“The position has been filled” she declared, “and I’m not taking applications.”
Lace’s words sliced through me like a machete through bamboo. Four years of careful seeding, tending, and cultivation of what I had hoped would yield a “kindred spirit” friendship had just been scissored into confetti right before my eyes.
“I have Bob” Lace continued, “he’s my best friend. I don’t need anyone else.”
I sat across the table from Lace and her husband in stunned silence. Choking back tears, all I could do was nod.
I lost my dearest friend five years ago. Gwen was my loyal comrade, ally, and confidante. As faithful as a bird dog. So close that some thought we shared the same heartbeat. I lost Gwen to illness at age forty-two. If you’ve ever had such a friend—the kind who knows you so well that she can finish your sentences, knows when to lovingly “slap you upside the head” and when to shut up and offer a hug—you can understand why losing Gwen left a Grand Canyonesque gap in my life. Maybe you’d also understand why I’ve been looking for candidates to help fill the hole left by her loss.
After moving to a new state a few years ago, I met Lace at church. A tall, slim woman with soft features and twinkling eyes, I watched Lace for over a year. It took that long to”get my legs back under me” after losing Gwen. I saw potential in Lace. She could never “replace” Gwen completely—no one could—but Lace had other gifts, qualities, and character traits that I admired. We hit it off. When an unusual series of unforeseen events threw our families together, we clung to each other. A bond emerged that seemed the start of a genuinely close knit. Further shared experiences began to mend the hole in my heart. After awhile, one name topped my “Best Friend Candidate” list: Lace.
I thought this was reciprocal, until four years later when a conversation took an unexpected turn: “The position has been filled.” Blindsided by Lace's announcement, I stared at the floor, not knowing what else to do. The horrible realization dawned on me that I had completely misread the relationship. Lace was suddenly foreign, speaking a tongue I didn’t understand. Waves of disappointment crashed over me. The light finally went on: “All this time I’ve been looking in the wrong place.”
I felt like a First Class Fool. Turns out I was pouring heart and soul into something that was never real. There was no anger, no raging cauldron of resentment—just some residual sogginess where the “best friend” oasis had melted into a merely moist mirage.
When’s the last time Disappointment lumbered into your life? Was it in the job you applied for, fully qualified and competent, but someone else was hired? Was it in your child’s report card? Did the cruddy creature sashay across your bank account, birthday, vacation plans, health, or spouse?
Disappointment arrives in all sorts of packages—some large, some small. Some folks seem more prone to its poison-tipped pike than others. If you’re breathing, however you will most certainly do battle with the “disappointment dragon” at least once in this life – and probably more. So, what do you do when the scaly creature slithers into your life and tries to set up shop? Reflecting on this the other day, Romans 8:38-39 hit me flush in the face:
"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
How much is “nor anything”? It’s nothing! As in zero, zip, nada. Nil, nix, naught. No thing can separate us from the love that’s grander, greater, higher and deeper than any other—the love of God that is in Christ Jesus!
God’s Word opened my eyes to the true source of my disappointment: me. More pointedly, me and my misplaced expectations. Like the old country/western tune, I was “looking for love in all the wrong places.” Have you made the same mistake? I was looking for a person to fill a void that only the Lord Jesus Christ can fully fill.
Disappointment hurts, doesn’t it? But let’s learn together. When the cruddy creature flexes its claws, let’s run to the One whose faithfulness is beyond words, whose love no tongue can truly tell. He will never disappoint. Jesus Christ gave up everything to take those dragon talons for us, and He will!
Yes. The position has been filled—by the only One who can.