Rebuilding Your Life When You've
Lost Everything
by Greg Hanson
Sunrise Wesleyan Church
September 25, 2005
Main Passage: Psalm
62:1-8 (NLT)
What a month it has
been. In the past four weeks, two major hurricanes have hit along the
Gulf Coast, and we’ve felt the impact even here. We all experienced the
sudden increase in fuel costs as a result of the storms. We’ve watched
the news every day and seen the devastation. In New Orleans, Katrina
resulted in 80% of the city being flooded. Of 200,000 homes in the
area, 100,000 will have to be bulldozed. Over a thousand confirmed dead
so far, millions displaced and affected by Katrina alone.
And then this weekend… Rita slammed into the Texas Coast. Did you see
the deadlock on the highways as people tried to evacuate? Storm surges
over 20 feet. They actually lucked out in Texas with mostly superficial
damage. But parts of New Orleans that had been pumped dry flooded again.
Tens of thousands… perhaps hundreds of thousands… have lost literally
everything they’ve ever owned. Lost it all! Well over a hundred billion
dollars in damage. And one city… New Orleans… the birthplace of jazz…
is fighting for its life. What do they do now? Well, after a disaster
there are always three stages:
Stage one is Rescuing. Emergency Response Teams spent days after
Katrina trying to find people who were still alive and evacuate them.
We all witnessed as helicopters rescued people who were stranded on
their rooftops.
Then comes the Resuming Stage. This is when the government comes in and
they restore water and power and lights and communication. This is
going on now, and it’s going to take weeks and maybe even months.
Then stage three is the Rebuilding Stage. And that’s going to take
years in New Orleans and the surrounding areas.
I don’t know if you know it or not but there’s an entire book in the
Bible about rebuilding a city. It’s the book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah was
sent to rebuild a city that was in ruins. In chapter 2 he says…
Nehemiah 2:17-18 (NLT/NCV)
“You know full well the tragedy of our city.
It lies in ruins, and its gates are burned. Let us rebuild the wall of
Jerusalem and rid ourselves of this disgrace!”…
Then they said, “Let's start rebuilding!” So they began to work hard.
Rebuilding is hard work. In fact, building from scratch is not nearly
as difficult as rebuilding because in rebuilding you have to clear away
the debris. You’ve got to deal with the damage. You’ve got to pick up
all the rubble. It takes a lot more time because you can’t start with a
clean slate. Rebuilding always takes longer than building.
That’s not only true of a city. It’s true of a life. It harder and
takes more work to rebuild your life after a major loss than it does to
build your life in the first place.
But the fact is, you cannot live without loss. Everything in this world
is temporary. You’re not made to live here forever. You’re made to live
forever in eternity. You’re only going to get 60, 80, maybe 100 years
on this planet. That means everything is temporary – everything. So
you’re going to have major losses in your life. Financial loses, health
losses, losses of loved ones. Some have lost a marriage. And there are
many other kinds of losses in life. How do you recover and how do you
rebuild after a major loss? Because it’s inevitable. You’re going to
have storms. You’re going to have tragedy. You’re going to have grief.
You’re going to have floods of failure in your life.
Now, you haven’t been through a flood like the people in New Orleans.
But you have been through other things and you’re going to go through
more things. So today we’re going to look at this issue of, “What do I
do after a major loss? What do I do to rebuild my life when I’ve lost
everything?” You may not need this message now, but you’re going to
need it some day. If you haven’t had a major loss in your life yet, you
will. I don’t want to be morbid, but you will. Your time is coming.
Because nothing lasts on this planet. It’s just a matter of time.
What do you do when you’ve lost it all? Some of you have lost a loved
one. Or you’ve lost your job. Or you’ve lost your financial security.
Or you’ve lost a dream – you’ve had a heartbreak. What do you do? How
do you rebuild your life? The Bible tells us to do seven things.
How to Rebuild Your Life:
1. Release your
grief.
Loss always creates very
strong emotions in us. We grieve. We worry. We fear. We may have
depression. We may have anger. I expect all kinds of emotions welled up
inside of you as you watched those homes being destroyed and those
people dying in New Orleans. Or when you heard about the busload of
seniors that exploded this week. What does God want us to do with those
emotions? What does He want us to do with the emotions when we’re the
ones who have experienced the loss?
Well, you don’t resist them or deny they exist. You don’t replay them
over and over again and wonder what you could have done differently.
And you don’t reduce them and say, “it was no big deal”… it was a big
deal and it hurt. And you don’t repress them and bottle them up inside.
You release them.
Because you will deal with your feelings. Either now or later. If you
don’t deal with them now, you’re just putting off the inevitable. Often
what will happen is this: when you swallow your feelings your stomach
keeps score. Or your back or your neck or something. When you
internalize your feelings, when you stuff them down, they come out
somehow, often in some kind of illness or ailment. And God says, “No,
don’t do that. I want you to release them.” Release them to God in
prayer. It’s described in the Bible as crying out to God. We see an
example of this in Psalm 18…
Psalm 18:4-6 (NLT)
The ropes of death surrounded me; the floods
of destruction swept over me.
The grave wrapped its ropes around me; death itself stared me in the
face.
But in my distress I cried out to the LORD; yes, I prayed to my God for
help.
I’m not talking about some pansy prayer where we go, “Dear God I’m not
feeling too good.” No, we go, “God! Life stinks! I’m afraid. I’m angry.
I’m hurt. I’m lonely. I’m grieving. My heart is broken.” That’s what it
means to cry out to God. Tell Him passionately exactly how you feel. He
can handle it.
Where do you think your emotions came from? God gave them to you. Why?
Because you are created in the image of God. God has emotions. God
cries. God laughs. God gets angry. God grieves. That’s why you do, too.
You were made in His image and He can understand your emotions. You can
tell Him anything. You just cry out to God. God would rather have you
be honest and release your feelings to Him than for you to fake it and
pretend like everything’s all right when it’s not.
Remember that old children’s song, “I’m inright outright upright
downright happy all the time”? I hate that song. Because it’s a lie.
I’m not happy all the time. Sadness is part of life. In fact, Jesus
even said it’s okay to mourn.
Matthew 5:4 (NLT)
“God blesses those who mourn, for they will
be comforted.”
So He says it’s ok to release your grief and tell God exactly how you
feel.
Psalm 62:8 (NLT)
Pour out your heart to him, for God is our
refuge.
2. Resist
bitterness.
Bitterness is far worse
than any loss or abuse or assault or problem you’ll ever experience.
Why? Because it’s holding on to the hurt. That’s what bitterness does.
Your past is past. It can’t hurt you any more. The only way it can hurt
you is if you choose to hold on to it through bitterness. That’s dumb.
You need to let it go. Because bitterness only hurts you. It never
solves the problem. It doesn’t change the past. It can’t control the
future. All it does is mess up your life right now.
So you need to ask yourself, “Do I want to be bitter or do I want to
get better?” Those are the options. But you can’t have both. You cannot
be bitter and get better at the same time. So if you choose to hold on
to that hurt and you will not forgive and you will not let it go and
you will hold on to that resentment, you’re choosing to not get better.
Hebrews 12:15 (NASB)
See to it that no one comes short of the
grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble…
Bitterness just prolongs the hurt. So how do you resist it? Three ways.
How
do I Resist Bitterness?
A. Accept what cannot be changed.
The truth is, much of life is totally beyond your control. And
sometimes the only way to overcome some problems is to accept them.
They’re not going to change and you just accept them. Like your past.
Your past is past. You can’t change it. You’re just going to have to
accept it.
B. Focus on what’s left, not on
what’s lost.
After a loss you need to find something to be grateful for. There’s
always something to be grateful for. We take so much for granted in our
lives and we need to just stop and say, “God I’m grateful!” I’ve read
that scientists have discovered that the attitude of gratitude is the
healthiest emotion you can have. And the more grateful and thankful a
person you are, the more emotionally and physically healthy you will
be. It’s good for you to be grateful.
The truth is, most of the people in the world would love to have your
problems. Really! You think your problems are bad, but are you worried
about what you’re going to eat next week? Or if you’re going to have a
roof over your head tomorrow? Most of the world would love to have your
problems. It’s like the old cliché, “I complained I had no shoes until
I met a man who had no legs.” You just need to find something to be
grateful for. You focus on what’s left, not what’s lost.
C. Play it down and pray it up.
Particularly if you’re a parent and you go through a crisis, you need
to do this with your children. The ones I worry about most on the Gulf
Coast are the children because children are traumatized faster than
anyone else. Parents don’t need to say to their kids, “This is
terrible! We’ve lost everything!” They need to reassure their kids and
say, “We’re going to make it. We’re here. God’s here. You’re here.
We’re going to make it.” You play it down and you pray it up and you
talk to God about it.
3. Re-evaluate
your life.
Ask yourself, “What
direction does God want me to take now?” Disasters have a way of
changing our direction, challenging our conceptions, and redefining our
values. It is in a disaster we realize what matters most and what
doesn’t matter most.
If you measure your life by how many possessions you have and if your
success and your happiness is dependent upon the things you’ve got and
the things you’ve collected and the cars and the toys and the boats and
the possessions and if your life is defined by what you own you’re in
trouble. Because you could lose it all in a snap! Don’t confuse your
possessions with your purpose in life.
Luke 12:15 (NLT)
“Real life is not measured by how much we
own.”
So don’t ever confuse what you live on with what you live for. A lot of
people have a lot to live on and they have nothing to live for. The
greatest things aren’t things.
I can imagine that right now in New Orleans under all of that water
there are thousands of very expensive cars rusting. And on many of
those cars is probably that stupid bumper sticker that says “He who
dies with the most toys wins.” Kind of irrelevant right now, isn’t it?
Life is not about the collection of toys.
1 Timothy 6:7 (NLT)
We didn’t bring anything with us when we
came into the world, and we certainly cannot carry anything with us
when we die.
U-Haul doesn’t do funerals. So since it’s all temporary, why build your
life around it? The best use of your life is invested in that which
outlasts it.
Can you lose your career? Yes! So don’t put your security in your
career. Can you lose your bank account and your investments and your
RRSPs? Oh, yeah! So don’t put your security in your nest egg. Can you
lose loved ones? Can you lose your husband or your wife or your
children or dear friends? Yes. You love them but you don’t put your
security in those people. Can you lose your youthful beauty? Don’t put
your trust in your good looks because you’re not going to have them
forever… look at me! You can lose it all.
There’s only one thing that cannot be taken from you. That is a
relationship to Jesus Christ. Remember Braveheart? What did he say?
“You can take our lives, but you can never take… our freedom!” Well,
not even death can take away the freedom you have in a relationship
with Jesus.
Matthew 16:26 (NIV)
“What good will it be for a man if he gains
the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in
exchange for his soul?”
At the end of your life do you want to look back and say, “See all
these things I’ve collected? That’s what I gave my life for. I worked
real hard to collect all these things. Houses, cars, boats, clothes,
Wayne Gretzky’s rookie card…” Then you’re going to go into the next
life and leave them. That’s not really long-term thinking, is it? It’s
pretty short-term thinking to invest all your time and energy in stuff
that you’re not going to take with you into the trillions of years
you’ll spend in eternity.
4. Receive help
from others.
God never intended for
you to go through life on your own power… as a lone ranger without
anybody else helping you. You were made inadequate so you would need
other people. And I was created inadequate so I would need other
people. See? There a reason! We’re created for community. We’re formed
for a family. You need me, and I need you. We need each other.
You know, most people have never experienced true intimacy. Why?
Because we tend to keep people at a distance. We don’t let them get too
close. We think, “If they get too close, they’ll see my fears. They’ll
see what I’m afraid of. They’ll see my weaknesses. If they get too
close they will see the real me, and what if they don’t like me?” Well,
that’s a risk you have to take. You must let people get close to you.
One of the most famous friendships in history was between David and
Jonathan in the Old Testament. We read about it in 1 Samuel…
1 Samuel 20:17, 42 (NLT)
And Jonathan made David reaffirm his vow of
friendship again, for Jonathan loved David as much as he loved himself…
At last Jonathan said to David, “Go in peace, for we have made a pact
in the LORD’s name. We have entrusted each other and each other’s
children into the LORD’s hands forever.”
And later when David was being hunted by King Saul…
1 Samuel 23:16 (NLT)
Jonathan went to find David and encouraged
him to stay strong in his faith in God.
And then in 2 Samuel 9, we discover that even after the death of
Jonathan, David fulfilled his oath of friendship with Jonathan’s
children.
This is what Jesus said about friendship…
John 15:12-13 (NLT)
I command you to love each other in the same
way that I love you. And here is how to measure it—the greatest love is
shown when people lay down their lives for their friends.
5. Rely on the
Lord.
You receive help from
others but you rely on the Lord. You cannot rebuild your life after a
major loss without God. At least, not the way you’re intended to
rebuild it. Because there are five qualities you need to rebuild your
life. What are they and where are you going to get them? In your notes…
God
Will Provide…
A. Peace.
Isaiah 26:3 (NCV)
“You, Lord, give true peace to those who
depend on You.”
Circle “peace.” You get peace from depending on God.
B. Hope.
Psalm 62:5 (NIV)
Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my
hope comes from Him.
Circle “Hope.” A couple weeks ago, Oprah pre-taped an interview with
Rick Warren which will air this Wednesday. Rick Warren, of course, is
the author of The Purpose Driven Life, which is the book that our 40
Days of Purpose Campaign is based on. I was talking with Oprah the
other day, and she let me in on some of their conversation. (Okay,
maybe not. But I did read a bit about it.) Oprah apparently asked Rick
if he knew why his book has been the best selling book in the world for
the last three years. And he said it’s because it’s a book about hope.
And he went on to say…
“Everybody needs hope! Human beings can go weeks without food. You can
go days without water. You can go a couple of minutes without air. But
you can’t go one second without hope. If you don’t have any hope you’re
not living. You’re just existing. You need hope to cope.”
~ Rick Warren
C. Courage.
Hebrews 6:18 (NLT)
Therefore, we who have fled to him for
refuge can take new courage, for we can hold on to his promise with
confidence.
You’ve got to have courage to rebuild your life. You get it from God.
D. Wisdom.
James 1:5 (CEV)
If any of you need wisdom, you should ask
God, and it will be given to you.
If you’re going to rebuild your life you’re going to need some wisdom.
And God can give you that wisdom.
E. Strength.
Exodus 15:2 (NLT)
The LORD is my strength and my song; He
has become my victory.
The Lord offers you power and strength. He’ll give you the strength to
rebuild your life.
When typhoons hit the
south pacific islands, the islanders used to tie themselves – and still
do in some places – lash themselves to giant trees so that when the
winds came through the palm trees they would be able to stand and not
blown off the island. And when the winds come through your life, you’d
better be tied to something that’s unmovable.
You need to be attached to God. You lean on Jesus for peace and you
look to Jesus for hope and you learn from Jesus for courage. And you
listen to Jesus for wisdom. And you live in Jesus for strength.
Where do you need strength in your life right now? What are you going
through? What problem are you facing that you’ve been trying to face on
your own? Perhaps some of you still haven’t recovered from a loss that
happened a week or a month or a year ago or a decade ago. And you’re
still holding on to that hurt. You need to let it go and rely on God.
You need to start rebuilding.
6. Refuse to be
discouraged.
Joshua 1:9 (NLT)
“I command you--be strong and courageous! Do
not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you
wherever you go.”
God’s purpose is greater than the problems you’re going through. So do
not be discouraged by them. Notice what Jesus said…
Luke 21:19 (NIV)
“By standing firm you will gain life.”
Circle “standing firm.” Sometimes you can’t even move but you just
stand firm. That means you refuse to be discouraged. The word “refuse”
means it’s a choice. It’s your choice. You don’t have to be
discouraged. If you’re discouraged right now it’s because you’re
choosing to be discouraged. As one person said…
“If you look at the world you’ll be distressed. If you look within
you’ll be depressed. If you look at Christ you’ll be at rest.”
~ Rick Warren
What do you do when you’ve done all you can and it seems like it’s
never enough? What do you say when your friends turn away and you’re
all alone? What do you give when you’ve given your all and it seems
like you can’t make it through? You just stand firm. When there’s
nothing left to do you just stand and watch the Lord see you through.
Psalm 40:1-2 (NLT)
I waited patiently for the LORD to help me,
and he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He
set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along.
7. Reach out to
others.
When we help other
people, God helps us. When you start helping others He heals you. When
you do it. It’s not, I’m going to get my act together, then I’ll start
helping other people. No. It’s when not then. It’s when you start to
help other people, before your life’s all figured out. When you do
that, God starts healing you. You start helping other people and that’s
part of the healing process of recovering from a loss yourself.
Galatians 6:2, 7 (NLT)
Share each other’s troubles and problems,
and in this way obey the law of Christ…
You will always reap what you sow!
How
do you reach out to others?
• By praying for them.
1 Samuel 12:23 (NIV)
“Far be it from me that I should sin
against the Lord by failing to pray for you.”
• By sharing with them.
1 John 3:17 (NIV)
“If anyone has material possessions and
sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of
God be in him?”
• By serving them
Galatians 6:2 (NCV)
By helping each other with your troubles,
you obey the law of Christ.
Much
of this message was adapted from material by Rick Warren at
PurposeDriven.com. Used with permission.
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