The Unspeakable Blessing of a Safe Space

“Welcome home. This is a safe space.”

I’ve had some really crappy days this week. I’ve been more emotional than I ever care to be, cried more than I have in months, and railed at the disappointments and injustices I’ve faced to the point of hoarseness. I’ve been loudly passionate about things that need someone—anyone—to speak about them. I’ve been both questioned (with suspicion) and championed for my voice. And all of it has felt . . . useless.

I feel numb. I want to quit. This morning, I wanted to stay in bed and never leave. I wanted to eat ice cream and cry and be left alone. I think we need days, and sometimes even seasons, like this to think, to process, to pray, to lament . . . to mourn. Because that’s what this is. Mourning.

Mourning

Mourning is a peculiar process filled with ups, downs, and sideways feelings. Sometimes, the feelings hit you like a bolt of lightning with no warning. At other times, the same feelings are a slow burn and they creep up on you. Mourning is unpredictable and painful. But as painful as it is, the process of mourning is a good and necessary experience. Mourning gives closure to whatever it is we’re attempting to lay to rest. Mourning calls us to honor the person—or thing— we’re mourning and teaches us to remember the good with the bad and hold it all in glorious tension. A holy tension.

Mourning is a gift from God. In the Ancient Near East, it was common practice to hire professional mourners. These professional emotes would clothe themselves in sackcloth and ashes and publicly wail over lost loved ones and other particularly grievous matters. Could you even imagine this behavior in our Western culture? Both the mourners and their employers would be sent directly to the nearest psychologist for examination. Here in America, we hide our grief by stuffing it down and getting back to “real” life. But what if the “real” life is actually found in the mourning?

Mourning gives us the wind to express our immeasurable pain. It puts voice to feelings we can’t put into words by giving us permission to moan and wail. Mourning allows us to display our pain with a bodily expression that brings literal physical release. Emotional pain manifests in physical expressions—and this is normal. But in our Western culture, we call these expressions symptoms, thereby dehumanizing people by declaring any expressed emotional pain as a sickness.

My father passed away in January 2022. I have spent a great deal of time mourning his loss and missing him. He lost a long battle with Alzheimer’s. When someone you deeply love passes from a disease that robs them of their personhood, their passing becomes a mercy of sorts. It’s hard to explain, but if you’ve been unfortunate enough to walk a similar road, I know you understand me.

Mourning Things Other Than People

The mourning I’ve been processing of late has not been the mourning of a person, but a thing. An ideal. A hope. As I have attempted to hold this hope tightly and poured myself into the realization of it, those who are against these ideals have required me to bend instead to their ideals and play by their rules, offering empty promises of partnership. I have twisted myself into a pretzel, aiming for the goalposts that never quite seem to stay put. In this process, much like my dad who lost his “Floyd-ness” in his fight with a disease that rips away pieces of both mind and soul, I have lost my own sense of self. There are times I don’t even recognize myself because I can’t separate the game player from the game. I’m so very tired of playing games.

As I study Scripture and see Christ in relationship with his disciples—his friends (as a good friend pointed out to me today)—I don’t see anything like this. Christ seems to celebrate the uniqueness and personality of each person in the small entourage he collected during his time on earth. While calling them to “sin no more,” he valued their personhood, the personalities he gave them (after all, he is God!), and the gifts they were uniquely suited to (again, gifts from him). Everything about what made a person that person was used for Christ’s mission and glory. They weren’t asked to turn themselves inside out becoming something they weren’t in order to be fit for his kingdom. Fishermen kept fishing. Patrons kept patronizing. The Samaritan woman at the well had the longest recorded theological conversation with Jesus. The declaration that Christ has risen came from the lips of a woman. Peter gave palliative care to his mother-in-law and Jesus stopped his ministry work one day to participate. All his disciples kept being themselves in their average, ordinary lives while serving this revolutionary King.

Welcome Home. This is a Safe Space.

At the end of a particularly hard day this week, I came home and my husband looked me in the eye, gave me a kiss, and said “Welcome home. This is a safe space.” Friends, he was more like Jesus to me in that moment than anyone has been in a very long time. He didn’t know it when he said it, but I heard the voice of God come from his mouth. Christ is my safe space. This mourning process has been painful, but it’s been gloriously good because, through it, my Lord has consistently invited me back home—to him—which is the safest space of all. He has given me a husband on earth who champions me to be exactly who I am for the glory of God and the good of others. And Christ is my bridegroom in heaven who beacons me, his bride, to let him hear me (Song of Songs 8:13).

Mourning may last for a night, but joy comes in the morning!