How can I help a Christian friend whose child recently died?
It would help first to understand the consciousness of people in this Christian society as they face death with their families and loved ones. They are trying to come to grips with their beliefs about God.
They have been taught that God gives only good, but now all of a sudden here comes something bad. And how do you pray to God to take away the pain, they wonder, when maybe God gave them the pain? These are questions in the hearts of people like your friend.
At times, we try to give comfort to others but say just the wrong thing: “Your child is now in heaven, and he is much happier there” or “God gave you this cross to bear because you were strong enough to bear it.” “Oh, that I had been weaker,” the friend cries.
Nothing can heal your friend’s grief but time. Man grapples with the meaning of life, and eventually he comes to certain terms with it.
—Sri Harold Klemp