187: Worship through Grief: Matt and Kari Perkins

Episode Transcript

FamilyLife Blended®

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Season 8, Episode 187: Worship through Grief

Guests:Matt and Kari Perkins

Air Date: April 6, 2026

Matt (00:02):

No one’s expecting you to have all the answers. They just want to be heard. They want to be seen, and sometimes they just want some vocabulary to even understand and process “This is what I’m walking through. Oh man, I wish I would’ve known that 15 years ago because I didn’t grieve these significant losses. I just kept on going.”

Ron (00:34):

Welcome to the FamilyLife Blended Podcast. I’m Ron Deal. We help blended families, and those who love them, pursue the relationships that matter most. And the best opportunity you have to be encouraged in your family’s journey and get connected with others is coming up in less than two weeks, and it’s free, Blended and Blessed® 2026 is happening Saturday, April 18th. You can attend virtually from anywhere in the world or you can join the live audience in Oklahoma City. We’re going to be at Crossings Church. Davey and Kristi Blackburn, Kathi Lipp, Cheryl Shumake, Gayla Grace, myself, emcee Brian Goins will be contributing to the live event, or you can watch from the comfort of your home virtually of course, and even better, your church can host the event for an audience of any size for free. Don’t miss it. Go to BlendedandBlessed.com to register or just look in the show notes.

(01:31):

We’ll get you connected. I would love to meet you at this event. If you can come to the live audience, that’d be fun to see you there.

Hope in the journey is the theme for Blended and Blessed this year. We got a little hope for you even before then. On our podcast today I’m going to be talking with Matt and Kari Perkins. Both of them were widowed prior to marrying and then forming their blended family, originally with seven children and now with seven grandchildren. And we may get an update. Who knows? Maybe they have more. Matt is a worship leader together. Matt and Kari have created a resource for individuals and churches called Grief to Growth. Matt and Kari, welcome to the FamilyLife Blended podcast.

Matt (02:12):

Thanks so much for having us. It’s great to be here.

Ron (02:14):

It’s nice to have you guys. Yeah, we really appreciate it very much. How many children did you guys have when you got married?

Matt:

So I had two girls.

Kari (02:24):

I have five boys.

Ron (02:25):

Alright, seven in total and did I get the grandchildren thing correct? Is it seven at this point?

Matt (02:30):

As of right now it’s seven.

Ron (02:33):

I realize this is how things roll. They do change, don’t they? I interviewed one couple one time, and I introduced them as having, I think it was six or seven grandchildren. They said “No, we have 11.” Okay. Alright, I’m out of date, but that’s good to know.

So two and five, but it didn’t start there. I mean we always talk about on this program, the blended family marriage is the middle of the story. It’s not the beginning of the journey. So would you mind just backing up a little bit, Kari, maybe would you go first and tell us what preceded the two of you getting together?

Kari (03:09):

My late husband and I were serving in ministry in California, and he was a children’s pastor and in 2015 he was speaking at our service for, in the adult world is what we called it, because he was always in children’s. We had been married 20, almost 21 years, and so we had been serving in ministry since we got married because he was called into the ministry at 17. And so that Sunday, November 22nd, 2015, he was speaking and walked off the stage from the first of a few services and he collapsed and passed away shortly after. We had a heart condition we didn’t know he had and so he passed away suddenly.

Ron (04:05):

Deeply shocking.

Kari (04:07):

Our lives were turned upside down for sure.

Matt (04:09):

I think one of the important parts of that is she had five boys, but they were actually with number five; had just gotten him in January, was in the process of adoption and so there’s a lot of moving parts in that.

Ron (04:28):

So did I get that right? You had just adopted your fifth or were in the process—

Kari (04:33):

We were in the process, yeah. We had been working through that prior for about a year and a half, almost two years. He was six years old when—we met him when he was four, and we finally brought him to our home January 2015. He was six years old and so we had him in our home for 10 months and then my husband passed away. It was very devastating, but he was definitely a light in our house who just kept us all—his sense of humor—this little boy just brought such light in our home in such a dark time.

Ron (05:18):

So he was six when your husband passed away, approximately how old were the other boys?

Kari (05:23):

The youngest of biologically was 14 years old, just turned I think 14. And then the oldest was 19—18, 19 yeah.

Ron (05:36):

So you had a bunch of teenagers—

Kari (05:37):

I did.

Ron (05:38):

—and a 6-year-old.

Kari (05:39):

Yes, I did; lots of sports, lots of moving always.

Ron (05:43):

Oh my. Yes. Testosterone through the roof. So now you’re a single mom and you’re grieving. You’ve got your own horrible heart journey to wrestle through and trying to help them manage that loss of their dad.

Kari (05:59):

Yeah.

Ron (06:00):

How would you describe those early years?

Kari (06:03):

It wasn’t just that it would’ve been fine to try to figure that out as a family, but what was added to that was this wasn’t just a private thing that happened. This was such a public thing because our church was a larger church in our town, and he not only it happened at church and not in front of all of those people, but it still was something that was impacted so many families because he was a children’s pastor to hundreds. And it was so devastating, not just for our family, but for our church family, and that was really difficult. And our children, it was on the news, so it was something that we had to also live out publicly and it was a difficult time at that time.

Ron (06:57):

Absolutely. I mean, that adds a whole nother layer there. It’s not like there was this private journey, but everywhere your kids go, I’m sure there’s people who are responding to them saying something to them, interacting or avoiding the subject. You probably had that as well. All the above comes with that. Wow.

Kari (07:13):

Yep.

Ron (07:15):

Difficult, difficult journey. We’ve talked about these kinds of transitions a lot on this program and what we know is that the grief continues even to this day, well into even a new marriage, new blended family and the new connections that are made. We don’t forget the people that we love. They walk with us in one form or another and how we make space for that. That’s the kind of thing we’re going to be talking about here in just a minute. So Matt, why don’t you give us your story.

Matt (07:43):

So I was a worship pastor really all of my career. We had just moved to California in 2014 and was in Orlando prior to that and serving at a great church there. And there’s the transition when you first move to a completely new area, you don’t know people, you don’t have family there and so navigating through that process. So you go through that change. And then my wife, a few months after we were out here in California, she was diagnosed with an aggressive rare form of breast cancer called triple negative breast cancer. And so we went through that process of just going, okay, we know we are where we are supposed to be and so we can understand that but now we have a new layer of challenges is how do we just getting to know these people, they’re getting to know us, and now we’re doing that with chemo treatments.

(09:00):

We have two daughters. And so navigating that all while being new to this area. So kind of in the same with Kari mentioning, I think it is one thing when you’re living out your grief and navigating life on your own, in your own family, doesn’t mean it’s less difficult. You just have another layer of complexity that I think it becomes difficult when people are trying to navigate their own loss and then now, they have to help other people navigate theirs and it adds that. But we’re going through all of the chemo treatments, everything with that and then seven months after her diagnosis, she passed away and we had been in California less than a year. And so it was a lot of times of just saying, okay, at that time my daughters were 19 and 15 when Mary Beth passed away. And so a lot of it just going, okay, I don’t really have any answers, but one of the things that I kept going when we’re walking through difficult transitions, I don’t think we give enough thought to things that had happened in our lives before.

(10:34):

And what I mean by that is I had just turned 14 when my dad suddenly passed of a heart attack. I remember being the youngest of six how my mom navigated that process. And so there were some things that I didn’t really know, and I would let them know, I don’t know how, but I do know that we’re going to make it through this because I’ve seen it in my own life. And so navigating that process, having open conversations with them, even when it was coming up to that time of just leaning in and asking my daughters questions for advice just so I knew like, “How do you feel about this?” And family coming in from different parts of the country and just letting them know, “Hey, we have to talk about this” because everybody’s going to have opinions and we’ve walked this 24/7 and so how do we navigate this? And so just—

Ron (11:45):

You stumbled your way forward as a family. I mean, that’s the way I’ve always talked about it. I mean, grief is one of those things where you don’t have a guidebook for that. There’s no blueprints. Everybody grieves a little bit differently. And so you’re just sort of like, well, what do we do? How do we do this? What does it look like for us? And with stumbling forward is kind of as good as it gets.

Matt (12:09):

Yeah.

Ron (12:11):

So 19 and 15, it’s an understatement to say all five of your kids, excuse me, all seven of your kids, that they were all grieving in their own unique ways, individual ways, maybe connecting with other people, maybe not. Some people isolate; some people connect and talk together with others. They all had their own journey with the difficulties of it all. And what were some of the big things for either of you that stood out about kids and reactions over the first couple of years?

Matt (12:50):

I think one of the reactions or one of the things that navigating is knowing that grief can show up at any given time, in any given way, and whether you’re on the way to some event that you were looking forward to, that everybody was looking forward to, it could just be one little trigger that sets it off and then, now you just jumbled all the cards again. It’s like the 52-card pickup is what my brothers would have me do. You know that game. And I think that’s where we would end up being a lot. And so it was always navigating the unexpected, but also having the trust of knowing, hey, we know that all three of us, we are for each other. And at the end of the day, knowing that we had each other’s best interest in mind, we just all process differently.

Ron (13:52):

Right.

Kari (13:52):

Yeah. When you have boys and you’re trying to figure out, I’m not really good with emotions already, so having to navigate my own in front of my boys was extremely difficult for me. It was something that I would just be washing dishes and start to cry and one of them would come over and try to take over. “I’ll do it, Mom.” And I’m like, “No, let me do it. I’m sorry, but I can’t control these tears. They’re just”— But then it would happen to one of them and they didn’t know how to respond to that either. And so it was just really having that conversation whenever those things would happen or if two were getting at each other and realizing it was that today was just a difficult day for one of them and the other one just triggered that in whatever that looked like. It varied with my children because there, I think all seven of them have such different personalities. There’s similarities in some of the things that they do, but they all have such different personalities and they all—it was whether it was just super quiet and you had to keep, pay attention to one because he was way too quiet or way too loud and too much.

(15:13):

It was like one wanted to talk a lot about it; the other one didn’t want to talk at all. And so then you had to find the balance. And I think we’ve experienced that both.

Ron (15:40):

I’m sitting here holding your Grief to Growth Pathway material, the small group guide that you’ve created for people, whatever that grief journey is. Let’s get behind that. What motivated you to put together this thing? We’re going to talk about the pathway here in a minute, but what motivated you to put the work in to design this for other people?

Matt (16:00):

Well, we were actually, I think it was sometimes we felt like anywhere we went, people would ask about the novelty of the seven kids and all of this. And so we were talking a lot about blended families, but we were speaking at a church down in south Florida, and this has been now five years ago, and we started just talking about how to, you’re not going to get over your grief and if that’s the goal, it’s not going to work. You’re going to be disappointed, but how do we move forward with our grief? And it was after the service that people started coming up and just asking the most transparent questions and we would respond to them. And we were on our flight home and just saying, there’s a lot of people that have, unfortunately have gotten to the blended family prior to processing some of the loss to where it’s, “Hey, I have this void in my own life” or my emotional needs or any of that.

(17:18):

And so then we jump into a relationship and now it changes the game even more. And we started looking at it and honestly, we wanted to do something that would be a program that we would want to be a part of. And I had just gone through some coaching certification things and started looking at it and going, you know what? This really—what if we approached grief and loss and also understanding that it’s not just about death because there’s people that are dealing with different elements of loss based on where they’re at. It wasn’t just that death is their only loss. For a lot of people, if there was a divorce, there’s that loss that they’re grieving, but most likely there’s some financial loss. Now there’s some social loss because now the friend circle, it doesn’t work like it used to. And so we just started looking at it and just saying, what if we did something that included creativity? And so we do some different projects as a part of that. And really, we just tried it just saying this might not work, but our goal is to not screw people up and just see what they think.

Kari (18:42):

Well, and I think too just we both went through counseling, grief counseling. That’s how kind we met with grief.

Matt (18:50):

We met through our counselor.

Kari (18:53):

But finding that there wasn’t, I was 39 years old with five kids and not really knowing. I went to this grief counselor, but there wasn’t a lot of resources that I felt were for my age, I guess, or for something that I could really relate to during that time. So it was just like, how could we help other people walk through this? We’d been asked, we still get asked several times just How do you do this? Or how does this work? I just had a lady come up to me the other day and said, she’s walking with a friend who’s walking through a bad divorce and has her kids, but she doesn’t know what to do. And so just being able to help other people, and I think that trip was a tipping point. We had already felt the desire of how can we help other people? I don’t want to waste my pain. I don’t want to waste what God has done and how he’s shown up for our families. How can we help other people with that?

Matt (20:02):

And I think even getting to the point where you can sometimes look like the only way that I’m qualified to do this is if I have all the answers. And nothing could be farther from the truth that no one’s expecting you to have all the answers. They just want to be heard.

(20:27):

They want to be seen. And sometimes they just want some vocabulary to even understand and process “This is what I’m walking through. Oh man, I wish I would’ve known that 15 years ago because I didn’t grieve these significant losses. I just kept on going.” And so that was, I think letting people know the goal isn’t to get from, we have this huge deficit that we’re facing through that loss. The goal isn’t to get back to zero what we think would be normal. It’s looking at it and saying, how do we approach this from any factor in our lives that we have this? How do we take one step forward today? What’s my next step? And I think once you start doing that, you give people permission to say, you don’t get back to normal when you stop crying every day or when you can pay your bills or any of that. It’s that’s your normal right now. How do you take action steps to move forward?

Ron (21:37):

What I love about what you’re saying is to me, this is the biblical model 2 Corinthians chapter one, starting in verse three, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in their troubles with comfort that we received from God.” So there’s this network of comfort that starts with God, extends into me, him to me, me to others. That’s what you’re doing. You’re just basically saying, we want a journey with you. And you don’t have to be an expert. You don’t have to have all the answers, but it’s helpful if you’re connecting with people who are sort of on the same comfort road and we’re just going to support each other as we go forward with that. I love that, and that has been huge for us. For those listeners of this podcast who don’t know, my wife and I lost one of our sons when he was 12.

(22:38):

We’re coming up on 17 years without him, and every day is a step forward in that journey for us. And finding early on, it was the people who had lost a child and were 10 years ahead of us that saved us because they provided the comfort they had received to us. And we’re now in a season where we’re trying to pass that on to other people whenever we get an opportunity. So I love the model and I love what you guys have done with this.

I want to go back to Matt, something you just said, because I think for the blended families that are watching and listening right now, you keyed in on something. I’d love for us to dig just a little bit around into it. And it’s the idea that people sometimes move into new relationships before they have really grieved. Now, I don’t want people to hear grief as in, well, you’re going to finally finish someday and then it’s over and you move in. No, no, no. We carry our grief with us. But have you spent any time grieving, have you given yourself space and permission given your children space and permission and that frequently, I want to use the word frequently. I think people move into a new relationship when they really have not had space to grieve. What kind of difficulties have you seen with others that can that create?

Matt (23:54):

Well, I think those are some of the things that we navigated with we were pastoring in the same town. Mary Beth died in the end of July. Eddie passed away in November. We didn’t know each other, but both of our churches were very recognizable, and people knew about our stories.

(24:23):

But we saw it even as we started talking and we would see other people in our churches or just other people that we knew, they would have a significant loss, whether it was a divorce or death or something and when they move into that new relationship, man, it’s difficult anyway if you’re navigating this, but if you’re navigating this with kids. And then I think what was so heartbreaking was seeing people that would jump into a relationship and then all of a sudden, they realize, “Whoa, this is not going well.” They end up, the relationship and the marriage didn’t last. So now you are just adding these layers of emotional things and everything with it. And when we don’t stop to look at, man, how are my kids in this process? How is our extended family? How is our late spouses family? Because that was important to us is it wasn’t just about us, but how do we move forward so that we don’t get down the road, and our kids hate us and God because of what we just put them through? And just so how do we navigate this together as a unit?

Ron (25:59):

I’m imagining somebody’s listening, watching right now, and they’re going, yep, that’s us. We jumped too early. Here we are. We’ve got at least one kid, maybe more who’s reacting pretty harshly and strongly to all this, and they’ve kind of closed the door. I’d love for you to react to this. One of the things I might say to that person is, okay, wow, this is repair and it’s hard and it’s difficult and you’re going to try to repair with that child. One of the things we suggest is in those circumstances, it’s really important for the biological parent to take the lead on that repair, on that focused time and energy with that child to try to connect, try to regain trust, try to grieve together because the child’s investment in any time of great distress is primarily in their biological parent, not necessarily in new stepparent, new step siblings and so on. So go back to the basics, start there, see if you can’t make some progress over time and then begin to see if that opens the door for that child to be more welcoming, more open, more relaxed, if I could say it that way, with the other stepfamily members. Just wondering if you’ve got a thought or a suggestion you would add to that or how would you react to that idea?

Kari (27:20):

Well, first of all, I would just say it’s not too late. Don’t just think, oh, it’s too late for us. You can start that repair at any point. It’s just going to take some time and patience. I think what you’re saying is so vital is looking at who can do that, the biological parent maybe connecting with that child and taking that time with them. But I think—I’m going to get emotional though—the one thing that really helped me, because when we would have some issues with maybe one child who was pushing away from us, or both of us or one of us, and it would frustrate me because as a mother of boys, everything had to be structured and we were ready. And they had a dad who was a coach, and not only was he the children’s pastor of a bunch of other children, he was a coach as well.

(28:31):

So he was their coach. He coached their friends. So he was a well-known person in that also and very athletic. And so I say that to say, I was like, okay, you need to stop being this way. You need to do it this way. And I wanted to just change that. And it wasn’t until one conversation that we had where Matt said, and maybe I should let him say it, but it was super important for me and it really just kind of stopped me as the biological mother of saying, okay, I just need to keep pouring into them and be patient, pray for them. I might not see it overnight, but I can just keep being there. I can show up and sit on the end of their bed and ask them how their day was, even if they don’t want to respond to me because they’re teenagers and they don’t really want to talk, nothing. Well, nothing doesn’t work in our family. You can’t just say nothing. And so we have those kinds of conversations, and that goes both ways. When they ask us questions, it’s not nothing. We have to give them the same respect back as well. But I’m going to let Matt explain it because he does such a better job, and I may start crying with that.

Matt (29:55):

I think seeing that there are times that I know Kari would, because she was adamant about, they need to show respect. I don’t want them acting like this or whatever. And really just, I had to go back to my own life as 14-year-old that lost his dad. My mom remarried a couple years later. Our lives really paralleled each other in a lot of ways. And I know that my response or enthusiasm or lack thereof of her stepping into this new relationship, and I was like, I was a teenager going, what does she need? Why? And so I had just mentioned, I think in that moment of going, they may come around and it may be before they leave the home, it may be after. And then it also may be that they never come around to accept this how we are as a family, but if I am consistent, then at least they can know, “Hey, this is at least when he says something, I can know that it’s true.” There’s one thing—

Kari (31:25):

You didn’t tell the little bit of the banking part. What I like!

Matt (31:29):

Well, I think it’s just you have to keep investing and you can’t expect to take a withdrawal when you’re the parent here, whether it’s a stepparent, bonus parent, whatever you, biological parent. There was one story that really helped me in this process, and it was before we got married because I was like we were seeing each other, but it was kind of just started out of just because we felt like this. Nobody understood us and so we would talk. But I went to a funeral and there was a lady that was in our worship ministry. She was older and her husband had died and it was her second marriage. Her first husband passed away, and now she was widowed for the second time, and her son got up to talk and he said, “When my dad passed away, he wanted me to make sure that my mom experienced and the love again of somebody.” And so he started talking.

(32:52):

He goes, “And I didn’t like this new guy. I didn’t like him.” He’s talking about the guy that had passed away. And he said, “Because his approach was different. How he communicated was different, everything was different.” He said, but he goes, “I learned to love him by watching him love my mom.” And I think that stuck with me and I walked away, and I think it was even when I was asking the boys, I took them to a coffee shop when I was going to ask them, “Hey, I would like to marry your mom and I want to propose, but I would like your guys’ blessing.” And so we went around that picnic table outside of Starbucks and everybody’s sharing what they thought about it.

(33:44):

And that was the thing that I said. I said, “I can’t guarantee so many things about this. I have no guarantees. But the one thing that I hope is, I hope that you would at least see the way that I will love your mom and I will take care of her. And if nothing else, if I can be an example to that, we call it a win.” And I think so much of the blended family is, man, if you get hurt over every little thing and you want to throw somebody else under the bus because of what somebody else’s trigger was, it is—when you talk about our spiritual walk and dying to self, walking in a blended family is a consistent part of saying, “This is not about me. Matt, this is not about you.” You have to give them space.

Ron (34:42):

And this is particularly true as you’re pointing out for the adults. I mean, I think you’re exactly right. I think a lot of adults walk into this situation going, but I’m helping here. I’m the good guy. I’m paying bills and I’m doing underwear and I’m cooking meals and I’m getting nothing in return, so forget it. I’m just not. No, no, no. You got to put on your thick skin, and you got to recognize that that daily sacrifice day after day is the investment, the ongoing investment that may or may not pay off exactly how you want it. And it certainly is not going to pay off as quickly as you’d like to see it, but it is the right thing to do. That’s what you can control. You can’t control their responses and reactions, but you can absolutely control how you posture yourself in response to them. By the way, wow, that was a big thing sitting around the picnic table asking them for their blessing.

Matt (35:36):

You have no idea how scared I was to go and talk to these boys, and you know what I so appreciate? Man, we are blessed. I am so thankful for all seven of our kids. But one of the things that when we were talking around the table, a lot of them would say “A big thing for us is for the youngest who had gone through all of this loss, has experienced more loss than any of us put together.” But they were like, “We’re his brothers. We can’t be his dad. Are you going to be his dad?” And then another one just looking going, “Well, what do we do if this doesn’t work?” I’m like, “That’s not an option for any of our families. We’re not quitting on anything.” And so they all had from, “I really don’t like this,” and “I don’t see why you need to do this.” So we had all of it, and that was probably one of the most nervous days for me.

Ron (36:53):

It’s an honest moment. It’s an honest moment. This is why we have Preparing to Blend resources for couples that are engaged, planning to get married, to include the children in dialogue and conversation. Like you did spontaneously just on your own is something we really recommend because you’ve got to open the dialogue, even if they’re not truthful with you at that point in time, at least you’ve opened the conversation to, how are we going to be family with one another? We’re going to have to figure this out together. And that is part of the journey of becoming family.

Well, obviously you did move forward. You guys did get married. I don’t know, did that conversation influence the timing of it in any way?

Matt (37:33):

Well, I think we had—actually, I had bought a ring, and I sat on that ring for a while. And even in—

Ron (37:45):

It’s good.

Matt (37:45):

I would have conversations with the girls of just saying, “Hey, what do you think about this?” and including them in the conversation because you can learn so much from them, from your kids if you just listen. But I think it—

Kari (38:04):

And be ready for what the honesty will be, what they say. You have to be okay with that because that is huge. Sometimes you don’t want to hear what they have to say necessarily, but it’s good for them to be able to say it and you to be able to take it.

Ron (38:21):

And I think so much of what they say, that’s not super exciting. “Yes, guys, go get married. You have my full blessing.” If there’s any hesitation in kids, it’s a statement of their grief in part. This is pain finding its way out, and I don’t know how I’m going to feel about new family, new changes, more unwanted change. Nobody asked for this. All of that kind of stuff rolls up for kids and that’s where it shows up as hesitation.

Matt (38:50):

I think even on our wedding, in our wedding ceremony, we had all four of our families represented from late spouse’s family, some of Marybeth’s family, Eddie’s family, and then we had all seven of our kids that were standing up with us. And even in that row of seven kids and us, there was grief all the way around. Some of it, it was, “Man, I’m excited for this day,” and others are going, “Why in the world did you make me stand up in front of all these people?”

Kari (39:28):

Which we didn’t make them. We gave them the option, but they did it.

Ron (39:33):

But still, the circumstances sort of required something of them. Yeah, yeah.

Kari (39:37):

Yeah.

Ron (39:37):

Well, we’ve said it many times on this podcast. The bitter always travels with sweet, even though there’s some good things happening at that moment in your family’s journey together in that wedding, there’s also some bitter with it. They have to travel side by side. It’s just the way it rolls.

I want to ask you guys a little bit about your pathway, your model, six phases in your model, and let’s just take a minute and sort of talk what they are, describe them, and what about these in particular is useful or helpful for blended families to keep in mind, if you could throw that in there. Okay, so you got problem, pain, paralysis, perspective, purpose, pursuit. Alright, let’s take them one at a time. What’s problem and pain? What are those about?

Matt (40:38):

Well, I think in the problem is when you’re faced with the loss, and so when we talk about our Grief to Growth Pathway, it really applies to any area of our life, but when there’s the problem, that’s when that impact or a significant loss happens. So if that’s a divorce, if that has been the job loss, whatever that might be, it’s identifying, what is that problem, but also understanding that loss takes place in so many, like there’s so layers of loss that happen. And usually if people come to one of our, a seminar or a class or whatever, the biggie is what got them to the door. It’s when we start to identify and say, “I don’t know if you understood that this is a part of loss too.” Empty nest, there’s—

Kari (41:37):

—retirement—

Matt (41:38):

—retirement, there’s the way that life used to be with our family before the blend. So there’s all of these different layers. So that’s identifying the problem. And then we talk about the pain, and that is when the reality of the loss sets in. That’s when we talk about emotions and how do you identify and have vocabulary to really process what you’re feeling. And I think for emotions has been one of the big things that we would talk about that Kari will talk—go on—

Kari (42:15):

It wasn’t my favorite week to talk, but now it’s one of my favorites because having to learn my own emotions and what they look like and identify what I’m feeling, whether it’s that day, that hour, that minute, and so it’s super important and giving words to what they’re feeling, and that’s something that’s super helpful.

Ron (42:43):

So for you, Kari, that’s been a journey to be able to put words on your pain and be able to describe that in any way that’s helpful. And now you’re saying you actually value being able to do that.

Kari (42:56):

Yes. Yeah, it’s been a journey for me, but I think it’s been super helpful. It’s helped me to be able to help other people as I’m feeling or what I was feeling, or they’ll say “I’m not sure what I’m”—, and we’re able to just talk about it and I can share my feelings when I did not care to do that for a long time.

Ron (43:19):

One of the things I want to say to our viewers and listeners is sometimes the pain doesn’t show up until another life circumstance sort of bubbles it up. Like we were talking about a wedding a minute ago. That’s a classic in a blended family journey where you finally see the pain in children, but not always, even then, depending on the age of kids, if they’re really young, it could be a few years and a different circumstance that arises—transition with school or moving into high school and pressure socially, or maybe somebody’s leaving the home and going to college or launching out on their own or having their own child or having their own wedding—all of those are moments where, oh, the reality of the problem, as you guys call it, whatever happened way back when, that is coming up for me again in a fresh way. That sort of thing is sometimes when you see the pain, which blindsides us as parents. We didn’t see that coming in our kids, but here it is, dig into it a little bit.

Matt (44:21):

And then when we talk about paralysis, it’s kind of like, how do you get unstuck? Because we talked about just a little bit ago, when you get to that point and going, oh my gosh, is this going to work? What do I do? This hill is too big to climb. I talk a lot of times about the roundabouts and where we live, it’s like they have caught on to the idea of roundabouts. And if you’re watching your navigation, you’re like, do I jump off here? Do I wait? Do I do? And I think you can start to second guess everything and you get stuck in that process. And so how do you identify those things? And then how do you get unstuck?

And so we talk about paralysis and then we talk about perspective, which is seeing your loss in a new light. And sometimes it’s, we do these pouring art paint projects as a part of a group, and so we reference back to all of these different elements. So the different colors of the paint, we equate to emotions. And here there’s layers of these emotions. And when you pour it and just put it onto this canvas and you pick that cup, everything is running. And it’s like the control freaks have a real hard time with that. They’re like, I wanted the blue, or I wanted the package of what a, I was thinking it was going to be a Hallmark movie, and it’s not looking like that. And so we talk about there’s going to be a mess, but emotions will run. And then you see that and you look at it going, I was focused on the mess, but God’s creating something completely new. And so a lot of times we’ll have them when we talk about perspective is say, take that picture and just turn it 90 degrees,

(46:27):

What do you see on that? And I think sometimes it’s a matter of stepping back from our loss and really looking, saying, what is God doing in this process? What is happening in my own life? And so we look at how do we see things different?

And then we talk about purpose, and that’s where we set, we call them hope goals. So it’s that they’re holistic, they’re observable, and what I mean by holistic is you’re not just trying to fix the one issue that’s bugging you that day. It’s like, oh, my emotional needs, all of these things I feel like is all depleted. So how do I overcompensate so that it’s not like that? And then so it’s looking at where you are as a whole. They’re observable and it’s all about progress, not perfection. How do I take one step and then realizing that if I trip up and I fall back, it doesn’t mean that I go all the way back.

(47:32):

It’s like, okay, I just have to get back up. So we just teach them how to set micro goals. What is that pile of clothes that you just don’t want to move because there’s so many emotions attached to it. How can you take one step forward to just process? Doesn’t mean you have to move those clothes but take a step.

And then when we look at pursuit, it’s, we call it living life as a mosaic. One of the beautiful things about a mosaic is, and what gives it depth and dimension is the brokenness. It’s all of these broken pieces, and if we quit hiding our scars, but we start looking at them and saying, “Hey, this is who made me who I am.” I’m going to embrace all of Kari’s past. I’m going to honor Eddie with both to her and with the boys because they had a good dad, and nobody has to pretend that didn’t exist in their lives. I want to embrace that because that makes us stronger if we can continue to grieve as a family. And realizing at the holidays there are two people missing at this table and everybody has a different idea of what that looks like. And so I think it’s really, how do we live our lives forward and what do we do with what we have been given because we can’t waste it. As Kari said, “I don’t want to waste that pain.”

(49:07):

How do we utilize this to help other people, to help our kids, to invest in them, of just saying our lives don’t look the way we thought they would. That doesn’t mean it’s bad. It doesn’t mean that it’s second rate. It’s just we walk through some difficult days, but now we have each other to lean on and go, “Okay, I’m going to be there for you.”

Ron (49:33):

I think that is so important, Matt. I want to hit that again for our viewers and listeners because I think that second class thing is alive and well. People really feel that in particular when they’re having a hard day. Relationships are hard, something’s going on with a kid, you’re not feeling great about life, and all of a sudden, it’s like, yeah, no, this is the family that should have never been or something like that. And all of a sudden, they start discounting and minimizing and backtracking. That’s the point where I think you key in on the purpose that you mentioned a minute ago. God’s doing something. I got to trust Him in this. It may not be the way we designed it, but we’re living with Him as best we can, and we’re resting in that notion that He’s in this with us and that we’re not alone.

(50:28):

We may not understand all the why’s, and I’m quite certain this side of heaven, we never will, but we know Who we can hold onto and rely on.

I just want to one more question. You guys, you’re in worship ministry. That’s a big part of who you are. What do you say to somebody who’s going, “Okay, this pathway looks good,” and we know it’s not linear by the way, it’s cyclical. You’re going to cycle back through all these things again and again and again. How in the world do I do that when I don’t feel good about it or have got some guilt because of the divorce or whatever that stuff is that gets in the way? How do you worship in the midst of the pain?

Matt (51:10):

You want to start?

Kari (51:11):

That’s kind of how we, as I was working through, just because I helped lead worship at our church as well. That was something that I did on the side of children’s, but it was really difficult for me to get back up there and continue leading and helping other people, lead them within, with music worship. And it was a very difficult time for me months after and into that next year. And just being able to do that was like, I don’t want to listen to anything. For a while, I didn’t want to listen to anything, any music. I didn’t want to hear anything. People would send me stuff, and I would thank you, but I’m not, just don’t—I would just say thank you and then not listen to it. But then I started slowly, trying to listen to those things and we’d have those conversations just later on just saying, “How did you do it?” because he had to get back up there. That was his occupation. That’s what he does for a living, was leading worship. And so how did you do that? I just couldn’t. And so just hearing that sometimes you just, that was one of the ways that honestly, when I got up there and I finally did it. One thing, I back up and say is when I was asked to come back and be back on the worship team was difficult because I’d have to walk right through the area where I watched them try to save him.

(53:05):

And that was very difficult to walk backstage and see that area again and walk up those stairs. And it was one of those moments where I had people surrounding me, I had friends and they were, “Are you okay? You don’t have to do this.” And I did it. And once I did it that one time, it was not as, it was easier every time. It was just one of those moments where I said, “Thank you, God, for allowing me to be able to get back up and to serve You,” and to know He was right there with me. And so it was difficult for me at first. And like I said, we talked and I was like, I don’t know. I don’t know how to do this, but I know I don’t even know how you did it.

Matt (54:03):

And it is difficult to, I mean, all my life, that’s what I’ve been involved in worship ministry. But I think there are times when I think when you’re leading, if you lead with broken, like through your brokenness, through your vulnerability, because at the end of it, our worship isn’t about whether we’re feeling it, whether “Hey, God, I’m going to put it on hold for this week.” There was a guy that had stopped me right before I was going onto a platform to lead worship. And it was just one of those abrupt things, like he had an attitude, he was coming for me.

Kari (54:51):

It was shortly after, right?

Matt (54:53):

Yeah.

(54:54):

And he goes, “How do I know you’re not a phony?” And that was his lead in. And I’m like, “What do you mean?” He goes, “Well, I see you and you’ll be singing about these songs of healing, or you have a smile on your face, and how do I know that you’re just not a complete fake?” And I, at first, I was trying not to, I probably shouldn’t throat punch this guy since I am one of the pastors. But I think really it was responding to him of saying, man, if I push God away, our prayers weren’t answered in the way that we chose. Mary Beth was healed in a different way than what we wanted.

(55:47):

But that’s all I had was God at that moment. If we want to hold everything, and we see that with kids, and especially you’re in a blended family and you see something and something’s not right with one of the kids, they’re not talking. “What’s wrong?” “No, I’m good. I’m good.” And then finally you’re like, I want to drag it out of you. I think sometimes that’s the way God is looking going, “Look, I know you’re dealing with this. If you just come to me with it and just be honest, I can take it.” God’s big enough to handle our pain. He’s big enough to handle our grief and our loss. And I think just the fact that we can be open and just saying—and there were times that I would lead through a soundcheck, and I would cry the whole way through, and we had the team and all of that, and I would just let them know, “Guys, I’m good. Don’t worry about me. But this soundcheck is more of a, this is my time.”

And then there were other times when you’re leading and it’s a large church, and so it’s like, okay, I can’t just fall apart. Now’s my time to lead them. But it’s also letting people know that man, I’m not perfect. I deal with emotions and pain. And when you come to that point with an openness and transparency of just saying, “I hurt just like you guys do, but the only thing I have is God, and He’s still a healer, He still can provide, He can still give joy.” And it takes a while to where you don’t have to feel guilty about those joyful moments. I think sometimes we’re playing this game of tug of war in our heads with what we’re walking through in life, but it’s just saying, “God, I am broken today and I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to handle the emotions of the other people around me. Just help me today.” And sometimes it’s just getting through that next hour, that next afternoon or the next day, and then you start, you talk about the grief that it doesn’t leave. I like to say it, grief still comes. The waves still come in. They just don’t crash as hard. And we just look at it and say, I’m going to embrace those moments because I’m thankful for that.

Ron (58:32):

And to sit down with your children and pray that very same prayer, “God, we’re broken. We don’t know. We don’t know what to do. We’re just calling upon you. We’re asking you to join us here.” Pray to the God of all comfort as we read in 2 Corinthians 1 and ask Him to do what only He can do when those moments come.

Matt, Kari, thank you so very much for being with me today. I appreciate you sharing your story and appreciate this resource, The Grief to Growth Pathway. You’re going to help a lot of people with this. Thank you guys.

Matt (59:05):

Thanks for having us on. We so appreciate it.

Ron (59:07):

To our listener, viewer, if you want to learn more about Matt and Kari and that pathway, check the show notes. We’ll get you connected.

Don’t forget to subscribe, post a comment, or tell a friend about FamilyLife Blended and invite a friend to join you for Blended and Blessed. It’s free, Saturday, April 18th, 2026. Join us and thousands from around the world as we share Hope for the Journey.

I’m Ron Deal. Thanks for listening or watching. And thank you to our production team donors who make this podcast possible.

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