What Can You Say to Someone Who Just Lost a Loved One to Sickness?
The most important thing a grieving person can know is that you care. The person does not need a theological dissertation about anything. I think the best thing you can say is probably, “I’m sorry about your loss.” Just being there for someone speaks volumes even if you don’t say a whole lot.
While “He’s in a better place now” is true if the person was as believer, it is probably not very comforting and can come across as trite. The grieving person is not upset about the believer’s current surroundings in glory. He is grieving because he misses the person who went to be with Jesus. That is perfectly normal and natural, and there is nothing “anti-faith” about being sad about a loved one’s departure. There is no “instant cheer-up” faith Scripture to stand on that makes everything okay, and the relatives don’t need your exhortation to cheer up; they need your compassion. The Bible tells us to weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15), not to rebuke those who weep because they’re not rejoicing at the moment.
In fact, I’d be concerned about a person who didn’t grieve at the loss of a spouse; one would wonder whom that person had waiting in the wings in an abnormal case like that!
We can pray that God will manifest Himself as the God of all comfort who comforts us in all our tribulation (2 Corinthians 1:3-4), comforts the downcast (2 Corinthians 7:6), heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds (Psalm 147:3). We can be thankful that Jesus came to heal the brokenhearted (Luke 4:18).
If the deceased was not a believer, “He’s in a better place now” is an outright lie that makes God out to be a liar, and under no circumstances should you say such a thing about someone who was known to be an unbeliever until his dying breath.
Of course, “He is wailing and gnashing his teeth in eternal agony in hell where the fire never goes out and the worm never dies” would be a correct statement about a deceased unbeliever, but not a comforting thought to share with the mourning family.
It can be especially difficult if the deceased person was a “faith person” who said he was “standing on the Word” for his healing. In such cases, family members can be angry at God and take it out on “faith people” when they feel that God failed to honor His Word. Sometimes, if they know you are a “faith person,” they will demand to know why the person died. I think the best answer comes from Deuteronomy 29:29: “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” Since we cannot see inside people’s hearts the way God can, some things will remain a secret to us until we see God in heaven. So it is not a problem to admit “I don’t know” concerning the exact reason that a particular person died. However, the things that are revealed to us, including His will to heal in all cases, are still true throughout this lifetime. What we must not do is back down on the integrity of the revealed Word to provide false comfort to the bereaved, which is all too often what happens. (See Descent into Stupidity for what can happen when people try to give false comfort to the bereaved.)
What is not a secret is that we do know that God’s will is healing in all cases. God didn’t make healing a secret. God does not make exceptions to His will for “secret” reasons – that is not what Deuteronomy 29:29 is talking about. So we cannot even hint that some sovereign exception could have been the case. However, especially if you are the pastor or a minister, you may get angry statements from grieving family members that the deceased was a person of great faith, and if anyone knew how to believe God, he did, and so on. They want you to side with them against the Word, and you can’t, but at the same time, you can’t come across as insensitive or as just wanting to give a lecture to the family. If they demand that you admit that sometimes it isn’t God’s will to heal, you can’t agree with that statement. In that case, you are experiencing Perilous Pastoral Pushback. You must not compromise the Word to please men. When things don’t play out according to God’s revealed will, the breakdown is always on man’s end of things, even though we don’t want to see it that way. The alternative is to deny the integrity of the Word and say that God no longer exalts His Word above His name (Psalm 138:2), but rather that He now violates it as He sees fit in His sovereignty.
So your job is to “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15), which means that you can neither be insensitive nor compromise anything God has revealed in His Word. Be glad that Christ has been made wisdom unto you (1 Corinthians 1:30) so that you may know how to answer every person (Colossians 4:6) as you walk that tightrope.
Here are some statements that are NOT good things to say to grieving families:
“If that person had been in faith, he wouldn’t have died so young.”
While you can’t deny this, saying something like that outright to the bereaved makes you seem like an insensitive boor rather than a compassionate follower of Jesus. This is why you need to walk in love and wisdom, not just Bible knowledge! Knowledge puffs up; love builds up (1 Corinthians 8:1).
“If YOU had been in faith, you would have commanded that person to be healed.”
This isn’t even necessarily true; there are many reasons that people don’t get healed – many of which involve that person not wanting to be healed. It is not right to heap guilt on others (or yourself) because someone died. And as one faith preaching pioneer said, “Everyone I lay hands on is going to die at some point.”
“He may have been a Christian, but he wasn’t a tither, so the devourer wasn’t rebuked for his sake.”
Save the tithing lessons for some other time. This would just make the bereaved think that all Christian ministries want is people’s money if you bring this up at such a time.
“He kept confessing that it was HIS cancer and that his back was KILLING him, and that’s why he died of cancer of the spine.”
Save the Word confession lessons for another time, too. The bereaved need your comfort, not your Bible lessons on confession.
“I know how you must feel.”
While not in the list of healing-related bad statements, unless you have lost a loved one under the same circumstances, you do NOT know AT ALL how the other person feels. This statement means well but is annoying unless your experience backs it up, and even then, it’s not necessarily comforting. It’s like saying to someone who just got hit by a sledgehammer, “Oh, I once got hit by a sledgehammer too. I know it’s painful.”
Many things could be discussed down the road, but immediately after the loss of a loved one is not the time to have those discussions!
Under NO circumstances should you EVER repeat one of the following LIES:
“God took him.”
God received Him if He was a believer; He did not “take” him. The only person I can think of in the Bible that God “took” was Enoch, and he DIDN’T die!
“God needed him in heaven in His choir.”
God has no urgent personnel needs in heaven that require killing someone on the earth. Satan is not God’s heavenly headhunter.
“In His sovereignty, God chose to say NO to his prayers and our prayers for his healing.”
This is covered elsewhere in this book.
“God wanted him to go home because He knew that others would be saved at his funeral.”
Only one Man had to die so that others could be saved, and it wasn’t the deceased person. This is also covered in more detail elsewhere.
“We can never know God’s will for sure; He works in mysterious ways.”
The Bible never says that God works in mysterious ways. The Bible tells you what His ways are. It is improper to blame God for working the works of the devil. See elsewhere for more on this particular lie.
“His time had come because He had finished his work.”
There is no God-determined pre-appointed time to die. If a Christian dies before living a long life, the only way that could be possibly be God’s will would be if he were a martyr.
“God didn’t want him to suffer any longer, so He caused him to die.”
Jesus, who is the same yesterday, today and forever, did NOT go around killing people to terminate their suffering! He terminated their suffering by killing their diseases!