I am hoping and trusting I’m not alone when I say, there are times in life when I thought I’d resolved something, learned the lesson, passed the test, etc. and something happens that lets me know I was um, wrong. I really hope as I type this from my cozy corner on the couch you are nodding in agreement as you read these words from your seat on the subway, park bench, bar stool in the coffee shop, or bar stool in a bar, backseat of your uber, or your own cozy corner on your couch.
I’d been fighting a recently familiar feeling. I wasn’t remotely interested in it however. I loathed it the first time it made itself cozy in my life about a year ago. While I was trying to be grateful that its approach this time around wasn’t quite as brazen as before, I was still giving it the stink eye. Broken. Or as I called it, Broken 2.0.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t tend to hold on to that which is broken. I have a few handle-less mugs that hold pens, markers, and make up brushes instead of green tea or hot cocoa. A hair pin that’s clasp has been replaced by a bobby pin. That’s about it. If I don’t perceive it to function or to be of use, I introduce it to the trashcan or recycle bin. Given the consumerist nature of our society, I truly support letting go of that which no longer serves you or has loss its functionality- the broken. Except for humans. We are the exception to the broken rule.
God in all His grace draws near to the broken. He does not ready us for recycling, sewage, or trash collection. He doesn’t snap and post a picture and say “#overit, #itisfinished, #wedone”. He doesn’t change our relationship status to “It’s complicated.” He sees blessing in our broken. He blesses in our broken- if we let Him. He and His grace, unconditional love, mercy, and faithfulness, gets into the cracks and crevices of our broken lives, healing and binding. Binding us unto Himself, His goodness, His provision, His power, His grace. His grace that is greater that the two haves we feel broken into or the million little shards we’ve shattered into. He fills in our broken dreams, aspirations, homes, marriages, pasts, lives, hearts. He gets in and fills and fixes our broken hearts. His grace gets all up in our broken hearts.
I surrendered to the broken a year ago. I gave way to the jumbled pieces, pieces that were only causing me to incur more wounds. I prayed. I read the book. Well maybe there’s lots of books about brokenness, but the book I read and recently reached for again is The Broken Way. I started seeing a clinical counselor again. I took a pretty decent break from even trying to date anyone. I committed to a church. Read that again. I don’t typically do that. I show up for sure, but I usually show up to a couple of churches that I enjoy on any given Sunday, online services and sermons included. This time I picked one. Even got involved in one of those small group house gathering things. Yet, I sit here and in all of the honesty, transparency, vulnerability I can muster, I tell you, I am broken. Again. Wanting to be unbroken, knowing the only way to be made whole is to surrender to the broken. To surrender these new fractures to grace. To trust that not a piece will be lost, forgotten, deemed of no value, and I will not be seen as irreparable.
That’s what I really want anyway. I really want, in all of my messiness, my hang ups, my hurts, disappointments, frustrations, and angst, I want to know I’m still worthy, still enough, still capable of fulfilling the purpose for which I was created, remembered in the moment, remembered smack in the middle of my brokenness, and still loved. Love me one whole piece or 80 billion broken ones. Say I’m still worthy one whole piece or 80 billion broken pieces. Cover me in grace one whole piece or 80 billion broken ones.
At the point of surrender, I am not reminded of all that I have been carrying and am giving up, but of the grace that has been waiting and willingly accepts all that I am willing to give it. I am reminded with tear stained cheeks that there is nothing (especially in the recent weeks) grace cannot manage. No piece too jagged, too heavy, too large.
At the point of surrender, don’t remember that all you have been carrying and are giving up, but remember instead that grace has been waiting and willingly accepts all that you are willing to give it. Emphasis on all. The abortion, the divorce, the affair, the stolen money, the break up, the words spewed in anger, racist slur spoken, death of a parent, silence for years between you and a sibling, the time served in prison for the crime you did commit, the jealousy, the resentment. Whatever it is that has or is breaking you is no match for the grace, mercy, love, and redemption of God.
I’m still good for reminding God that I’m ready for Broken 2.0 to wrap up…knowing that as long as I live there will undoubtedly be Broken 3.0, 4.0. 79.0. Also knowing that as long as I live there will undoubtedly be God’s grace as well. I hope you know that too. xxoo
With Love,
Grit + Grace