Why can’t we talk to our loved one who has passed? I am having a very hard time with death and the feeling that it is cruel that we can’t know our loved one is ok. My years of church taught me to know of God’s love for us which gives us eternal life, but the cruelty of not knowing how our loved one is or their terrible suffering seems so unlike the personality I have had of God.
Dear ______,
I am so sorry for your heartache at missing your loved one. I truly understand; it’s only been a few months since we lost our son and we miss him very much.
I think God uses the heartache of losing communication with our loved ones to remind us that death and separation was not part of His original good creation, so we gain a fuller understanding of the impact of sin on our world—and why it required something as huge as the death of God’s Son to rectify. I also believe God redeems the pain of grief so we can learn how to turn to Him as “the God of all comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3). If we were able to communicate with our loved ones, it would be so easy to bypass God altogether and just seek to connect with our friends and family—just as we so often do with those with us on earth.
We are so limited by our earthly existence, we can’t begin to imagine the intense joy and glory of our believing loved ones’ life in heaven. And if you could see your unbelieving loved one in the torment of hell, would that bring you any peace, or would it rip you apart inside? I think that “not knowing” is the grace of God for us still here on earth.
It’s interesting and poignant that you used the world “cruelty.” And it’s easy to think that it’s God who is being cruel. But the true source of cruelty in our enemy, Satan, whose agenda is to “steal, kill and destroy” (John 10:10). It was his idea to inflict immeasurable pain on us as God’s image-bearers by bringing sin into the Garden of Eden.
We do know in Deuteronomy 18 that God forbids us try to contact the dead. He even calls it an abomination. All of God’s prohibitions are given to us for our protection and blessing, so like with so many other things, there must be something about God’s “no” in this issue that is meant for our good.
The Got Questions website has a couple of articles you may find helpful as well:
If we talk to loved ones who have died, do they hear us?
Can I ask God to deliver a message to a loved one who has died?
______, I send this with a prayer for the God of all comfort to give you His comfort as you trust Him in His goodness. And in Paul’s words in 2 Thessalonians 3:16, “Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way.”
Warmly,
Sue Bohlin
Posted Jan. 2025
© 2025 Probe Ministries
Sue Bohlin
Sue Bohlin is an associate speaker/writer and webmistress for Probe Ministries. She attended the University of Illinois, and has been a Bible teacher and conference speaker for over 40 years. She is a speaker for MOPS (Mothers of Pre-Schoolers) and Stonecroft Ministries (Christian Women's Connections), and serves on the board of Living Hope Ministries, a Christ-centered outreach to those dealing with unwanted homosexuality. Sue is on the Bible.org Women's Leadership Team and is a regular contributor to Bible.org's Engage Blog. In addition to being a professional calligrapher, she is the wife of Probe's Dr. Ray Bohlin and the mother of a son in San Francisco and another son who joined his baby sister in heaven in 2024.. Her personal website is suebohlin.com.
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