Does God Forgive Suicide? | An interview with The Aiden Matthew Ripple Effect Foundation founders

So, another one of the questions that I decided

to answer this, but I felt it was necessary.

All of you aren't going to have experienced this.

Some of you have, but all of us have experienced

lost. But this question says, would God forgive?

suicide. I personally have a number of friends

that have lost their lives to suicide, and I

have struggled my life with this very question.

And the reason I invited the Alexanders up is

because they have firsthand experience as suicide

loss survivors. So Matt and Sarah, can you just

share a little bit about your story with us today?

Okay, so we have three wonderful children, Tyler,

Aiden, and Ella. I could be up here all day talking

about all the greatness, but today we're going

to focus on my youngest son, Aiden, or our youngest

son, Aiden. He was the kind of child who would

just light up a room. He was funny, intelligent,

athletic, empathetic. I can remember back to

a story. He was 15. He got his learner's permit.

We decided to take him to HCC. because there's

no cars around, and that's what you need to do

when the child's learning how to drive. And I

remember him saying that, wow, this driving is

a lot harder than it was on video games. Which

worried me. So then one day we decided we were

going to work on parking. And we were parking

a very small car, mind you. But every time he'd

try to park, I'd tell him to get out and look

around, see if he did a good job. And he would

get in a little discouraged every time, like,

no, it wasn't good. He'd over -align, whatever.

So then we kept doing that. Eventually, one time

he parked, and he nailed it. I didn't let him

know he nailed it yet, but he nailed it. And

I said, go ahead and get out and take a look.

And he comes back in the car with a grin from

ear to ear and just goes, I did that. Unfortunately,

on April 19th, 2021, Matt and I both received

a phone call from my mom somewhere around 8 .30

in the morning telling us, don't ask any questions,

get in your car and come home right now. We did

exactly that. And as Matt sped through every

single red light in Hagerstown and I was driving

120 miles an hour on I -70 East, we were able

to figure out what happened. Our youngest son,

Aiden, at the young age of 15, died from suicide

at our home. I remember that drive very vividly,

and the entire drive home, I remember begging

and pleading, please, God, not my son, not my

baby. Don't let this be true. Despite all of

the amazingness Matt shared about Aiden, which

is just the tip of the iceberg, unfortunately,

there were people in his life, his classmates,

his teammates, who made him question his value,

who made them question his amazingness, and ultimately,

it skewed his lens and contributed to his decision.

The ripples that got created on April 19th shattered

our innocence. rearranged our entire lives in

ways we never could have imagined, and has changed

the trajectory of the lives we live today. I

want to pause here. Many of us have had similar

thoughts in our life, but if you personally are

dealing with thoughts of what it would be like

if I wasn't around, I want you to not believe

any of the lies and understand that I love you.

We love you. But more importantly, God wants

you to have the best because he loves you. So,

guys, what would you say to somebody that's going

through this or maybe a similar season? So, I

will say from firsthand experience that you're

going to want to give up. Those thoughts are

understanding. Rudy stole my thunder a little

bit. I was going to change my speech a little

bit. I love you, and more importantly, God loves

you. So don't do that. I would tell others that,

yeah, this sucks. It's more devastating than

anybody could ever imagine. It doesn't make sense.

I don't know why. I might likely never know why.

As humans, we have a tendency to withdraw inside

of ourselves, and that's what I, what Matt and

I did for now five years. We still find ourselves

doing it today. We try really hard not to, but

we recognize it. I'd also say that while, yes,

this is really hard, and yes, it sucks, that

we have to just keep going, even if it's just

one breath at a time, one second at a time. We

just have to keep putting one foot in front of

the other. So, did you do it alone? No, you cannot

do it by yourself. I'm going to steal Sarah's

thunder here. We had to do it together, but more

importantly, we had to do it with God. It took

about three years after Aiden's death before

Matt and I invited God onto this journey with

us, and I can honestly say until that happened,

we did not actually feel any real healing. We

were stuck where we were, and God is the one

who has gotten us through it. So you said doing

it together, and that's something we're going

to come back to when we get to the action steps.

But I want to take a moment to answer the question,

will God forgive it? And I want to answer it

this way. Remember, there isn't any work or act

that you can do that gets you into heaven. There

isn't any work or act that you can do that keeps

you out of heaven. The work was paid for by the

sacrifice Jesus made on the cross. What gets

you into heaven? The one thing you can do is

accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior. What keeps

you out of heaven is rejecting Jesus. Since we

are covered by the blood of Jesus, our ticket

was stamped the day we truly invited Him into

our hearts as our Savior. I don't believe suicide

is a determining factor. to getting you into

heaven. I believe it has to do with accepting

Jesus. That's the determining factor. So Sarah,

in our conversations over the past couple years,

I've used the word committed suicide. And a couple

weeks ago when we met, you gently corrected me.

So if you would, could you just share with us,

everyone else, what you shared with me? Yeah,

when we refer to the cause of someone's death,

we don't say they committed a heart attack, they

committed cancer, they committed kidney disease,

because it's not something that they did. It's

something that has happened to them. And so when

we use that term committed in reference to suicide,

what we're doing is we're alluding that the person

who died from suicide committed a crime or a

sin and they didn't. What actually ends up happening

is suicide is the result from an illness. It's

a result from mental illness. Just like heart

disease, just like cancer, mental illness is

also a real disease. So I want to look at 1 Corinthians

and Paul's first letter. In chapter 10, it says,

No temptation has ever overtaken you that is

not common to man, meaning others have already

lived what you are living. And after you, others

will continue to live similar seasons. But God

has faith when he will not let you be tempted

beyond your ability. But with the temptation,

he will also provide the way of escape that you

may be able to enjoy it. You know, another phrase

that I'm not a fan of is, God will never give

you more than you can handle. It's false. Even

though I just read that scripture, it's not true.

It's 100 % lies. Because it's only half truth.

I know plenty of times in my life, God has given

me more than I can handle. The scripture says

he will provide the way of escape that you may

be able to endure it. Ultimately, the full truth,

God will not give you more than you can handle

as long as you rely on the Holy Spirit to comfort

and guide you. So ultimately, I can't tell you

why God separates some. or relieves some suffering

from people and allows others suffering from

others. But I do know that God makes a promise

for suffering. So I want to tell you a quick

story, another car maintenance story. No, it

is not changing a tire. I needed to change my

windshield wipers a couple months ago, so I went

to Sands and I got these windshield wipers, right?

I didn't need the instruction because I've changed

them dozens of times. I didn't need the instructions

because I'm a man. But the next time it rained,

after I changed, the next time it rained, I noticed

my windows were blurry. But it stopped raining,

and my windows cleared up, so I drove on. Then

a couple weeks later, I was driving down the

Falling Waters, and it's blurry again. And as

I'm driving home from Falling Waters, one of

the blades just starts breaking off. As I'm crossing

the river, it flies off. Like I'm going to Sam's

and returning this thing. And then before I got

off the interstate, I look over and noticed that

the passenger side where it fell off was actually

clear. But the driver's side, can you pick that

up, man? The driver's side wasn't. Because I

didn't read the directions. I didn't have all

the information. That thing was put there to

protect. The windshield wipers. Know this. God

puts things in your life to protect you that

you might not all have the wisdom or understanding.

But the protections are still there. Now, again,

I can't tell you why he allows suffering. But

I can tell you that he provides a promise. And

I want to read a poem for you. It's one of my

favorite poems. It's by a woman named Annie Johnson

Flint. It says this. God has not promised. Sky

is always blue. Flowers turn pathways all our

lives through. God has not promised sun without

rain, joy without sorrow, peace without pain.

But God has promised strength for the day, rest

for the labor, light for the way. Grace for the

trials, help from above. unfailing kindness,

undying love. It's not about why God allows suffering.

It's about the promises that God gives us. So

we want to take today's action steps and walk

you through how you can remember God's promises

through the suffering. Because you never have

to walk alone. The first action step, you need

to embrace your grief. And your grief doesn't

have to be something big. something dire, something

as grave as what we're talking about. It may

be you leave a job and go to another job. I know

that I had to grieve giving up teaching when

I became a pastor. It may be moving out of the

house that you brought your babies home to and

raised them in, even if it's a bigger, better

house. But there's a promise that God gave us

in the Beatitudes, Matthew 5, that says, blessed

are those who mourn. for they will be comforted.

And if you hear nothing else today, hear this.

Grief is a word of love. Loss of anything puts

a huge wall in front of us. But God provides

a gate of grief for us to walk through. And most

of us do our best to avoid that gate at all costs.

But no, you can't walk around the wall. and no,

you can't get over or underneath the wall. The

only way to get healing is to walk through the

gate of grief. But once you decide to open the

gate, you will find that God is there with you,

and not only will he let you through, and also

understand that joy and grief, they can coexist.

So quickly, Matt, Sarah, can you talk about how

you have been able in your lives to embrace the

grief. Yeah, so embracing grief was difficult.

I was searching for answers on how to exist without

my son, reasons to keep going. And then through

God and through this community of faith, I realized

that grief is, this is going to sound really

weird, but it's a good thing. And the fact that

you only grieve things that you really loved.

And the more you loved, the more you will grieve.

So just keep that in mind. After Aiden died,

I struggled with God. If I'm being completely

honest, I pushed him away. I couldn't understand

why Aiden, why us, why didn't he do something

to save Aiden? How dare he take my child away

from me? How dare he call my child home early

when I knew he had so much life left to live

and how amazing his life was actually going to

be? But then about three years in, we have some

really good friends who said to us, hey, we go

to this church. It's kind of hippie, but we think

you might like it. Will you come with us? And

we said, absolutely. And so we did. We came,

and look, we're still here. We fell in love immediately,

and we realized without God, without our church,

without our faith, without our community, we

would have continued to feel lost, and our healing

would have never been able to begin. Which leads

us to our next point. Don't walk alone. Get an

ally. Get a friend. But first, part of that goes

to you and me. We need to be a friend who recognizes

the grief in others. Matt, Sarah? Yeah, so if

you know someone going through grief or just

plain needs help, a lot of tendencies is asking,

you know, what can I do for you? Is there anything

you need? Please let me know if you need anything.

I can tell you firsthand they're not going to

ask. You just need to do it. It could be mowing

the lawn. It could be a hug. It could just be

saying, I'm here. Two days after Aiden's death,

my best friend just showed up at our door unannounced.

We had family in town. We had just made plans.

We were going to place a to -go order at Buffalo

Wild Wings. We were all excited because we hadn't

really eaten in two days. And she shows up with

Kentucky Fried Chicken. She didn't know what

to do, but she knew she could feed us. And what

I can tell you is that during those early days

of our grief, you really do forget how to live.

If breathing wasn't automatic, I know for a fact

that there would have been many, many times where

I would have forgotten to simply do that, just

breathe. Ecclesiastes 4, 9 and 10. Two people

are better off than one, for they can help each

other succeed. If one person fails, the other

can reach out and help. But someone who falls

alone is in real trouble. Get a mentor. Get a

confidant. Get in a growth group. We're going

to have a tailgate party in a couple weeks. There's

over 30 groups in this church, one of which is

called Grief Share. Reach out and get prayer

ministry. Find a trained therapist. I see a therapist.

It doesn't mean you're weak if you get a therapist.

The strong people are the ones who decide to

reach out and talk to someone. And I'm not advocating

for medication, but maybe medicine is part of

your answer. I take anti -anxiety and anti -depressants.

But understand this. You need to pray like it

depends on God, but you need to put in the work

like it depends on you. And part of that includes

reaching out to your community. And the other

thing it includes is our last action step. Use

your story. Psalm 66 tells this in verse 13.

Come and listen, all who fear God, and I will

tell you what he did for me. Tell people what

he did for you. But God did listen. He paid attention

to my prayer. Praise God who did not ignore my

prayer or withdraw his unfailing love from me.

Telling your story is part of your healing. So

Matt and Sarah, how has embracing your grief

by sharing your story helps you heal? Aiden passed

away on a Monday and Wednesday morning when I

got out of bed, I knew immediately that we were

going to start a nonprofit organization in Aiden's

memory. And that foundation gave me a way to

continue to love Aiden out loud and share his

amazing story and life with as many people as

possible. And ultimately introducing Aiden to

people who haven't had the pleasure of meeting

him. has been incredibly healing and has actually

filled some of the fractures in my heart. Yeah,

we initially need the foundation to pour ourselves

into something, to keep us busy, keep our minds

occupied. As we continue to do that, people would

reach out to us saying, thank you for doing this.

You've touched my heart. You've helped me. Some

of it's been as simple as I've asked my kids

the hard question of, how are you really doing?

I'll say for as many people as we've helped,

They've also helped us. It's just as healing

for us and sometimes very much enjoyable for

us to talk about him. So it's not a one -way

street. You may be helping someone, but they

also may be helping you. So tell your story.

Even if you've lived a perfect life all your

life, come tell me your story so I can figure

out how to do that. But understand that your

story, like Matt said, it might help someone

else heal or grow. or walk through the season

at the ring.