Sin, Grief, Confession, Forgiveness, Grace and Peace

Teacher, How do we navigate through the complex emotion and procedure dealing with the combination sin and grief?

Grief may visit us during life events in classic fashion, such as death of a loved one or some significant loss, but we may also experience grief when someone has sinned against us in a fashion that results in actual or perceived loss or emotional harm, whether this result is intended or not.
We may encounter this even when we are the type of person that may shrug off those more trivial “sins of little consequence” that we experience from time to time.
In Scripture, Matthew 18 gives us a framework to follow in social interaction with the sinner. We must first pray for guidance, then approach this person, in the spirit of brotherly love, and clearly state our concerns about this person’s harmful behavior toward us or others. Hopefully this will result in dialogue and a heartfelt confession from the person responsible for the harm. (Rite of Confession. Small Catechism. Martin Luther.) Of course Forgiveness (Reconciliation, Absolution) should follow as this person has made a formal decision to seek forgiveness and come back into grace. Should this person choose to ignore or respond inappropriately to the invitation to dialogue, Scripture states that we should bring others with us to visit with the person to discuss the harmful interaction. This allows the person another opportunity to come into dialogue, confession and a state of grace and peaceful resolution with the individual and community.
Should this person ignore this opportunity to engage resolution with the community, then he or she should be “treated as a Gentile or tax collector.” This is serious stuff! Furthermore, we are told that what is “bound on earth will be bound in heaven.” Jesus goes on to explain, “If two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” Matt. 18.
As a community of believers, we can come to understand the process of sin, confession, forgiveness, grace, the grief process and support our fellow believer transition from denial to acceptance and / or from sin to forgiveness and grace!
We pray for all to “come to the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, that will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4.

Five Stages of Grief
On Death and Dying The Kübler-Ross model, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross. 1969.
http://www.ekrfoundation.org/five-stages-of-grief/
Denial and Isolation – A normal reaction to acknowledging grief.
Anger – Recognition that denial no longer works.
Bargaining – Hope for “undoing” or avoidance of grief.
Depression – We become “tuned into reality.” The ability to deal with harsh reality is muted.
Acceptance – “Coming to terms” with the focus of the grief. This is not necessarily approval nor gratitude, but merely assent to the reality one faces.

Prayer:

“Feelings come and feelings go,
And feelings are deceiving;
My warrant is the Word of God,
Naught else is worth believing.
Though all my heart should feel condemned
For want of some sweet token,
There is One greater than my heart
Whose Word cannot be broken.
I’ll trust in God’s unchanging Word
Till soul and body sever,
For, though all things shall pass away,
HIS WORD SHALL STAND FOREVER!” Amen. Martin Luther.

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