Chrysostom
Beloved of All
Your prayer request for your family as September begins and for your cousin who has lost her husband has been heard, and we join you in prayer before God.
We pray for your family in this new month, that the Lord would keep you, guide you, and fill your home with the fullness of His blessing in every good work, and that you would walk before Him with faith and love and peace. We ask that He would give you strength for each day and draw you closer to His word.
For your cousin, we pray especially in this time of deep grief. Sorrow in bereavement is heavy, and the wound of losing one so close is grievous and brings many tears. Even those who loved the Lord most grieved when they faced death, because they clung dearly to the one they loved and did not yet clearly see the comfort that would follow. It is natural to mourn, and God sees that sorrow.
We pray that He would comfort her as the Father of the fatherless and the protector of widows, and that she would be able to trust in the Lord in this desolation. Scripture calls blessed the one who in such loneliness trusts in Him, for He does not forsake those who look to Him, and He will give patience and strength to endure.
We encourage both you and your cousin to keep the Scriptures near as medicines for the soul. Take the Gospels, the Acts, and the letters of the apostles as your constant teachers. When grief presses upon you, go into them as into a chest of medicines and take comfort from them, whether in loss or in death or in the absence of loved ones. Keep them in your mind and heart, for no one else can teach and comfort as they do.
We also remember the hope we have in Christ for those who have fallen asleep in Him. Our comfort is not only in this life, for the true blessings are kept for the life to come. All will rise, but those who are in Christ will be raised to glory and will be with the Lord forever. This is the speedy and sure comfort held out to us, that death is not the end and that God will work innumerable blessings through His resurrection power.
May the Lord grant to your family a peaceful and faithful September, and may He surround your cousin with His presence, sustain her day by day, wipe away her tears, and fill her heart with the hope of being with the Lord and with those who sleep in Him.
We pray for your family in this new month, that the Lord would keep you, guide you, and fill your home with the fullness of His blessing in every good work, and that you would walk before Him with faith and love and peace. We ask that He would give you strength for each day and draw you closer to His word.
For your cousin, we pray especially in this time of deep grief. Sorrow in bereavement is heavy, and the wound of losing one so close is grievous and brings many tears. Even those who loved the Lord most grieved when they faced death, because they clung dearly to the one they loved and did not yet clearly see the comfort that would follow. It is natural to mourn, and God sees that sorrow.
We pray that He would comfort her as the Father of the fatherless and the protector of widows, and that she would be able to trust in the Lord in this desolation. Scripture calls blessed the one who in such loneliness trusts in Him, for He does not forsake those who look to Him, and He will give patience and strength to endure.
We encourage both you and your cousin to keep the Scriptures near as medicines for the soul. Take the Gospels, the Acts, and the letters of the apostles as your constant teachers. When grief presses upon you, go into them as into a chest of medicines and take comfort from them, whether in loss or in death or in the absence of loved ones. Keep them in your mind and heart, for no one else can teach and comfort as they do.
We also remember the hope we have in Christ for those who have fallen asleep in Him. Our comfort is not only in this life, for the true blessings are kept for the life to come. All will rise, but those who are in Christ will be raised to glory and will be with the Lord forever. This is the speedy and sure comfort held out to us, that death is not the end and that God will work innumerable blessings through His resurrection power.
May the Lord grant to your family a peaceful and faithful September, and may He surround your cousin with His presence, sustain her day by day, wipe away her tears, and fill her heart with the hope of being with the Lord and with those who sleep in Him.
