Chieseld Ep 90 Sorrow & Joy in the Midst of Grief - Bob Arnold

Chiseled with Rob Commodari

The worst thing imaginable happened to Bob Arnold and his wife Jeanne in 2002. They were getting ready for bed and a coroner calls. Their 23-year-old daughter Marcie was found dead in her apartment nearly 500 miles away.
Marcie, a vibrant young woman who was just getting established in North Myrtle Beach, S.C., was talking with a friend on the phone when the conversation went silent. She had suffered QT prolongation, sudden death from cardiac arrest, a rare occurrence that afflicts people with arrythmia, or irregular heartbeat.
It is a tragedy that no parent should have to endure. But rather than get angry or go into denial, Bob and Jeanne chose another route to confront their suffering.
"I knew one thing that had to happen in order to do that ... is to really be honest about what's going on," Bob said. "Trying to think of all the ways to try to rationalize this or deal with this, I knew none of those were reality."
Bob started journaling. In the first three years after Marcie's death, he wrote 1,300 pages to help him "sort through the depths of despair" he was feeling.
Those reflections turned into a book authored by Bob and Jeanne called When the Circle is Broken: Our Journey Through Deep Sorrow and Surprising Joy in the Loss of Our Daughter.
The suffering also led Bob to ministry. The Arnolds now have a 70-acre farm in Western Maryland named Marcie's Meadow, which serves the ministry. They help people who are facing illness, death, divorce, or family difficulties find the joyous hand of God in their sorrow.
"God doesn't take away the pain, but the pain continually became a healing agent," he said. "It (keeps) shaping and reforming and reforming, and in the process, we meet this compassionate and caring God."
Bob's spirituality is evident in this week's episode of Chiseled. He tells a profound story of sorrow and joy and shares a path to healing that we can all follow.
Bob's ministry is available to anyone who needs a lift. He can be reached at his email or phone number, which he shares at the end of the episode. Meanwhile, you can check out his ministry at his website, meadow4.org.