How Do You Grieve a Child Who's Still Alive?
How Do You Grieve a Child Who's Still Alive?James Luginbyhl said goodbye to his two daughters two and a half years ago. This is how he learned to grieve with God instead of running from Him.About this episodeJames grew up on a West Texas cattle ranch, where faith was inherited and feelings were buried. Then, in his late 30s, everything came apart at once. He lost his dad to cancer and his father-in-law within three months, his marriage ended, and a two-year custody battle followed over his two teenage daughters.To stop the fight from damaging the girls, James made the hardest decision of his life. He had to walk away from the custody battle and said goodbye, and he hasn't seen them since. In the middle of that loss, he finally found the grace he'd heard about his whole life. He tells Matt how he keeps hope without pretending, how he learned to forgive, and why he now writes so his daughters could find him if they ever go looking.This is an honest conversation about grief and faith held together. If you're carrying something heavy, this one is for you.Key moments00:00 Welcome03:32 From a West Texas ranch to culturally Christian06:03 When everything fell apart08:17 Saying goodbye to his daughters17:07 The grace that found him24:02 Learning to grieve with God41:29 The one message he'd preachRaised to tough it outJames was raised in the Texas Panhandle, working cattle with his granddad when he'd rather have been playing Super Nintendo. He loved it, and he also names the cost of the culture he grew up inside."There's very much cowboy culture in Texas, that you tough it up, you handle everything yourself, you don't ask for help, you definitely don't ask for grace, and if you aren't good enough, you're just not good enough."He'd always called himself a Christian. Looking back, he describes a performance-based faith he felt he could never be good enough for, and he walked away from it in his early 30s.When everything fell apartIn his late 30s the losses stacked up fast. His dad died of cancer. His father-in-law died within three months. His marriage ended as his faith and his wife's went in different directions, and a two-year custody battle over their two teenage daughters followed.James is careful here, and it matters. He won't say anything against the girls' mother, because his hope is that his daughters will one day hear this."I chose to walk away from the custody battle after two years. It wasn't because I couldn't afford the elite lawyers anymore. It was just literally I could tell how it was damaging them."He said his final goodbye around two and a half years ago. He started writing on Substack so that, if his daughters ever Google his name, they would be able to find him.The grace that found himThe turn came through a marriage class in Texas called Re-Engage. A leader there told James he didn't really understand grace. James thought he did. The leader said he didn't think so, and something started to shift.His conversion moment came later, alone in a Waffle House at three in the morning over a cup of cold coffee."I remember sitting in a Waffle House, drinking some cold coffee and just being like, God, I can't do this without You."James describes learning grace in two directions at once. Grace towards the other person, and then grace towards himself, which changed how he saw himself in God's eyes.Learning to grieve with GodFor the last couple of years, James says, his faith has mostly been about learning how to grieve with God rather than away from Him. He fell in love with the Psalms, which he'd always skipped over as poetry, starting with Psalm 42 and then Psalm 13 and its honest cry of "how long?".He also found a new picture in the story of Jesus raising Lazarus."Jesus knew the end story. He knew He was going to raise him, but instead He joined them in their grief and cried next to them. And I remember reading that story one time and just having a whole different lens of, okay, Jesus is just crying with me right now."He doesn't pretend the grief is gone. It still arrives every day, often through a photo on his phone or a song. He gives himself a moment, prays for his girls, and turns towards God rather than letting it pull him under. Forgiveness, he says, is something he sometimes has to pick back up."I'm not gonna lie to you that there's a three AM every once in a while where I wake up just mad. That happens, but it's happening way less now than it used to."He prays for his ex-wife, a practice his wife taught him, and he's clear that his healing began with forgiveness.How to show up for someone grievingMatt and James land on something simple and freeing. You don't have to fix anyone's pain to be there in it. The people who helped James most were the ones who listened, let him cry, and didn't try to tidy it away with easy answers."If you know someone who's grieving, bring food and your ears, and just hang out and spend time with them. And call them next week."James is honest that not everyone can carry grief with you, and that's all right. He leans on his wife and a couple of close friends, including a mate named Jeff who took his crying phone calls daily for a long stretch.The one message he'd preachWhen Matt asks for the one thing he'd say if he only had one message, James doesn't reach for anything complicated."Find your meaning in Christ."He read Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning early in the journey, and it stayed with him. The people who found meaning were the ones who could survive. For James, that meaning became his writing, telling his story, and helping other men walk through their own grief. Be vulnerable, he says, and don't try to white-knuckle it alone. Find the people who can handle your grief with you.Key referencesPsalm 42 and Psalm 13, the laments James came back to again and againThe book of Job, and staying solid in faith through lossThe prodigal son, which James hears now from the father's sideJesus weeping and raising Lazarus (John 11), grieving with the family before the miracleMan's Search for Meaning by Viktor FranklIt Is Well With My Soul, the old hymn James tells the story behind, which closes his bookToday's guestJames Luginbyhl lives in West Texas, where he was raised on a cattle ranch. He hosts the Credo podcast, which is Latin for "I believe", and he's the author of Hymns for the Unfinished, a book of stories about grief and overcoming. He started writing so his daughters could find him one day, and it's grown into something that now helps other grieving men. Matt is writing his own book on Christian masculinity, Act Like Men, so the two share a lot of heart for this ground.Podcast credopodcast.comBook Hymns for the Unfinished on AmazonLinksMore real stories of faith at whatsthestorypodcast.comFind out more about Crowd Church at crowd.churchNew to faith or full of questions? A good place to start is the Alpha course, a relaxed 15-week online exploration of the basics of Christianity, with people joining from all over the world. Find it at crowd.church.Crowd Church — a community for those who might not see the point of church.
