The Empty Chair
Amidst the challenges of planning a wedding, there is one practicality that stands apart from the rest. I am, of course, referring to the seating arrangement. Indeed, once the guest list has been made - which in and of itself can be difficult - it seems nothing short of mental gymnastics to coordinate, untangle, and arrange these guests in a manner that seems best.
Nearly two years ago now, my wife and I were finalizing the seating arrangement for our own wedding. At the time, we found ourselves, though ever so slightly, impeded not only by space limitations, but by the lingering limitations of the pandemic as well. Despite these obstacles, I at one point in the ever-changing Rubik’s Cube of our seating chart had a fleeting idea: what about reserving an empty chair at the front table for Tata?
I say this idea was fleeting because, quite simply, we could not spare the space - even for an individual who was ‘not there’. What I at first imagined to be a heartwarming and honoring tribute soon became impractical above all else. An empty chair at the front table, where my immediate family was to sit, meant that someone actually at the wedding could not sit there. This idea of mine was so passing in nature that it never passed beyond my own thoughts into words, not even to my wife.
Tata, my father, had passed away several years before my wife and I got married - in fact, well before her and I ever met. It was in the days and weeks leading up to my wedding that I became more acutely and intimately aware of my father’s absence - indeed, a felt absence, as it were. That itch, that phantom limb, of his once overwhelming presence in my life began to overshadow my heart as the day approached. After my wife and Lord, I must admit, there may have been no one’s presence I wished for more dearly on the day of my wedding than that of my father’s.
However, our wedding was to be a day of joy and celebration, not a day of sorrow and sadness. As much as I wanted to honor my father, I did not want to do so in such a way that would distract from the day’s true purpose. I knew it would be folly to focus on that which was missing, for in doing so one could so easily miss everything else; and this was not a day to be missed. My father’s ‘presence’, or lack thereof, would inevitably be felt throughout the day by myself and others - that was expected, and that was okay.
Indeed, a visibly ‘empty chair’ for my father on our wedding day was unnecessary; no one needed a reminder of his absence.
Life is filled with empty chairs, is it not? For those of us who have lost dear ones, does not the grief feel fresh when the milestones of life begin to pass us by? Engagements, weddings, graduations, birthdays, funerals, births, anniversaries - these are all necessary and beautiful threads that make up the mosaic of our lives. However, it is within these that the echo of our loved one’s life begins to ring again; all the chairs around us are filled, save a few. We have moved on, yet they remain the same. My father will forever be fifty-six in my mind; that is, until I see him again and he proves to me otherwise.
That’s the dirty little secret about grief: it doesn’t go away, it lingers. With each passing year it takes on a different form to be sure, but it still remains. Grief grows with us, not away from us. However, as the years ebb, covered softly by “the velvet feet of darkness”, there is a sweetness to grief that begins to take hold. A warmth blooms within the soul that, like David after the death of his child, can now dare to say with joyful sorrow, “Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23).
When a dear friend, parent, spouse, or child passes to be with the Lord, we become reminded of the fact that we have skin in the game. Suddenly, there is no room for a fickle faith; either the Bible is true, all of it, or it isn’t - simple as that. But because the Bible is true, because Christ finally and fully secures the salvation of those who cast themselves on Him, we have hope. Hope that this is not a life that leads to death, but a death that leads to life, and life abundant. Hope that, though their chairs may be empty here below, it is because they have taken up residence forever at the side of Him who invited them by name to the Wedding Feast of the Lamb:
“‘Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests” (Matthew 22:9-10).
For those of us in Christ, this is our great hope; for both ourselves and those who have gone on before us. After the death of his son, David wrestled with his grief until he could say, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints” (Psalm 116:15). Dear brother and sister, if there is an empty chair in your midst today, rest assured that it is because your loved one had another appointment to keep. For they were invited by name, just as you were, to sit at a chair with a handwritten place card, written by the very hands that were pierced for our transgressions. They now occupy a seat that is less a chair than it is a throne - one that shall never again go empty.
Photo by ashleyphotography.ca
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