considering the question about how you encourage and care for the grieving person if you didn't love, but slow down on this just for a bit. Do I love this person? Or let's change it a little bit: Am I affected by their loss? Does my love express itself in compassion? Is my love apparent? Do I love this particular person?

Here is what love does not say. Love does not say, “at least,” anything on the far side of at least. “At least it could have been worse” or “at least he is in a better place.” This is the lack of compassion. If you love this person, you would know that there's no such thing as “at least.” When we love somebody, we bear the burdens along with them. We would never say such a thing. We don't say that. We might say something like this: “I love you. I love you. Thank you for allowing us to be with you in some way in the midst of your grief.” You could say, “I'm so sorry. This has left me, and it's left our family, undone by what's happened.” Or here's what you could do. You could simply write something. “This is how I prayed for you today, and I want you to know how much we love you and how much we bear these burdens along with you.” Perhaps later, and one of the challenges with people who are grieving is they will hear a number of words of encouragement initially, but the grief persists and the words can fade away. So later what do you do? You remember. Sometimes the remembrance is an anniversary. Sometimes it's simply, “I just want you to know I love you. You have been on my heart, and I know that as we seem to go on with our lives, you continue to carry such profound grief. This is the way I pray for you.” Or perhaps you can even ask, “How can I pray for you now? Here's ways I have prayed for you; how can I pray for you now?” So the first question that's going to both protect you from unhelpful comments and lead you into helpful ones would be the question, Do I love in a way that my compassion is aroused by the grief of the other person?

The second question is this—now, this is going to seem a little unusual at first—do I live humbly before God? Do I live humbly before God? Do I have a keen sense that I live before my God and I need him every single day? “Jesus, help me” is one of your cries. If indeed you're living humbly before the Lord, your humility as it's lived out before the Lord will be expressed in humility before the person who's grieving. As a result, you will not say something like this: “What is God teaching you?” as if suffering is a kind of puzzle where we have to find the right answer. Humility walks before the Lord, even though there's so many answers to questions that we will not have. This is a matter of finding the right person in whom we trust rather than finding the right answers. Out of humility, another thing we will not say is the word “just,” anything on the far side of “just.” Just read scripture, just exercise, just get out of the house every day, just pray. You can see some of these things are very, very important things, but you are speaking them with a certain confidence. If you just did this, then everything would be better. There's a certain arrogance, a certain pride in that confidence. Humility would not say “just,” just change your diet. Humility recognizes in the midst of suffering, there is so much we don't know.

Perhaps you can hear in how we don't say the word “just,” you can hear how we don't give unsolicited advice. Now, we all know this. We all know that somebody who is grieving, they're not asking for advice and it's wise not to give them advice. That is, advice being, here's what I would do in your situation, here is what I think would be helpful. Now the problem is we know that advice is typically unhelpful, but we have this sense that we have advice that is especially good, better than all the rest, so we will give it anyway. Humility will stay away from unsolicited advice. And one of the reasons we speak against unsolicited advice is this: The problem with advice is that you want in your grief a person who is next to you, who is with you, who perhaps even bears your burdens along with you. When that person who is next to you is giving advice, all of a sudden they become a teacher. They're no longer next to you. They are in a different category. They are the teacher, you are the student. They are the expert consultant. The words you want to hear are words that bring you toward other people. Words of advice actually tend to distance you from others. Humility will be reluctant to give advice unless it's asked. What humility might say are things like this.

Even before you speak to a grieving person, you have an interest in learning from those who have gone through grief, and you're simply going to have a habit of asking them, “Could you help me to understand what are the things that have been most helpful for you? What have been the things that have been the most hurtful for you?” For example, I recognize that there are some people where there are times where they want to speak about the loss, especially if it's been a person they lost. But there are also times where they're tired of being asked how are they when of course they're a wreck. So the first thing humility does is it has a lifestyle of wanting to learn more from those who have gone through grief. And obviously you've gone through grief, you live with people who have gone through grief. So there are all kinds of opportunities for you to learn. More specifically, humility perhaps will ask close friends and family of the grieving person, “What could I do? What would be helpful for this particular person?” Do you see? It's a posture of learning. There's much we don't know, and so we come before God as needy and we come before other people as needy as well.

And then you consider, what are ways to serve? From taking the dog for a walk to babysitting the kids for a while to being the house cleaner or having the house cleaners come in and help. The creativity of “How can I come under this person and care for them and serve them?” is a way to remind them that they're not alone, that there are other people who hear. That would be an act of humility.

One more idea on what to say or what to do under the category of humility is you live under Scripture and Scripture has blessed you. Write out Scripture that is suitable for the other person. Write out Scripture that has been good for your own soul. If it's been good for you, chances are it will also be good for the other person. Write it out and text it, email it. Send a letter to the person. Allow them to have the privilege of being under the very words of God.

Since grief persists, when everybody else leaves, the person can still be grieving. What you can do as you grow in humility before Christ and you grow in love, you simply ask the person, “What has helped you in the past? What are the things that people have done or said? What are the words of Scripture that have helped? What are the things that haven't helped?” And then you simply, of course, you repeat the things that have helped and you avoid the things that haven't. This question is so important, so important for all of us. How can grief, instead of being a time where people feel isolated from the church and hear comments that can tear them down, how can grief, communication where the church comes together and we love obviously by speaking words of humility and love to others, and how especially in our humility can we continue to be students of words that build up and comfort?

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For similar content, check out Ed Welch's book, Someone I Know Is Grieving: Responding with Humility & Compassion (New Growth Press, 2023). Learn more here.