Holding Onto God Through Devastating Loss – Highlight Episode 379

Tragedy can strike without warning, and for Granger and Amber Smith, the sudden loss of their son River became a catalyst for a profound encounter with God. Ray, E.Z., Mark, and Oscar discuss how this event revealed the fragility of worldly peace and prompted Granger to confront his own despair, ultimately leading him to find salvation. Amber shares her parallel journey of nights spent in raw grief and relentless prayer, showing that suffering can bring believers face to face with God. They explore how lament is a biblical response to pain, showing that crying out to the Lord is not a sign of weakness but a step toward healing and intimacy with Him. The conversation highlights the importance of confronting sin, understanding God rightly, and rejecting the false peace offered by the world. The guys also focus on hope for those struggling with despair or suicidal thoughts, explaining that fellowship, honest prayer, and a proper understanding of the gospel can transform despair into purpose. Finally, Granger and Amber share practical ways they have integrated grief and faith into daily life, walking their remaining children through sorrow while pointing them toward Jesus, strengthening their marriage, and deepening their ministry.

Thanks for listening! If you’ve been helped by this podcast, we’d be grateful if you’d consider subscribing, sharing, and leaving us a comment and 5-star rating!
 
Visit the Living Waters website to learn more and to access helpful resources!
You can find helpful counseling resources at biblicalcounseling.com.
Check out The Evidence Study Bible and the Basic Training Course.

You can connect with us at podcast@livingwaters.com. We're thankful for your input!
Learn more about the hosts of this podcast.
Ray Comfort
Emeal (“E.Z.”) Zwayne
Mark Spence
Oscar Navarro

Transcript

Meeting Granger And Amber

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Today, like I said, we have Granger and Amber Smith. Welcome, guys. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Yeah, all the way from Austin. Yeah. I started to read the book, and even the beginning like hit me in a huge way. But you start out this way. Hey, you, can I come in? I'm Amber and I'd love to sit with you for a few moments, if that's okay, to simply be here beside you with you. I want to lie down on the tiles next to you and look into your tired, tear-filled eyes and say, I see you. I understand. I hate that you're going through this pain. I know how deeply it hurts. And I'm so, so sorry. I don't want to jump right in and tell you all the ways that this will get better or how God has a plan for this awful thing you are going through, because I know you don't want to hear that right now. You want your life the way it was. You want your marriage healed, your finances restored, your child to stop abusing drugs. You want the cancer gone, your spouse, your mom, your friend, or even your sweet baby back in your arms. You just want this pain to stop. I know. And it's it's those last words that uh get me emotional. I know. And not a lot of people can say that, Amber, to people hurting in the way that you described there. And so tell us a little more of your story and and even how it led to you doing what you're doing now in ministry and you guys together as a couple.

The Day Everything Changed

Hitting Rock Bottom On Tour

SPEAKER_01 1:25

I was there with all three kids at the time, um, playing gymnastics with my daughter. Um the boys were playing water gun fight, and Amber was in the house, kind of getting the house ready for our bedtime routine. And it there was just this moment when I I realized it had been quiet. I hadn't heard from the boys, I hadn't heard the boys running around in maybe a minute or two. And um, I looked over my shoulder and I saw something that it couldn't compute with me. I didn't it didn't make any sense. I saw River in the pool face down, in the middle of the pool, inside the gate, you know, locked, fenced gate, which he he had no way of getting in there. Um so none of it made sense to me. And and the other thing was I had just I I just saw them. Um so I ran uh kind of crashed into the water with my daughter who was with me and and pulled him out. And and I was I was expecting him in in that moment to be coughing and crying and scared, but he was none of those things. He was lifeless and cold. And so we found out a few days later in the hospital um that he was not going to make it. That was a a catalyst in in our lives that was uh what at the time we thought was a good life.

SPEAKER_03 2:43

And that ended up just revolutionizing everything basically in your lives.

A Wake-Up In John 14

Amber’s Path Through The Valley

SPEAKER_01 2:50

Absolutely, it was a tidal wave. Those next six months, I I recognized something, especially looking back, I recognized that I was living as someone with no hope. Which is which is a huge red flag for someone that calls themselves a Christian and yet has no hope. About six months after we lost River, uh things hit rock bottom for me. Everything I thought I had built and and all the the safety nets that I had put in place, um they came crashing down in Boise, Idaho one night, actually, on the back of my tour bus. I I realized the world would be better without me. But in the Lord's kindness, I recognized in that night that I was not alone, but it wasn't God's presence that I recognized. There was an enemy present with me that had been with me a long time, that had been feeding me lies, that was speaking into me, that was offering peace, and ultimately that peace would be to end my life. And in the Lord's kindness, recognizing that that was a foreign thought, that was a thought my brain thought that it didn't generate, um, I recognized then I needed a savior. And I cried out that night for the Lord, cried out to Jesus, and I had enough peace to drop the gun onto the bed, and I fell asleep there, crying out, Lord, see, Jesus, please save me, God, save me. And so then I'm then my question was, Well, who is Jesus really? If I thought I've always known him, I could articulate the gospel, I could tell you where certain Bible verses are. I used to teach FCA in high school, like I'm a Christian, right? But this is different. This is different. Who is he really? So I began just pouring over uh sermons and YouTube videos and just trying to figure out who he was. I was listening to a sermon by John Piper. He was preaching out of John 14. And he says, the disciple asked Jesus in John 14, Lord, why is it that you manifest yourself to us and not to the world? And I kind of leaned in. I was driving my truck, I leaned in and I thought, oh, this is I think this might be the question that I've been asking. Like whatever Jesus is gonna say might be the answer I've been looking for. Because I felt him on that tour bus. He came to me, he loved me, but why did he do that? Yeah. And Jesus answers him if anyone loves me, he will keep my word. And my father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. It was not the answer I was expecting. But in some kind of reverse psychology, I knew in that moment, I know I feel like that was on the timeline, that was the day of my salvation because I suddenly became aware of my sin. I came, I became aware that for so long I was a sinner, and yet the Lord sought me and saved me in my darkest moment, you know, Romans 5 8 moment. The Lord saved me and loved me. And he says that you'll know the people that I do this to because those people keep my word. And I was like, you know, this reverse psychology. Not being someone that even knew his word, suddenly, in my desires were rearranged, suddenly I wanted to know his word, all of it. And I, you turned and went home that day, and I said, Babe, we're reading too many devotionals. We need to read the Bible. Nice. And she said, Where? And I said, let's start in Matthew. Let's start in Matthew 1 and let's read forward. We've been eating salad and we need steak. And from that day on, I wanted to know him as he's revealed himself in his word. And I can't, I can never get enough of knowing more and more who he is.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

Amber, real quick, uh, just because from experience, I know that grief and suffering often um we process differently at different times. So I'd love to just hear your parallel story from that moment um in the backyard leading up to that moment where he did that U-turn. Tell us just about how you processed your relationship with the Lord. Would that look like for you?

SPEAKER_04 7:19

Yeah, I uh just the year before we lost River, I had I had found my seeking, I had begun seeking. I started going to women's Christian women's conferences. I was reading devotionals, I was doing women's Bible studies, but I didn't truly know who who God was as he reveals himself to be in scripture. And that night, um, as you can imagine, was one of the worst nights of our entire lives. And I start the book with the girl to with a letter to the girl on the bathroom floor because that's where I was. And so I wanted to meet the girl where she was. I was on the bathroom floor in the hospital whenever my son was down the hall, and we knew that we were about to have to say goodbye. So I don't want to, the Lord has been so kind over the last six years to heal so much of my heart and reveal himself to me. But I know that there are people that are still on day one of their of their grief and pain. So I wanted to meet them where they are and say, I see you, and just sit with them in that, but also tell them what I have found to be true about God. And we, as you said, we both grieved very differently. One day he would be having a good day, as good of a day that you can have, and I would be having a very low day, or he would be having a low day, and I would be having a good day. But we made this unromantic agreement in the hospital when we were having to say goodbye to River that we were gonna find the good in this, that we were gonna not let anything tear our family apart, and that we were gonna fight for each other and we were gonna choose each other every day. And that's what we did. And it wasn't pretty, but God brought us through something that almost killed him and brought us alive in Christ. And it just was a complete 180 in our lives. He transformed everything, flipped everything upside down, lowered our passions for everything else, and increased our passion for who he was. But it was when I began studying the scriptures when he said, Let's read Matthew 1. I would have told you I knew God, I knew Jesus. I knew I could tell you that Jesus died for me, but I didn't know who he was. I didn't know where he was in our pain and our suffering. So I begged God every day through tears and prayer and reading my Bible to show himself to me, to reveal himself to me. And he carried me through that dark time. And I I don't ever want to go through something like that again, but I almost miss that intimacy of that valley because you're so he's he is so close to you in the valley. And I miss that. Um, I still crave him and love him and feel him, and you know, and and know that he's speaking to me in his word, but there's something about being in the depths where he meets you right where you are. And it's it's so kind and sweet, and he has just been so faithful through the worst thing that we could imagine.

SPEAKER_03 9:40

You know, Ray, I I just wanted to have you touch on this, but recognizing that there's something in terms of not being a real Christian, right? Like the true and false conversion that you talk about, like that tragedy brought that about and how important that is that that people examine themselves to see that they're in the faith, because that's not popular today.

False Conversions And Real Faith

SPEAKER_05 10:02

Especially in the Bible belt. And in Southern California, where most people have been born again six or eight times. Right. Well, they've named the name of Christ, but never to part of iniquity. And I think the the fault lies in the pulpits, because so many ministers could not be called sons of thunder. They don't preach sin, righteousness, and judgment. They preach everything around that, and yet that's most necessary for someone to understand their state before God. Sin, transgression of the law, righteousness, which is God's holiness, and judgment. There's a day of judgment coming. And that's what's left out. And that's why instead of preaching the straight gate and people strive to enter, they preach a wide gate, just come in and give your heart to Jesus, and we've got masses of false converts, and it's frightening to think that a tragedy sometimes has to come along to awaken some, but we can actually put people into a tragedy of realizing they're under God's wrath and awakening them that way. You don't have to wait for someone's house to burn down before they realize they're in trouble with God to make them look heavenward. And that's we need to go back to biblical preaching.

Lament, Sovereignty, And Comfort

SPEAKER_04 11:08

Yeah, you know, I write in the book, I'm so thankful for that gift of lament. Like just the beautiness of God and how He created us and gave us a way to cry and to grieve and to lament. We have the scriptures that show us, all everyone in the Psalms, crying out to God, lamenting to the Lord. I wouldn't just off track one second. People try to get God off the hook, and they tried to get God off the hook for our loss. And they would look at us and say, God had nothing to do with this. God hadn't would never take your son, God would never do this or that.

SPEAKER_05 11:38

Right, right.

SPEAKER_04 11:38

It's like, and then we went through this wrestle of, well, then where was he? Where was coming with it? Is he not powerful enough? Is Satan really in control? There is a war question. Did he just miss it?

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Did he not know? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:48

And that puts the power in the wrong place. And there's no freedom and comfort in that. There's comfort in a knowing that God doesn't miss a thing. We might not understand it in our finite minds this side of heaven, but we can know through the scriptures that God is sovereign over everything. Satan is on a leash. Maybe maybe Satan did do it like he did to Job. But God only allows Satan to do so much. So I know that was off track, but that just I think people tried people tried to take God off the hook for us. And I think just coming to know the God of the Bible is what truly allowed me to lament to God, to see the stories of Job and how he lamented to the Lord and David and the Psalms. And so I would just say practically, cry out to the Lord. Hit your knees. And even if you don't know if he exists, say, God, I don't know if I believe in you. Show me. Show me who you are. Pray and cry and lament. I allowed myself every day to cry and to let it out, to not stuff it down because grief will eat away at your bones and damage you. And I just I gave myself grace to do that every day before the kids woke up. So I would say practically wake up, lament to the Lord. He he already knows. He already knows. Just as long as you're going to him, there's healing in that.

Parenting Kids Through Grief

SPEAKER_00 12:59

And I remember just thinking, Lord, what are you doing? You know, how am I gonna how am I gonna move on from this? And I and I heard somebody say, You will never move on from this. But by God's grace, you'll move forward with this. God's not calling you to move on. How do I how do I forget a memory? How do I forget a person who was so impactful in my life? How do I forget them? No, you're not called to forget them. You're called to move forward by God's grace.

SPEAKER_03 13:33

I I'd like to end on just an encouragement to maybe people listening who have experienced tragedy and who have young children. What would you say to those that have to walk their children, whether it's through a tragedy like this or even just, you know, someone died naturally in the family or and they're just hurting? How do you how do you work through that?

SPEAKER_04 13:52

You know, we I can only say what worked for us. There's no perfect way to grieve. Um, but I would say we very much kept River very much alive in our home. We we talked about him all the time. We allowed the children to talk about him. We didn't lock up his toys and make his room like off limits. We let them see us grieve. We let them see us cry. We talked to them about this world is broken. That's not the way that the world is supposed to be. It's not the way that God intended it, but it's not gonna be this way forever. God is rescuing all, he's rescuing his people, he's redeeming, making all things new. So with our eyes on Christ, we can get through anything. And we just allowed them to feel any emotion they were feeling. So we just we prayed, we cried, we allowed them to see us grieve, we we looked to Christ and assured them that nothing was gonna tear our family apart and that we were gonna make it through this together with our eyes on the Lord.

unknown 14:37

Wow.

Christ First In Family Worship

SPEAKER_01 14:37

But I tell you, if a deep meditation on the Godhead, as Spurgeon said, is the solution to all sorrow, well, we we talk about Jesus a lot more than we talk about river at our house. And our family worship, we'll go through the scripture, you know, three minutes of scripture and three minutes of prayer and three minutes of singing, and we do this as many mornings as as we're allowed to do it, um, looking to Christ first. And and then river is another conversation we have, but we don't we wouldn't ever talk about river more than we talk about Christ, you know.

Highlights Wrap And Next Steps

SPEAKER_03 15:10

Thank you for tuning in to this week's highlights from the Living Waters podcast, friends. We value your time. So we've created a bite-sized version of our podcast for listeners who want to get equipped without the jokes and fellowship. Be sure to check out the full episode every Thursday where we dive deeper into the topic. Until then, you can watch the full podcast episode available now on livingwaters.tv.