Tuesday's Trust - The Grace Card ~Tommy and Angie Prince

Tuesday's Trust

The Grace Card

~Tommy and Angie Prince

Tonight, Tommy and I watched a movie... about what you ask? Just ask our two sons -- What do we do to take a break away from our grief and trauma? You probably guessed it ~ we watch a movie about grief or trauma!

We entered into watching this movie tonight with fear and trepidation as we've watched our share of "somewhat hoaky" to "pretty hoaky" movies about grief. We all know it is pretty hard to show what a child-loss parent's grief looks like...

And here comes this dvd that is made up of mostly volunteers... {We don't mind that of course ~ our nephew was an actor volunteer in "We Are Marshall" (he was the kicker on the football team), and our own son Rollin recently has been cast in one of these types of movies, one called "Laughing at the Moon," but this movie has not yet been released. (I'm sure you'll hear more about that later!)}

We were teasing each other before watching this particular grief movie, called "The Grace Card" by saying:

"We'll give it ten minutes...!"

We seem to have this need to check out all the movies we can about child-loss. 

Another movie we recently checked out was, "The Other Woman" ~ another movie about child-loss. Though it had a famous actress (Natalie Portman) starring in it, it seemed to fall flat to us. But then our standards are pretty high about whether people can "capture" such a grief as the one we are living out day by day, hour by grief-struck hour.

In the movie tonight, "The Grace Card," fortunately we were pleasantly surprised (if you can be pleasantly surprised about grief). The "grieving family" members were continuing to show the pain and struggle that I'm sure can still be with you after 17 years of grieving, complete with the toll such grief takes upon every family member, each feeling grief's pain and chaos in their own unique way. The main character, the "father" in particular (who is a Christian stand-up comedian by trade) did an excellent job of portraying the angst of a child-loss father: with the soul-searching questions, the guilt, the isolating oneself from others who don't or can't "get it," the power of life-stopping triggering moments, the guilt, the anger, the repulsion over "God-talk" when it is plastic, cliche, cheesy, or a quick cop-out versus the authentic experience of God that can be loving, comforting, challenging, growth-producing, and life-transforming. 

How many of us secretly harbor that self-blame still? How many of us feel the continued raw anger and wonder where is this coming from, and is this perhaps the start of bitterness, or is the anger mere self-protection needed to survive another day? This movie showed a simple but powerful concept of grace ~ grace toward others, and grace toward yourself amidst such grief. 

This movie seems to stand alone in showing the transcending quality that the spiritual component can bring to one's grief. The movie aptly captured both the angst of child-loss, but also the redemptive component that can come in child-loss as you learn to extend grace to yourself (and others) amidst your pain. 

And "The Grace Card" didn't show this redemptive quality in a cheap way, but in an authentic-enough way that we were right in the pain with the parent. And we were right there in the grace with him too. 

This movie is one that seemed to come close to capturing some of the real agony of a child-loss griever, and that of the other child-loss family members. And yet, it also presented a fairly authentic portrait of the grace that we trust is also an important aspect of our healing as God, by His tender mercy, enables us to learn ways to transcend our terrible angst and pain.

Picture, thanks to Amazon.com