John Mark Hicks

Actually, I’m more interested in Job’s journey of faith than I am his “miserable comforters” (Job 16:2), but for the present I want to take a closer look at these “comforters.”  I have decided to do this as an exercise for my own spirituality over the next few weeks because sometimes, in the midst of my grief, […]

Was Job right? He was, I have no doubt, right about his feelings. His losses seemed to have no meaning from his vantage point. Sitting on the trash pile, thinking about his children, his wife, his isolation, his “miserable comforters,” and his future prospects, it would be well-nigh impossible for him to find meaning in […]

As I revealed in a previous post, I pray the Lord’s prayer at least three times a day…and these are some thoughts that often accompany that prayer in recent months and especially given how May 21 is now meaningful in the same way for both John and Maggy Dobbs and myself with the death of our sons, John Robert […]

This morning I received an email from a friend who will be conducting a graveside service for premature twins who died hours after their delivery. They were only 24 weeks into their term. He asked my advice. I struggled with what to say. What would I say at such a graveside service? I have spoken […]

Given my discussion of the “why” question in the last few posts, I want to offer a caution to would-be comforters. Here is some advice from a sufferer. We don’t know what God is doing in a person’s life.  We don’t know the reason “this” or “that” happened. We don’t know for certain whether there is a reason […]

When a cyclone kills over 130,000 in Myanmar and an earthquake snuffs out the lives of 80,000 more in China, I have little interest in defending or justifying God. When my son (Joshua Mark Hicks) dies of a genetic disorder after watching him slowly degenerate over ten years and I learn of the tragic death of a friend’s son (John Robert […]

Since I was disconnected from the electronic world, I was unaware of the loss that the John Dobbs family has just suffered.  John Robert Dobbs died on the same day as Joshua Mark Hicks….my son in 2001, John’s son in 2008. Here are my feelings…about God…my prayer to God. Frankly, God, I am sick and […]

After memoralizing a couple of days in my life (May 21–the date of Joshua’s death and May 22–Sheila and I would have been married thirty-one years), I feel better. It was a cathartic–a kind of cleansing–though I recognize it is a long process (and has been a long one already).  I now realize that I […]

Grief should be the instructor of the wise.  Sorrow is the knowledge.  Lord Byron Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart, Who looks outside, dreams, who looks inside, awakes.    Carl Jung I call to God; God will help me. At dusk, dawn, and noon I sigh deep sighs–he hears, he rescues.    Psalm 55:16-17 […]

Madeleine L’Engle:           “Dear God.           I hate you.           Love, Madeleine.” I have been contemplating this brief prayer for several days after I read it in Gary Thomas’ Sacred Marriage (p. 157; an excellent read, btw!). Initially, I was horrified by how much I identified with the prayer and I was quite troubled by the […]