Tale of Two Widows

by Martha E. Stortz

"What did we do to deserve this?" This is the question my neighbor has been asking over and over — and not just this morning. Like all the other times, I have no real answers. She can’t ask her children, because it would scare them. And she won’t ask her pastor, because she doesn’t see him anymore. Church is what she used to do on Sunday mornings. Now it’s the farmers’ market and The New York Times. She’s sick of people telling her that God will bring something good out of all this. I know what she means.

"Where is God in all of this?" We both lost our husbands to the same rare form of brain cancer. For a year we shared doctors and treatments, news of clinical trials and alternative therapies. We even shared dinner at the local neighborhood restaurant, booking the same booth so that whoever had the more recent surgery could hide his scars from the rest of the diners.

Now we share coffee, questions, and this gallows sense of humor. Her husband, diagnosed earlier, lasted longer. He declined gradually like a leaf falling in a gentle breeze. Mine, diagnosed later, fought to maintain an active life, then just dropped off a cliff. One month we were hiking in Kauai; the next, he was dead.

"If God is all-powerful, why would God let cancer happen?" Mentally I add to the list: Or Darfur? Iraq? The murder rate in West Oakland? We are sitting on her deck on a crisp Saturday morning, wrapped in blankets, warmed by the autumn sun even as our coffee makes steam. Above us all the clouds look like brain scans, but I keep this insight to myself. This kind of sky used to scare me, until I imagined that maybe we were all living deep in the mind of God. Maybe, just maybe, I muse, God wanted so much to share our lot that God took on brain cancer. Maybe, just maybe, this is how God is all-powerful. God is powerful enough to be stricken.

"I mean, what did we do to deserve this?" Ah — we have come full circle, back to the original question. I admit my mind wanders during these recitations, partly because I know the script so well, partly because I still have no answers. I can only give her companionship, like the companionship that Ruth gave Naomi. If she could receive them, I’d give her two things in addition: a rough distinction and a hard truth.

The rough distinction
Suffering and grief
Put simply, suffering is what happens to you; grief is what you do about it. It’s an important difference, one better illustrated than explained. Occasionally two of my students sport black T-shirts that declare on the front in bold white lettering: "Manure occurreth." Bad stuff happens all the time, and the two students have had their share. That’s suffering. But in spite of it all, these two live life boldly, and wearing T-shirts with attitude testifies to that. That’s grief.

You can hear the distinction between suffering and grief in everyday speech. It’s the difference between "I" and "me." A woman who’s suffered a stroke tells you: "A stroke paralyzed me on my right side… " Pause the video camera: That’s suffering. There she is in the objective pronoun, the object of a verb’s action, the victim of a devastating short-circuit in the brain. But roll the camera: "… so I use a cane. On bad days, I use a walker that my grandkids painted all the colors of the rainbow." That’s grief. There she is in the nominative pronoun, the subject of a verb’s action, the stroke survivor. These two illustrations describe the difference between suffering and grief, a difference between being a victim and a survivor, the difference between being a subject of one’s actions or the victim of circumstance — and reclaiming what agency you can.

My neighbor on the deck that chilly morning simply isn’t there yet. Someone who’s been hit by a truckload of suffering doesn’t just get up, dust herself off, and walk away from the scene of the accident. Suffering takes its toll, and suffering takes its time.

What moves someone from suffering to grief? This question does have an answer, and Ruth knows it. Nothing more and nothing less than companionship. When my husband died, I felt like an amputee. It was as if my right arm had suddenly been torn from my body, yet I still had the sensation of searing pain at the end of fingertips that were no longer there. People carried things to me: meals and casseroles and flowers. People carried things for me: groceries and books and all the beautiful clothes that my husband had bought so thoughtfully and worn so well. In time, I learned how to carry things by myself. But it took time — and the infinite patience of my friends.

Naomi suffers the loss of her husband. For a while, she is paralyzed. But in time, she learns to walk again. And when Naomi starts grieving — watch out! She changes her name; she decides to go back to her homeland; she releases her daughters-in-law. We may not like her new name; we may think there’s nothing for her back in Bethlehem; we may find her overbearing and bossy. But Naomi has taken charge. Grieving reclaims agency.

The hard truth
An old life and a new one
My neighbor calls to me as I head out for a walk: "If you see my Old Life out there, could you please remind it where I live?" We both laugh, but I know that our Old Lives are not coming back. It takes a while for this hard truth to sink in. Naomi doesn’t leave Moab right after Elimelech’s death. Maybe she too is looking for traces of her Old Life.

In the same way, Easter morning finds Mary Magdalene back at Good Friday’s tomb. Mary is looking so hard for the old Jesus that she fails to see the risen Christ in front of her.

The hard truth is that after his resurrection Jesus gets mistaken for all kinds of strange people: a gardener (John 20:15), a ghost (Luke 24:37), a wandering rabbi on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13–35), another fisherman who stands on the shore like some backseat driver and tells everyone else how to fish (John 21:1–8), a short-order cook who shows up to prepare the first breakfast for a group of weary fisherman (John 21:9–14).

All of Jesus’ friends were looking so hard for the old Jesus, they failed to notice the risen Christ. It’s as if they had all walked out of a dark movie theater into the bright afternoon sun: Their eyes needed time to adjust. The good news is they have time. Jesus doesn’t ascend to his Father right after Easter. He sticks around, giving the disciples 40 days between Easter and Ascension to get used to the new life in their midst. Their hearts needed time to adjust.

So do ours. Sometimes we are so busy looking for an old life that new life could be doing cartwheels in the living room and we wouldn’t even notice. Our hearts need time to adjust. Grief gives us that time. Just as the risen Christ searched out the disciples wherever they were — at tombs, in their boats, even behind locked doors! — so grace finds us in the midst of our grieving. All we have to do is look up, unlock the doors, and open our hands.

"What did we do to deserve this?" The question keeps coming. When she looks up again and unclenches her hands from around that coffee mug, these are the two things I’ll put in them: a sense of surviving and the promise of new life. In the meantime, I can only give her what Ruth gave Naomi. Sturdy companionship.

Martha E. Stortz is professor of historical theology and ethics at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary. She was the author of LWT’s 2007–2008 Bible study "Blessed to Follow: The Beatitudes as a Compass for Discipleship."