“God meets us where we are and not where we pretend to be.”- Esther Fleece
Esther Fleece recently published No More Faking Fine: Ending the Pretending to explain and apply the ancient biblical language of lament. In the Foreword, Louie and Shelley Giglio (Passion City Church, Atlanta) describe the beautiful nature of lament. They write:
“The beautiful nature of lament is that it has a beginning and an end. No one is meant to live forever in grief and sorrow, yet without it, our life loses all meaning and our sense of immeasurable joy that is intended for our journey. Without lament, there is no joy.”
Next, Ms. Fleece follows the Foreword with a letter to her readers. In the letter, she notes the desperate nature of her own circumstances- with no relief in sight. In addition, Esther wondered if this moment pushed people to give up on God. Yet, in the midst of a dying will and hurting heart, a lament began to surface.
However, this surfacing lament produced a deep, authentic, worth everything (emphasis Esther’s) faith. But this type of faith comes with a cost. Esther observes that lament was:
- giving her a language for relating to God, her Creator
- saving her faith
- the only thing that enabled her to keep the line open to God in her moment of greatest need
Although we experience pain, Esther exhorts us not “to settle for heartache without comfort.” God cares for us too much to leave us alone.
In conclusion, Ms. Fleece provides some thought for the hurting, restless, disappointed, stuck, faithless- and even the faithful. She writes that we’re all in this together:
“All of us need lament. All of us long to be rescued from pain. . . . Pain will not be forever, but pain will be present in this life, and so I pray for you. I pray for us. That God will meet us in our distress, and that we will end the pretend, together.”
Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, provide examples of how “God meets us where we are.” Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Get out of pain as quickly as possible”
