God Meets You in the Empty Places

While You Wait Wednesday with Dr. Lael

Hi sister, this is your midweek reminder that waiting is never wasted when God is in it.

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If you watched the video above, you heard me say this. But I want to sit with it a minute longer with you, because I think there’s something in it that needs to land.

Naomi said, call me bitter

That’s how deep her pain was.

She came back to Bethlehem after losing her husband and both of her sons, and when the women in town recognized her, she told them not to call her by her old name anymore. Don’t call me Naomi, which means pleasant. Call me Mara. Call me bitter. That is what God has made me.

Read that again. She did not whisper it. She did not soften it for the room. She said it out loud, in front of everyone, exactly how she felt. And what is so striking about her story is what God did next.

He did not correct her. He did not lecture her. He did not require her to clean up her language or her grief before He moved on her behalf.

He met her in it.

That is cover and care

God does not require you to be whole before He holds you.

I need you to hear that, because so many of us have been taught the opposite. We think we have to pull ourselves together before we can come to Him. We have to dry our eyes, organize our thoughts, get to a better place spiritually, and then approach. As if God is waiting for the polished version of us to show up.

He is not.

He meets you in the empty places. He shows up in the kitchen at midnight when you don’t have words. He sits with you in the car after the appointment. He stays when everyone else has moved on. That is what cover and care actually looks like. It is not a reward for getting it together. It is the very thing that helps you get back up.

And often He does it through people

This is something I don’t want you to miss in Naomi’s story. God’s care for her did not stay invisible. It came through Ruth. A daughter-in-law who would not leave her. A woman who stayed when staying made no logical sense. Presence that did not flinch.

So if someone has stayed with you in your hard season, that is not a coincidence. That is God.

And if you are the one staying with someone right now, do not underestimate what you are doing. You are part of how He covers.

Pour it out

Psalm 62:8 says, pour out your heart before Him, for God is a refuge for us.

Pour it out. Don’t filter it. Don’t edit it. Don’t decide what God can and can’t handle. He is not afraid of your honesty. He is asking for it. Because the heart that pours out is the heart He can fill.

So today, wherever you are, whatever this midweek caught you in the middle of, pour it out. He is right there.

Because waiting is never wasted when God is in it.

Dr. Lael