Are you dealing with grief that just won’t go away, because a literal death has not yet occurred? We can learn how to deal with a living death from the story of Tamar, King David’s daughter.

As a child of divorce since the age of 4, I have dealt with a living death most of my life. Though my parents’ marriage ended decades ago, I still deal with the fallout. The marriage is over, but the negative effects linger on, because the divorce is a living death.

I’ve also experienced living deaths from loving prodigals, handling disappointments, and dealing with various messes. Life doesn’t always give us definite endings, and when negativity continues, you can feel the reverberations of a living death.