When life takes a turn down the unwanted path...lessons learned from the Walton's

1 Peter 1:21

who through Him are believers in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God

I watched another episode from the Walton's on Youtube. For those who were not around when it first came out the Walton's was a story about family, faith and life growing up during the depression. The series appeared on Sunday evenings on CBS. In my home it was one of the shows our family were allowed to watch. 

As I watched this episode which was written through the eyes of all of the Walton's I saw the impact of grief on each one of them when the youngest sister becomes paralyzed after falling down a unstable pile of logs after placing a baby bird back in it's nest within arms reach on top of those logs.

When the two youngest boys returned from the swimming hole they soon realized that their neglectfulness in securing the logs lead to their sister's tragedy. Each of them processed the tragedy differently. The older of the two boys went to work and began buying things for his sister and momentarily giving them to her, but never staying long enough to spend time with her which is what she really wanted her brother to do.  The youngest one blames himself and decides that it would be best to leave the family totally until grandpa reaches out to him and reminds 'Jim Bob' that this too shall pass.

I was reminded that life is full of uncertain and unexpected things that have a tendency to make life messy, but when they do it is our faith that we cling too that make those messy things make sense.  I won't give away the plot from this episode in case you are inclined to watch it, but I will say that valuable lessons on grief can be learned from this episode.

When tragedy strikes a family it is important to know that everyone responds to that tragedy differently and  there is no cookie cutter approach to healing from that event. Like the Walton's God will bring each family member through the fiery event in very individual and specific ways. In time the family will come out stronger than they did before the tragedy. Until He does it is our faith in God that help us weather the storm.