In John 16:16–22, Jesus speaks a simple sentence that lands like a deep, wordless ache: “A little while, and you will no longer see Me… and again a little while, and you will see Me.” His friends didn’t understand it. But they felt it. They were standing at the edge of loss, and Jesus was naming the pattern every grieving heart eventually learns: absence, sorrow, and then—slowly—presence returning in a new way.

This passage isn’t a riddle. It’s a map of how love transforms. The disciples could have chosen despair, denial, nostalgia, or even violence. Instead, Jesus invited them to walk through grief until presence shifted from beside them to within them.

We know this pattern. Anyone who has lost someone and still hears their wisdom rise inside them knows it. Grief breaks us open. Love returns by another door.