When You Need Tips To Keep From Crying

Dear friend who is going to visit another friend who is dying,

"Do you have any tips to keep me from crying?" you asked.

My first thought was a memory, perhaps twenty-five years ago.

Mom was visiting from Minnesota. We were sitting at the kitchen table, my kids tearing through the house. I had lost a baby in the second trimester several months earlier. This was the first time Mom and I had met face to face.

We talked about the loss, of our much-wanted daughter and her granddaughter. Mom began to cry.

"I'm so sorry," she said.

"Sorry?" I questioned. "For what? Loving me enough to feel my pain?"

So, dear friend who has to do the difficult, to face loss while deeply loving, I am afraid I have no tips to keep away tears.

One of the names of Jesus in Isaiah 53:3 is Man of Sorrows who is acquainted with grief. Paul encouraged us to weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15).

To cry with a friend is to join in a heavenly calling.

Sometimes tears are the bravest gift we give.

I think we get caught up in trying to come up with the perfect thing to say when a friend is hurting. We become paralyzed in our fear of doing or saying the wrong thing.Let me encourage you in this. Forget about trying to do or say the perfect thing.

Drop the perfect and just be a friend. 

Don't focus on "do" or "say", but "be."