The Mercy of Finality

Learning to Let Go, Stay Present, and Begin Again

Life, if we are honest, is suffering. The Buddhists say this, but so does the Bible. Ecclesiastes echoes it with its lament of vanity. Paul names it when he says all creation groans. And Jesus, our wounded Savior, doesn’t shy away from it. He walks straight into it, through a garden soaked with blood-sweat and onto a cross erected by empire.

Suffering, for all its agony, is a teacher. It burns away illusions. It invites us to examine what matters. It calls us to live from the inside out instead of the outside in. I didn’t always believe that. For a long time, I resisted suffering. But lately, I have felt the Holy Spirit gently, and at times forcefully, urging me to let go. To let go of what no longer matters. To release what no longer gives life. To trust that what dies in me might yet be the soil of resurrection.

A few days ago, I sat across from a senior adult, a former pastor, a fellow sufferer. He was telling me his story. During the pandemic, he nearly died. His body was ravaged by illness. He was isolated from his family, his church, and his sense of self. Eventually, he lost one of his legs to amputation. And with it, he lost many other things too: his ministry role, his place in the church, his sense of purpose. He grieves for what was lost. But he also spoke with the kind of clarity that can only come from suffering.

As we talked about suffering, we also talked about grief. I asked him how he felt about a certain situation he had been anticipating and grieving for a long time, one that is finally reaching a point of finality. He paused, took a deep breath, and said, "Strangely, I feel relieved. There’s a relief that comes with finality." He explained that while loss brings sorrow, it also brings a strange and unexpected gift: clarity. The end of a thing often brings the space we need to understand what really matters, and what never did. Then, he reminded me of Jesus' words from the cross: "It is finished."

"Jesus didn’t say I am finished,” he told me. “He said It is finished.”

That idea has stayed with me. We often fear the finality of things: the end of a relationship, the loss of an unhelpful habit, losing control. It sometimes feels like death or like failure. But what if finality isn’t a failure, but a mercy? What if surrender is a doorway, not a death?

I’ve been thinking a lot about that word: finished. There are things in my life that needed to end a long time ago. Old fears. Deep disappointments. Expectations I placed on myself when I was younger and didn’t know better. Relationships I clung to out of guilt, not love.

And this year, I’ve felt the Spirit urging me to finally let them go. Not just to loosen my grip, but to release them entirely. To say, “It is finished,” and mean it.

There is something sacred about that kind of surrender. It’s not passive. It’s not giving up. It’s naming the truth and trusting that on the other side of that truth is freedom.

Henry Cloud writes in Necessary Endings that endings are not just inevitable, they are essential. Without them, we stagnate. We stay stuck. Just like a gardener prunes dead branches to make room for new growth, we too must make necessary cuts in our lives. Cloud writes, "Without the ability to end things, people stay stuck, never becoming who they are meant to be, never accomplishing all that their talents and abilities should afford them."

I know what it's like to stay stuck. To cling to roles, rhythms, and relationships out of fear that letting go would leave me with nothing. But the truth is, not everything we lose is a loss. Some endings are sacred. Some pruning is holy. And some final words, like Jesus' 'It is finished,' are not declarations of defeat but of completion.

Words of Finality

Not only did my elder friend remind me of Jesus' final words, he shared his own father’s final words to him, words that carried just as much weight. His father, a military man, spoke them from his deathbed. They were simple, firm, unforgettable: “Stay on your post.”

What does it mean to stay on your post? In the military, staying on your post protects the life and well-being of those who trust that you'll be where you are supposed to be. It means remaining faithful when no one is watching. It means keeping your eyes open, your heart soft, your presence steady. It means choosing responsibility when retreat would be easier. It means recognizing that your presence holds weight in the lives of others.

I think about the people who depend on me: my wife, my daughters, the seniors I care for, the community that looks to me, not for perfection, but for presence. Staying on my post isn’t about being strong all the time, it’s about being there. Showing up. It’s about laying down your own comfort so others can stand safely. It’s about sacrifice, not for show, but for love.

Stay on Your Post

One of my favorite films is A Few Good Men. In it, Jack Nicholson plays the role of U.S. Marine Colonel Nathan Jessep. He is a man hell-bent on fulfilling his complicated duty of protecting the servicemen stationed at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. While he takes his duty too far, crossing moral lines in the name of discipline and national security, there is a scene in which he speaks a truth that even he admits most cannot handle. That truth was that despite how people felt about him, they needed him. They needed him to stay on his post, because he protected lives. Until that point, he was unknown to most people, yet they benefited from his protection and faithfulness to his service.

I identify with the Jessep character in some ways. One of them being that despite how many in my faith tradition feel about me, which is often a feeling of suspicion, they need me on my post. They need me to explore the edges of our faith. They need me to ask the hard questions. That post, though, comes with great responsibility.

In Colonel Jessep’s case, he forgot that responsibility. He stayed on his post, but he didn’t die to his own ego, and it cost the life of another man. That’s a sobering reminder. Presence without humility can still be dangerous. Faithfulness must be paired with surrender.

That is why these two truths must stand hand in hand: stay faithful and stay surrendered, not to your ego, but to God. When I’m not on my post, physically and spiritually, I disappear into self-protection or disillusionment. Something is missing. Not just for others, but for me too.

What If You Finally...

So let me ask you: what would it feel like if you finally surrendered? Not in some abstract, spiritualized way, but in the very real and practical corners of your life?

What would it feel like if you finally surrendered your life to God, not the version of God you’ve inherited, but the One who calls you into fullness and freedom?

What would it feel like if you finally committed to spiritual practices, not as obligation but as oxygen for your soul?

What would it feel like if you finally addressed the toxic relationships in your life, the ones that keep you stuck, small, or spiritually numb?

What would it feel like if you finally laid your past to rest, trusting that your identity is not in who you were, but in who you are becoming?

What would it feel like to breathe on the other side of what’s been keeping you bound?

What if finality was the beginning of freedom?

You are not finished. But some things in your life may be. And that’s not failure. That might be faithfulness.

Let it end. And begin again.