"The deepest spiritual lessons are not learned by His letting us have our way in the end, but by His making us wait, bearing with us in love and patience until we are able honestly to pray what He taught His disciples to pray:

'Thy Will Be Done'."

~Elisabeth Elliot

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Beautifully Broken

It seems like the older I get the more I notice that all of us have our hidden obstacles or hindrances...a fear, a fetish, a tendency to be tempted, unforgiveness, obsession, hurt, loss...just fill in the blank. I already knew this to be true...we all struggle with something one way or another, but I'm just now realizing that we walk around like it's not true. Would it be freeing if we were able to humble ourselves and be honest and confront our own brokenness? Since when is brokenness such a bad thing? Does God use people who are already whole in themselves? No, I think, in fact, that God usually breaks us in order to be made whole in Him. Brokenness strips us of the tendency to be self-reliant and self-righteous because it makes us realize that our need for a Saviour is severe. With the understanding that we are all pretty much broken APART from Christ's working in our lives and sometimes BECAUSE OF Christ's working in our lives.... what would be the point then of going on pretending? Do we have privacy from God? No! So, who are we really kidding? I'm not inferring that we initiate a new trend or something...like wearing pins that say "I'm Broken"...I'm just saying...why do we cry behind closed doors when someone feels the same way as you? Why do we hurt inside and pretend we are strong? Why do we allow ourselves to be tempted, but never seek help? I'm not going to go into a cliche' about how God can put your pieces together (although I know that to be true because He did it for me) and make something beautiful out of it...but I want to urge you to allow yourself to be prayerfully put back together and offer the jagged pieces to be used in order to point others to the God that heals...What would bring more glory to our God than finding victory and completeness in Him and praising Him for it?

"So, thank you, Jesus
even when You see us just as we are
Fragile and frail and so far
from who we want to be
So, thank you, Jesus
even when the pieces are broken and small
dreams shatter and scatter like the wind
Thank you, even then."

Even Then
lyrics by Nichole Nordeman

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