When a person says they cannot see the way forward anymore, when they can’t figure a way out of their situation, when they feel powerless, the message they most need to hear is “You are in a good place.” They are in a place of need and poverty of spirit. Jesus’ words apply to them: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the reign of God is theirs.”
We have different ways to talk about this “good place.” (Never mind that it does not feel good.) We speak of someone reaching the end of their rope. Their life is in pieces. They have nothing to stand on. They are at a loss. It has become clear to them that they need help beyond themselves. Self-help is not helping anymore.
We may be tempted to encourage them by saying that things are not that bad. They just have to be strong. With such words, we turn them back upon themselves with their poverty and helplessness. Of course, they expect this kind of encouragement. The world around them speaks this way and they try to speak to themselves this way but to no avail. They have reached the end of their resources. They are despairing of themselves, of their ability to fix their lives.
Good news, for them, has to come from someplace other than their ability to lift themselves up. They are going to have to see that the place they have come to is rich in possibility. They are in a good, fertile place. It is a place of blessing. God’s reign is near and it is for them.
Jesus said to the self-sufficient and self-righteous religious leaders that the sinners and outcasts of society were entering the reign of God ahead of them (Matthew 21:31). God’s reign, God’s healing, liberation, and restoration are available to the poor in spirit, to those, who in their brokenness, reach out beyond themselves to the Source of life. Their insufficiency meets God’s sufficiency.
Paul learned this. He discovered that “whenever I am weak, then I am strong” and that God’s grace is sufficient whatever the “weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities.” The God who is present and active in all things is our hope, the ground of our being, our all in all.