Soul Kitchen

Let's pretend...

Actually, let's not.

Let's be real...especially with God. We're allowed to be real with God, even if it's downright ugly. He knows anyway, you know. So who are we kidding? Not Him. Not even ourselves. God can handle it. He's big enough.

I had the incredible privilege of being with a very hurting and distraught woman yesterday. We were in a setting of all women...many of them strangers to each other... in a place where we desire to love and care for the needs of women. Well, this woman opened up and didn't hide anything. There was no pretending or tempering what she was saying. It was exposed raw emotion. She has suffered physical and sexual abuse as a child in her home by her family who went to church and claimed to know God. Now, with the fresh, tragic loss of her friend, all her feelings inside came out in a jumble of pain, anger, confusion, loss, and intense questions about God and life...trying to sort and make some kind of sense of all the conflicting emotions and thoughts and what's really true.

Can you empathize with her feelings? To some degree we've all been there or walked with someone who has been there, or is. In the past she's had people wag their fingers in her face outraged that she would question God. How dare she vent and be angry at God...the church...people who claim to be Christians!

We let her vent. We didn't "shush" her or move her to another room so no one else would hear her anger, pain, and haunting questions. One woman kept walking past where we were sitting and finally couldn't stand it anymore...she just had to wrap her arms around this woman and give her a hug. After the hug, the same woman returned to our table with a generous wad of toilet paper for the woman's tears and said, "This is what people did for me when I was crying all the time."

We let her be real...and we were real too. We didn't have to defend God. We could just listen. She said that she doesn't get it...why does she want God so desperately, when on the other hand she "feels" that He's hurt her so much? "What is that... to want Him even though I'm so mad at Him?" she passionately expressed as she aggressively pointed her finger heavenward.

We told her it's OK for her to question God even if it comes out in rants of pain and anger. The point is that she's turning to Him. She's being honest with Him. She's acknowledging Him... and she wants Him.

She left feeling affirmed and supported at least in some measure. And we'll be here for her with more practical help. You can pray for her... that she'll be able to truly know that God cares and loves her, and with knowing His love, will begin the gradual process of trusting Him as well.

You've heard of Job? He didn't hide his pain, frustration, or questions. He went to God with all those hard questions. Job's friends told him off for questioning God. Maybe they even wagged their fingers at him too. God didn't. In the last chapter, Job 42:7, God says to Job's friend Eliphaz, "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has." God actually honoured Job.