Episode 38
Shattered Amid the Celebration

Jill LeBlanc:
00:05

Hi and welcome. This is Charlie and Jill LeBlanc and we are here to talk about finding hope, getting through what you never asked for. There’s a lot that that covers in there.

Charlie LeBlanc:
00:18

A lot, a lot, because there’s so many things that hit us in life, every day even sometimes that we don’t ask for it. It comes and we have to deal with it by the grace of God. We need help.

Jill LeBlanc:
00:30

Yeah.

Charlie LeBlanc:
00:30

Every day of our life.

Jill LeBlanc:
00:32

We do.

Charlie LeBlanc:
00:33

Yeah. To get through these things.

Jill LeBlanc:
00:34

And thank God the Lord is there for us every day.

Charlie LeBlanc:
00:37

Yep. He’s a present help in time of need. I love that. You know? He’s present with us always.

Jill LeBlanc:
00:44

All the time.

Charlie LeBlanc:
00:44

But he’s also a present help in a time of need when things are really, really tough, which, you know, we’ve experienced very tough times, not just the loss of our son, but other very difficult things with our kids, children, friends, losing loved ones, life in general, very, very tough situations. But he is a present help. He is present in every difficult situation and is including our losses. You know. We thank God for that.

Jill LeBlanc:
01:18

Here we are approaching Christmas.

Charlie LeBlanc:
01:20

Just a couple days away.

Jill LeBlanc:
01:22

And we were talking earlier about realizing the real meaning of Christmas, which, you know, commercialization makes it so hard to realize the real meaning of Christmas. Now, am super blessed when I go through our neighborhood. Our neighborhood is crazy as far as I mean, it’s like one neighbor tries to outdo the next neighbor, which we’re not in that.

Charlie LeBlanc:
01:52

We’re not in that competition.

Jill LeBlanc:
01:54

No, but it sure is enjoyable as we drive through to look at other people’s spirit of competition. But when I see the ones that that have nativity scenes and angels and things like that in their front yards versus all the alternatives, it’s really cool. And so I feel like, you know, well, maybe more people realize, but not if they’re, you know, it just depends on what they’ve been exposed to as they’ve grown up and in their families and all this. But in regards to grief, you know, that- can realizing the real meaning of Christmas affect our grief?

Charlie LeBlanc:
02:37

Oh, absolutely. It it helps us so much. And, you know, just before I get into this, I I wanna say you were talking about the decorations.

Jill LeBlanc:
02:45

Yeah.

Charlie LeBlanc:
02:46

And what what do what did you buy and put out in the front? Not not this week, but prior.

Charlie LeBlanc:
02:53

What do we have for the past few years?

Jill LeBlanc:
02:54

So we have an inflatable in our front yard and I thought it was the cutest thing ever. It is Mary and Joseph and Mary is pregnant and she’s up on a donkey and Joseph is guiding the donkey and then there’s a palm tree behind them.

Charlie LeBlanc:
03:14

A palm tree of all things cuz we’re in Florida. Yeah. And it’s called Journey to Jerusalem is the name of the inflatable. It’s real cute. And so, I have always wanted to get another one, which I ended up just purchasing. I’m not gonna put it out until the night of Christmas Eve, but it’s an inflatable of Mary holding baby Jesus and Joseph right there next to her. So I’ll put it out Christmas Eve night and I’ll take down the other one. And so we have the whole story then.

Charlie LeBlanc:
03:51

Yeah. So that’s pretty funny. But, yeah, so so really, you know, I think the the problem with with Christmas for us who grieve is the commercialism of it. You know, everybody be happy, everybody, you know, decorate the trees, all this all this stuff that’s totally secular. You know, I don’t mean against it.

Charlie LeBlanc:
04:16

I’m just saying that part of the grief thing is is dealing with the presence, the families and all these different things that are not really the true meaning of Christmas. And, you know, to to realize as a grieving person, someone who’s lost a loved one, to realize that Jesus came into the world to give us eternal life, to forgive us of sins and give us eternal life. You know? So for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes on him would have eternal life would not perish. And so it’s it’s I don’t know, you know, when you’re approaching the season, maybe maybe we need to just dig in a little deeper to knowing what the true meaning is.

Charlie LeBlanc:
05:02

You know, thank God we have, churches that when you go to church services, thank God they’re emphasizing the right thing. We’re we’re we’re together as Christians and we are emphasizing this is all about Jesus coming to forgive us of sins and to give us eternal life and and, you know, to release us from the bondage of the devil. And this is could possibly be a part of our comfort into knowing, obviously, knowing that our loved ones through the birth of Jesus Christ, knowing that our loved ones are have eternal life, knowing that they are with Jesus forever. And you may say, Charlie, well, I’m not even sure if my loved one knew Jesus. Well, you know what?

Charlie LeBlanc:
05:48

None of us really know what’s in the heart of a man. You say, well, Charlie, he was so mean or she was so mean and blah, blah, blah. We still don’t know what was in their heart even at the point of death. We don’t know what their decision was. I mean, Jesus could have appeared to them even as they took their last breath and said, here I am.

Charlie LeBlanc:
06:12

And they could have said, Lord, forgive me. I’m with you. I want to be with you. I mean, at that moment. So I think we shouldn’t be so quick to just say, well, our loved one didn’t know Jesus, you know?

Charlie LeBlanc:
06:23

Maybe they didn’t know it in their life, but they may have met him in their death, in their moment of death. And so I think we need to just why not why not just trust that? Let’s just believe that you know, God is so gracious. He’s so big. And in the way that he loves people and, you know, you were a Christian, you love the Lord, and you had been a witness to your loved one and and our friend or whatever.

Charlie LeBlanc:
06:50

You had been a light and you had given them some sort of hope. You know, maybe they rejected it into your face. Maybe they cussed cussed the God out. Maybe they, you know, they said they’d never be a Christian, whatever. But still we don’t know the seeds that were planted.

Charlie LeBlanc:
07:06

We don’t know what happens at the point of death. And so I think to just know that Christmas is celebrating the birth of Jesus to give us life in that more abundantly.

Jill LeBlanc:
07:18

Yeah. And I’m reminded of the scripture that says that God wants, He longs for all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. The Father longs for that. And you know He’s going to do everything in His power to make that happen. So we can’t give up hope because we just don’t know what happens once they slip into that supernatural realm of eternity.

Charlie LeBlanc:
07:51

That’s right. So when we you know, shake off all the the, you know, the the holly and the and the and the and the, you know, the tree and the the Christmas commercialism, you know, push all that aside because sometimes that can bring the grief that can bring, you know, the pain. But push it off for a minute and just dive into Jesus. You came. This is what Christmas is all about.

Charlie LeBlanc:
08:22

You came that to give us life and to give us eternal life, to give us, you know, give my loved one. Heaven is the doors of heaven are wide open for each one of us. And I just think, Jill, that that’s that can help. You know, I know that when Beau first died, I know that we knew that he went straight into the arms of Jesus. I know it’s still hurt on our side.

Charlie LeBlanc:
08:48

The pain of grief hurt. And so just someone to say, oh, praise the Lord, he’s in heaven. That didn’t help us at But, that you know, I’m thinking more about those who are approaching the holidays and approaching Christmas. You know, I think for me, I think when I get into those sober moments, even when I was hurting so bad fifteen years ago, even a year after two years after both past as we approach these holidays, it was more of the the commercialism of Christmas that freaked me out and that made it hard for me to I didn’t want to decorate. I want to do anything like that.

Charlie LeBlanc:
09:26

But it wasn’t the heart of Christmas. The heart of Christmas brought me peace.

Jill LeBlanc:
09:31

Yeah.

Charlie LeBlanc:
09:31

And that was a Jesus love so loved the world that he gave God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have eternal life. Just the fact that Jesus stripped himself of the Godhead, came down, became a man, humbled himself and died on the cross to forgive mankind of sin, that we could all be free and that our loved ones could enter into eternity.

Charlie LeBlanc:
09:58

That’s, you know, with him. That’s definitely a comforting thought.

Jill LeBlanc:
10:03

Yeah, it is. No doubt.

Jill LeBlanc:
10:05

I want to read this from the Passion Translation. And I just want to encourage you, if you haven’t looked into the Passion Translation, it is so, I just love it. It’s so

Charlie LeBlanc:
10:20

Passionate.

Jill LeBlanc:
10:21

It’s passionate for sure. And it just brings another level of understanding of our wonderful Lord.

Charlie LeBlanc:
10:33

It really does.

Jill LeBlanc:
10:34

And so we’ve all read Isaiah 9:6. You know, it’s the wonderful passage of, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Well, just thought about reading it in the Passion, and the book of Isaiah has not been out that long in the Passion translation, so I don’t think I’ve ever read this scripture in it before, but it’s really powerful. It says, A child has been born for us and a son has been given to us. The Lord sent him for us.

Jill LeBlanc:
11:09

It says, responsibility of complete dominion will rest on his shoulders and his name will be the wonderful one. The extraordinary strategist. In most translations, it says counselor, but he is the extraordinary strategist. And a lot of us need that, don’t we? We need extraordinary strategy from the Lord.

Jill LeBlanc:
11:36

We need his wisdom. We need just to hear from him to carry on in this life, especially if things have been turned upside down. The mighty God, the Father of eternity, that’s the everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace. Great and vast is His dominion and He will bring immeasurable peace and prosperity. That’s so beautiful.

Charlie LeBlanc:
12:05

That’s pretty cool.

Jill LeBlanc:
12:06

Yeah. And that’s what the Lord has given to us in the true meaning of Christmas, in sending his son to us. And it can be really challenging if we are living with loss, living with grief, but he wants to be our Prince of Peace. And he sent Jesus so that we can have his peace. We can have peace in the middle of grief, you know.

Jill LeBlanc:
12:42

Like, you know, we were talking recently about attending a funeral of a very close friend, and I was in a lot of grief during that service for her family, as well as for losing my good friend in this life. I know she’s in heaven with Jesus and oh my gosh, she loved the Lord so much. And I just know she is rejoicing greatly and enjoying it so much. But man, I’m gonna miss her on this side. I remember being in the service and grieving, but yet still I had a hope.

Jill LeBlanc:
13:24

I had a peace. It was so hard and challenging, but yet I knew that the Prince of Peace was right there with me to hold me. And He’ll be right, He is right there with you.

Charlie LeBlanc:
13:38

Amen.

Jill LeBlanc:
13:39

To hold your heart. He is the Prince of Peace.

Charlie LeBlanc:
13:44

Yeah. Yeah. It’s a tough one. You know, some of you actually may be alone this Christmas. You know, maybe you don’t have family in town and maybe you’re just, you won’t have your husband with you.

Charlie LeBlanc:
13:59

You won’t have your wife with you. You won’t have your child with you. And and I can imagine how hard that that could be if you’re all alone. But, again, we’ve said it, and I know I know it’s sometimes, trivial to say, well, God is with you. But he is, and he is the comforter, and he will be with you.

Charlie LeBlanc:
14:22

And I know Jill said many times, I want Jesus with skin on, so have someone come over that represents Jesus so we get that too. But at the same time, you know, if you’re having to face this Christmas by yourself, know, number one, that that God is with you, the Holy Spirit is with you, and and our hearts are with you as well. We’re praying for you. We’re we’re trusting that God is gonna help you get through this terrible time and, you know, give you peace, give you strength, and, you know, thank God for livestream, church services and and for, you know, bible teaching on television and and, you know, healthy Christmas music, which we have an album that we believe is healthy Christian music, not just, you know, rocking around the Christmas tree.

Jill LeBlanc:
15:19

Mhmm.

Charlie LeBlanc:
15:19

But, not that I’m against all the fun stuff too. I don’t I’m not downing it, but I’m just saying, you know, when you’re hurting, you need more than just, you know, a jolly jolly Christmas song.

Jill LeBlanc:
15:31

Mhmm.

Charlie LeBlanc:
15:31

You know, or Frosty’s a Snowman. You know, you need to know that Jesus is with you. You need to know that he is, gonna comfort you and be with you.

Charlie LeBlanc:
15:40

And that our our album called The Little Child, I was just mentioning the might as well talk about it now. But, you know, we we purposely went through the songs and picked ones that we felt would really be, you know, speak the word of God, speak about Jesus, joy to the world, speaking about the Lord has come silent night, talking about that moment that Jesus was born. Glory to God in the highest. I wrote that song and Mary and Joseph is a beautiful song about, I think, a couple of podcasts, a few podcasts ago, we put this song on the end of the podcast. Beautiful song about Mary being told by the angel that, you know, she was going to give birth to the savior and Joseph seeing her pregnant and saying, what the heck is going on here?

Charlie LeBlanc:
16:24

So it’s an incredible song, by the way. You should get this album to listen to these. What child is this? Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel. You wrote a song called The Little Child, Gloria in Excelsis Deo, Crippus song for all year round, like a brother that we know wrote that, Randy Stonehill.

Charlie LeBlanc:
16:45

The Savior Has Come, another one that a friend of ours wrote, Oh Come All Ye Faithful, which we are going to play at the end of this. But but again, you know, you’re if you’re hurting, if you’re alone, you know, put on some healthy Christian music, not the one that’s gonna make you make you wanna smile, make you wanna be happy, but that’ll minister to you. You know, I know that when I was going through this deep pain that there were sometimes I couldn’t even worship. I would go to church and just stand there with my hands in my pocket. But, but the music, when it was done in spirit and in truth, it ministered to me.

Charlie LeBlanc:
17:24

And it was almost like the Lord was washing me with it with songs. It’s like it’s almost like he was singing over me at times. And so that’s our prayer for you is that, you know, you would if you are alone and if you’re depressed and having a difficult time going through this season, that you would find something, whether it’s, like I said, a program on television, a a good preacher, a good teacher, a good service that that is honoring Jesus, a candlelight service, whatever it might be, or get some good good Christian worship music, you know, and and just let it draw you close to him. You know, there was a scripture. I was actually looking on my phone for it, but I couldn’t find it.

Charlie LeBlanc:
18:03

But it it just basically says that the Lord waits for us to come to him, that he may show us his salvation and he longs to be gracious to us.

Jill LeBlanc:
18:13

Yes.

Charlie LeBlanc:
18:14

And, you know, I know that when we’re in pain, I know that the Lord is weeping with us and I know that he is reaching out to comfort us. And many times like a wounded dog, you know, we don’t want to leave me alone. Don’t, you know, we don’t want anyone to touch us when we’re trying to help us. And sometimes the Lord’s really trying to help us when we’re in a lot of pain and hurt. And, but we have to let him.

Charlie LeBlanc:
18:38

We have to really allow him to comfort us. I know, Jill, you know, you’ve testified so often how angry you were when Beau died and that you just you just turned God off. You you turned a hard a cold shoulder to him. He said, I’m not I’m not, you know, I’m over this. I’m angry.

Charlie LeBlanc:
18:54

And there’s a season for that, and that’s okay. There’s a time for it. But, but, you know, thank God the Lord kept just tapping you on the shoulder with love

Jill LeBlanc:
19:03

Mhmm.

Charlie LeBlanc:
19:04

And with his compassion showing you that he loved you and he wasn’t the one that hurt you and that he wanted to help heal your broken heart. And and that’s what he does to each one of us in our pain, in our hurt, in our sin, in whatever difficulty we get into.

Charlie LeBlanc:
19:22

He is tapping us on the shoulder saying, I love you so much. I want to be with you. I want to comfort you. I want to minister to you. He’s always there trying to help us get through these really tough times.

Charlie LeBlanc:
19:36

So I pray that these words will help you and comfort you in some way.

Jill LeBlanc:
19:40

Yeah. And we just wanted to mention, Charlie was talking about the Christmas album. We have a special $5 download sale going on for the rest of this month. So it’s a great time to pick up the whole album, but we do wanna give you we’re gonna play a song for so you, it’ll be on the end of this podcast. And we did one last week and one the week before, you can listen to those for free.

Charlie LeBlanc:
20:08

Yeah, and they’re all on Spotify and YouTube and Apple Music as well. So, you know, but if you want to have a download on your own phone or whatever of the songs, you can get it through our website as well.

Jill LeBlanc:
20:25

So we know that if you’re listening to this on the day that it comes out, it’s Christmas week, it’s a couple days before Christmas, we just pray for you that God’s grace will be on you for this week to help walk you through this time because He loves you so much. And He understands the pains that we walk through. And He is compassionate towards you. So we just, let’s just pray, pray right now for everyone listening. Father, we thank you that you are the God of all comfort. You are the Father of compassion and we just are so grateful that you don’t turn away from us when we’re faithless, but you remain faithful and continue reaching out to us. We just thank you so much for your love for us. Thank you.

Jill LeBlanc:
21:27

And I pray for everyone here that they would experience your comfort. You are the God of all comfort, that they would experience it genuinely, tangibly in their hearts, and they would experience your peace. You are the Prince of Peace and you were sent to each one of us. So we pray they would tangibly experience your peace, your comfort, all the things that you are to us, Lord, that they would experience the God of all

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:00

Yes, Jesus.

Jill LeBlanc:
22:02

We thank you, Father, for your love.

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:04

Yes, Lord.

Jill LeBlanc:
22:05

And thank you for helping them through this time.

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:08

Yes.

Jill LeBlanc:
22:09

In the name of Jesus, thank you for sending Jesus to us.

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:13

Amen.

Jill LeBlanc:
22:14

Thank you, father. Amen.

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:17

Yes. Yes. Beautiful. Well, again, we do love you and our compassion is with you and we’re praying for the strength of the Holy Spirit as Jill prayed to be with you through this difficult time. And, you know, most people would end the program saying Merry Christmas, you know, But, but I don’t know. I was thinking about that that, you know, I wanna say, have a blessed time with Jesus, you know, and and have have a have a time with him to help heal your broken heart.

Jill LeBlanc:
22:51

Yeah.

Charlie LeBlanc:
22:52

Yeah. Amen. So God bless you. And we do have that song, Oh, Come All Ye Faithful that I believe will be will really bless you. So, again, happy Christmas or blessed Christmas or holy Christmas.

Charlie LeBlanc:
23:07

May the Lord be with you and may his face shine upon you and give you peace.

Jill LeBlanc:
23:12

Yeah.

Charlie LeBlanc:
23:13

In Jesus’ name.

Jill LeBlanc:
23:14

God bless you.

Charlie LeBlanc:
23:15

God bless.