How do grieving parents move through unbearable loss without losing sight of their hope in Christ?
Mike Triem talks with Kyle and Christina Bowers, founders of Lamenting Faith Retreat Ministry, about the loss of their 18-year-old son Korey in a November 2021 car crash and the ministry that grew from their own journey through grief.
Kyle and Christina share how studying the biblical practice of lament gave them a way to bring their sorrow honestly before God without pretending the pain had disappeared. That experience eventually led them to create a retreat specifically for parents who have lost a child.
Well, it’s Mike Treem here with Crawford Media Group. I’m with Kyle and Christina Bowers, and they’re with Lamenting Faith Ministry. And Kyle and Christina, thanks for taking the time with us.
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, you’re welcome. Thanks for having us.
SPEAKER 01 :
We’re happy to have you on. I know it’s under, you know, a difficult circumstance that happened five years ago. And, um, Kyle, I’m going to throw it to you first and you’ll know which parts you want to, uh, to have Christina talk about as well. What happened back in November of 2021 and how did that start the retreat in your ministry?
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. Thank you, Mike, for asking the question. Um, so yeah, we are serving here at Frontier School of the Bible and, um, Our son, Caleb, we brought him out in 2021. That was Caleb. I’m sorry, our oldest. Our dad in 19. And then in 2021, we brought our son, Corey, out. And then he was here for three months. And then November 17th came. That was his birthday. And him and his girlfriend, Emma, as they always did, they took a drive. And fortunately, this drive ended up in their home going to heaven with a semi hitting them.
SPEAKER 02 :
Corey and Emma had kind of met in September and formed a sweet relationship quickly and they just wanted a really good friendship and Corey had called us and said, Mom, I met someone. And we drove out in October to meet Emma. And to spend some time with her. And that was a great opportunity that we had. And we left that weekend saying we’ll see in a month because he was going to be home for Thanksgiving. And we never missed one of the boys’ birthdays. And his birthday was the 17th. He was going to be home one week later for Thanksgiving break. And so we said, we won’t drive the nine hours out. We’ll just see you next week. And we never got to – a week later, we were playing in a funeral.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah. Instead of Thanksgiving meal. Yeah. I’m so sorry. And we talked a little bit offline that I can think of listeners that have contacted us that have, you know, some elements of that story, what they were faced with, whether it was a cross-country runner that – passed away at a cross-country meet or something along those lines. And it was different for everyone. We understand that no one, none of us can understand you and Christina’s, your loss. And Christina, I’ll ask you this one. So you had this loss of a child, the immense grief. And even in the midst of that, you wrote that… that you understood, you and Kyle understood that your days are held and orchestrated by Jesus, by the Lord, and that there was the darkness and the grief, but also the comfort and mercy. So talk about that. Tell us how that helped shape the ministry.
SPEAKER 02 :
Sure. So the depth and the darkness of grief is a big variable to this. And for about the first year, I didn’t want consolation. We knew truth and we knew that Corey was with his savior. He had accepted Christ as his savior. But moving to a point of using the word and other people to console us or to bring hope to us was very difficult in those early days. We had a friend that had shared a book with us on lamenting and I left it on the end table for about a year and a year in I picked it up and I was like, okay, maybe, maybe this will help. And so I read the first paragraph and I sat it down and I told my husband, I said, we need to read this, this Nelson family. And, um, the Lord has just knit our hearts with Emma’s mom and dad. And, uh, so we called them and said, will you read this book with us? And that started our journey of lamenting and what the Bible talks about lamenting. And it’s really a worship, a prayer to the Lord. And that’s available to believers. And so once we start understanding what true lamenting was, it was just such a help and an encouragement to us and a process of grief that we hadn’t began to experience before. So we, about two, three years in, we had been to a, I had been to a retreat for moms and together Kyle and I had been to a retreat for parents and it just wasn’t what we were looking for and the word was not opened. We didn’t talk about that our hope is in Christ, although they were Christian organizations, it was more about the story and of how our kids died and not our hope of Christ and eternal life. And so the wheels started turning for us, I think me before Kyle, but just we need to offer this hope that we have. I mean, serving has not been foreign to us. We’ve been missionaries since 2012, and we’ve served in Canada with remote Native tribes. grief was very common to our ministry up there. And then we’ve been serving as missionaries here at the Bible Institute. And so our heartbeat is to serve people. And we said, how can we serve other parents and help them walk through what we’re walking through and what that looks like through lament?
SPEAKER 01 :
So Kyle, you started, you and Christina started Lamenting Faith Retreat Ministry. And this retreat, by the way, is October 2nd through 4th. We want our listeners to know that. Registration has been extended through August 21st or until August 21st. You can let us know which. So the people hearing this interview, you’ve got a little time, but not much. You’ve got to make a decision that there’s someone that you know that should go to this retreat, which we would probably say they should. You know, they probably haven’t processed it. lament properly in a biblical way. So tell us about the retreat and what you’ll be doing there.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, so as my wife said, the retreat is really, it’s a purple song of uninvited, song of lament. We see that throughout the book of Psalms. But during our retreat, we will be having, again, a three-day. It is to encourage parents to process their grief by the focus of time in God’s Word, to study and to be equipped with the tools of encouragement through a prayerful worship, time of lament, and 1 Thessalonians 4.13 will be our theme verse, which says, We should not grieve as those without hope. And so throughout this weekend, parents will have the time to spend really unhurried time alone together as a couple. They’re going to be able to visit with other parents who have, again, walked a similar journey and then also participate in any of the offered activities at the venue. And so throughout this weekend, our hope and our prayer is that the retreat ultimately leads parents to a deeper trust and hope in God’s faithfulness. And so it, again, will be held, yes, as you said, at the YMCA of the Rockies. And so, again, our desire is to offer this retreat and the weekend at no charge to parents. So, honestly, we do not want the weight. Yeah, that’s huge. That’s exceptional. We don’t want this weight of grief to be compounded by the financial strain. Okay. And so that is our prayer. that the Lord would provide the resources through individuals and churches that would want to partner with us.
SPEAKER 01 :
So people hearing this interview, they may not have someone, if they don’t have someone that they’d like to stand or they’d like to go themselves, perhaps a husband and wife that might have lost a child or had that happen, they can help out or they can get the church to help out of their Bible study. That’s good to know, too.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yes, absolutely. You can share our website. We’re also on Facebook.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yes.
SPEAKER 02 :
And we’ve partnered with New Horizon Foundation to help process donations for the retreat.
SPEAKER 01 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 02 :
And so there’s various ways that different people can plug in. All of that is available through our website.
SPEAKER 01 :
And give us that too. Let’s do that a couple times. Here for sure, then at the end, please.
SPEAKER 02 :
LamentingFaithRetreatMinistry.com is our website, and we’re also found on Facebook at Lamenting Faith Retreat Ministry. On our website, there’s a support tab that you can look at donor information. There’s also a tab that allows you to sign up for the retreat or share the information with someone else that you would like to know. About the retreat. Our contact information is also on there, our email and our phone number.
SPEAKER 01 :
Great. And you said lamentingfaithretreatministry.com, not .org, but .com, correct?
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s correct.
SPEAKER 01 :
Okay, sounds good. Yeah, people sometimes, that can be confusing. So lamentingfaithretreatministry.com. You have partners to help with the processing if somebody wants to donate. And Christina, speak to this a little bit. We’ve got three or four minutes left, and I know earlier you said you and Kyle had gone to some ministry gatherings and retreats and different things, but it was more about the stories of what happened than processing, lamenting, being a part of that.
SPEAKER 02 :
correct yeah the retreats that we had participated in or that we had looked for um didn’t offer time in god’s word and that’s ultimately where our hope and lies and where we can get encouragement um other people’s stories are can be helpful to us but ultimately it’s god’s word that walked us through lamenting and walked us through our grief we’re still grieving it’s it’s early, you know, it’s only been four and a half years. And, but it’s been the mercy of God and his gracious love and abundance in our life that has helped us to be able to get through that. But we just, we have found other retreats that cost, you know, five, six, $800 for the weekend. And that just wasn’t feasible for us. And so our hearts were just burdened to be able to,
SPEAKER 01 :
walk this journey because we needed we need parents to walk through with us and so we want to be that for other people i really like too that that you’re making sure that hope’s a component of this because without the hope of christ you know without his word you know we we all talk amongst ourselves when there’s certain situations we we remark If we don’t have Christ, if somebody doesn’t have Jesus, how in the world do they process any of these things? Yet we have His Word and lament is a part of His Word that seldom gets addressed in ministry. And you and Kyle are able to do that through this thing that God’s kind of set up for you.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah. That has been our heart’s beat. That’s great. Since Corey’s home going.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, Kyle, if you want a close us basically in the next minute or so. Give whatever final comments you would for someone who might say they don’t have the time, they’re on the fence, oh gosh, maybe we should talk to our friends about this because they experienced that in their life. What would you say?
SPEAKER 03 :
I would say walking through grief is nothing you want to walk through alone. That is one reason. Another reason why Chris and I have started this is that there was just not too many people to walk alongside of us. And there’s something special about grieving parents that we can share. And it’s just being in a room like there’s no judgment. There’s nothing really has to be said. And there’s just a if I can see a joy in that. And so
SPEAKER 02 :
You can have a joy moment and laugh and not feel like you have to explain yourself that, oh, I’m not grieving right now because I’m laughing. And there’s guilt there when you’re grieving. And when you’re in a room full of parents, there is a peace that everybody knows what everybody is going through. And you have the freedom to have joy, to lament, to grieve, to cry together.
SPEAKER 03 :
And it’s okay. And it is okay. Yeah. Unfortunately, our world says… We can’t cry no more. But what we can, it is God’s nature that he’s given us to shed tears. And so, yeah, I would just encourage if you’re on the fence of should you come to a retreat, absolutely look at our website and feel free to reach out to us with any questions.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, that’s Kyle and Christina Bowers. If you have any questions, please just reach out. If you’re thinking about it or you have friends that you’d like to refer and you’re just not sure, it’s lamentingfaithretreatministry.com. Lamentingfaithretreatministry.com. And if you have any questions, call us here at the station. Many of you have that number, 303-481-1800. We’ll get you connected with Kyle and Christina. We hope those of you that have… that have had this experience and need to go, will go. If you have friends, please refer them. Again, August 21st is the registration date, due date, because they have to have the time to plan. YMCA of the Rockies, October 2nd through 4th. And again, it’s lamentingfaithretreatministry.com. Kyle and Christina, thank you for taking the time with us. Thank you for having us.
