Friends and family of Oral, the Lord and Savior of all says through the pen of St. Paul, "we do not want you...to grieve like the rest of men who have no hope." This is the grace and mercy of God in action for those who are in Christ who mourn the loss of a loved one.

Make no mistake, there is still grief. There may be periods of denial. There might even be times of relief. But there will most certainly be grief. Someone who has been a part of your lives for many years is now gone, no longer to be a part of your life. You are left, now, with only memories, some pleasant, others not so much. But the man, the person, the interaction with him is gone.

That cannot be replaced, and so there is grief. There is mourning. But it is not mourning like the rest of the world mourns.

For them, there is no hope. For them, death is it, and beyond death, there is nothing to look forward to. There may be words from them claiming a belief in an afterlife, a thought that heaven awaits because they were, more-or-less, good people, but the fact of the matter remains: without Christ, those thoughts and actions are baseless, fruitless, and hopeless. The Christ proclaims, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also..." Without the Christ, there is no access to the Father, no knowledge of Him, no life, no hope. It doesn't get any simpler than that. And so, for those who suffer loss without faith, there is hopeless grief.

But for those who are in Christ, there is hopeful mourning. Yes, we suffer loss, but the loss is fleeting; it is passing, because there is more to look forward to. For the Christ has also said, "In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also." For those who are in Christ, a place is prepared in heavenly glory; we have God's Word on that.

But, we grieve hopefully for another reason, too, as we heard from St. Paul, earlier.

We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him...For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.

Those who have died in Christ before us will be raised to life at the Christ's return to be reunited with those who are still in Christ on that gloriously dreadful day. Those who grieve with hope mourn temporarily, with the knowledge that they will see their loved ones again, even as David proclaimed after losing his infant son. We have that now, and we look forward to that day when it is manifest to us.

We have God's sure and certain word on that, a word which proclaims that the only-begotten Son of God died for the remission of all sins when He was nailed to a cross, suffering the punishment and wrath of God due the world, and rose again to life on the third day, gaining for His people victory over death and removing from the grave its sting. Death is nothing to be feared by one who is in Christ, for to this person is given the victory over death by the Savior's resurrection from the dead. Eternal life is theirs, to be fully realized and experienced when the Christ returns to claim His bride, the Church, to Himself.

This is His promise to you—Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again. He then says, "Believe it," and gives faith in order to believe it and receive His promises. For those who reject this promise and faith, there is no hope; there is only weeping and gnashing of teeth. To those who receive this promise (and, make no mistake, there is nothing for you to do to receive it, it is a gift), there is hope and forgiveness and life and salvation.

Therefore, it must be asked, are you right with God? Only through Christ, are you made right with God, declared just, and given faith to believe and receive it. God grant this to us all, for Christ's sake.