Where Awe Meets Ache

Surrogate.

Pregnant.

Mistreated.

Alone.

Terrified, she runs—into the wilderness,

into the unknown.

No one protects her.

No one sees her.

No one cares.

No prayers whispered.

No promises believed.

No plan to hold on to.

But now...

There are moments

—raw, breathless moments

—when all we can do is run.

Run from the pain.

From the past.

From the people who hurt us.

From the person we can’t bear to be anymore.

Like Hagar, fleeing into the desert.

Like the Samaritan woman,

drawing water in the heat of shame.

We end up in barren places

—forgotten, fractured, full of regret.

Carrying stories too heavy to speak aloud.

But now...

Two words that split silence.

That shatter despair.

That pierce the wilderness

like light through cracked walls.

But now—God comes.

Not with condemnation, but compassion.

Not to expose, but to restore.

Not to demand, but to deliver.

He comes looking.

For the outcast.

For the ashamed.

For the ones who were never chosen

—and says, I choose you.

And in that moment...

… we don’t just find God.

We are found.

The God Who Comes Looking

There are moments in life when all we can do is run.

From the wounds no one sees.

From the people we thought we could trust.

From the version of ourselves we no longer recognize.

Like Hagar, pregnant and mistreated, fleeing into the wilderness with no prayers on her lips, no promises to cling to, and no plan to follow. Just fear in her chest and sand in her shoes. She isn’t looking for God. She’s looking for a place to disappear.

But God—He was already looking for her.

“The angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness” (Gen 16:7).

He finds her—not because she called for Him, but because God always seeks before we even know we’re lost. And when He speaks, His first words are not thunderous commands or divine corrections. They’re a question: “Where have you come from, and where are you going?” (Gen 16:8).

Not a demand for explanations

—but an invitation to honesty.

The kind of truth that doesn’t need to be polished.

The kind of confession that grace can hold.

The kind of answer that begins to unlock the soul.

And Hagar answers.

Not with a grand explanation or a religious performance—just a raw and human sentence:“I’m fleeing from my mistress Sarai” (Gen 16:8).

That’s it.

Just truth.

And that’s enough.

When Truth Meets Grace

What makes this encounter so sacred is not only that God finds her—but how, and why He finds her.

Not to shame.

Not to correct.

Not even to fix.

He finds her to see her and to show her that He knows her.

Because He knew her he said to her, "Return to your mistress and submit to her" (Gen 16:9). It’s the same posture Jesus takes with the Samaritan woman centuries later at a different kind of well. He does not flinch at her past. He doesn’t recoil from her reality. He simply says, “Go, call your husband” (John 4:16).

It’s not a trap—it’s a door.

A gentle question that opens the floodgates of healing. Because the truth, in the presence of grace, is not a weapon—it’s a turning point.

God’s truth doesn’t crush us. It enlivens us. His presence stirs the soul and as we hear Him say, "You don’t have to hide anymore, you are seen," we come alive, we are born anew.

The God Who Sees

After her encounter, Hagar gives God a name born of experience: El Roi—the God who sees me.

"So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.”
Genesis 16:13.

In the Hebrew, her response—I have seen him who looks after me—is laced with awe and wonder, even uncertainty. It’s more than just a declaration. It’s a life giving question. “Have I really seen the One who sees me?”

Perhaps that's exactly what some of us need—to realize we live in the sacred space between awe and ache, belief and bewilderment.

Because, that tension—it’s holy.

Because in that space, we begin to recognise something deeper than certainty.

We begin to be gripped by the kind of presence that doesn’t demand answers.

The kind that sits with us in the wilderness.

Have you truly encountered the One who sees you?

Living As the Seen

To be seen by God—for who we actually are, not for who we pretend to be—changes everything.

We stop performing.

We stop running.

We begin to heal.

Hagar returns—not to a perfect situation, but to a renewed sense of purpose.

The Samaritan woman runs back to her village—not with shame on her face, but with joy in her voice: “Come see a man who told me everything I ever did.”

She doesn’t bring a statement. She brings a story.

And that’s how it works.

Those who are seen become those who see—and those who see become witnesses, tellers of a story worth living.

Come and See

So let me ask you—

Have you seen the One who sees you?

Even in the heartbreak, the silence, the stretch of ordinary days—have you felt His nearness?

Even if your eyes have been closed, could you say with trembling wonder,

“I think I’ve been seen”?

That’s enough.

In the kingdom of God, seeing is not the prerequisite—recognising that we are seen by the one who comes seeking is how we enter in.

Where Awe Meets Ache

Perhaps this is where it starts anew for you. Not with certainty, but with acceptance. Not because you possess all the answers, but because you are courageous enough in the collision of ache and awe, to be honest.

Maybe you’re standing in that fragile space—where ache presses in, and awe feels just out of reach. And maybe Jesus is already there, waiting. Not with judgment, but with gentle presence. Not asking you to perform, but inviting you to converse.

So come—with your ache, your wonder, your questions still unfinished. Bring your silence and the hopes you hardly dare name.

Come sit a while with the God who came seeking, the one who sees you and stays with you.

Sacred space is where awe meets ache, where Jesus meets you—and the conversation begins again. Come back. He’s still listening.

Come!