The God Who Sees: A Balm for the Grief of Strained Relationships

Once again, the topic of her sister arose in conversation, and once again, I could hear it in my friend’s voice: the underlying sense of wistfulness, the trace of disappointment. The low-level sadness and quiet grief in her tone articulated what her words could not fully convey. 

The years of relational strain, not fully verbalized but indeed fully felt, had taken their toll. Over coffee, she relayed the latest interaction with her sister: one laced with awkward small talk, dancing around the tension, hovering slightly above any substantive—or healing—dialogue.

My friend set her mug down. 

Pensive in thought, she sighed. “It just is what it is.” 

And, indeed, at some level, familial relationships just “are what they are.”  And oftentimes, what they are is difficult, divided…even deeply fractured. Years of small offenses tally up on the relational chalkboard, tracking a score for a game that no one ever wins.  

Within the breadth of these family difficulties, the relational divide can leave a person longing — longing for closeness, longing for connection. When these elements remain elusive and family relationships turn sideways, so often sadness grips and grief over “what-could-have-been” engulfs.

These feelings? This sadness and grief? They are a normal and expected response to life in a broken world, life which all-too-often includes relational issues we would rather not have.  

So, recognizing that varying degrees of sadness, disappointment, and grief often linger within family relationships, let’s pause for a moment and consider something—or rather, someone—who might intersect this sadness.

Would you allow me to remind you of the story of Hagar?

In Genesis 16, a slave named Hagar finds herself squarely within broken family dynamics; she is on the receiving end of her master’s faithless outlook and actions. Within this, Hagar is treated poorly—treated so poorly, so unfairly, and so harshly that she flees her family.

As she flees, Hagar finds herself in the wilderness by a sole spring of water, likely devoid of hope, depleted of any optimism…isolated, estranged, and alone.

Resonate at all?

Thankfully, Hagar’s story doesn’t stop here because it is within this exact wilderness that the Lord himself finds her and calls her by name. 

The Lord sees Hagar—he sees her and he knows her, personally.

After this brief encounter with the Lord, Hagar responds with a perspective-altering truth: “You are the God who sees me” (Gen 16:13).  

May I gently offer these same words to you?

Friend, he is the God who sees you.

In whatever bruised or broken familial relationship that has led to your own relational desert, the Lord sees you. 

He sees the unfair treatment, the cutting comments, driving the wedge of division deeper. The Lord sees the miscommunication landing in frustration, the icy anger creating streams of separation.

The Lord sees.

Could this, in even a small way, provide a sense of comfort today? 

You are not alone. You are seen and you are known. 

The triune God who only needs to speak and the heavens and earth erupt into existence has spoken to you. 

And he says, “I see.”

While the relational strain might not resolve and the tension might not mend, God is a God who sees into all of this—he sees you.  With compassion and grace, the Lord sees into the brokenness and brings to it something healing, hopeful, and even redemptive. 

He brings himself.

So, friend, within whatever relationship leads you to set your own cup of coffee down and sigh, stating“it just is what it is,” may the God who sees what it is and who sees you within it bring you a sense of comfort today. And through his Spirit, may you be able to eventually echo Hagar’s response: “I have now seen the One who sees me” (Gen 16:13).

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