Broken

“It felt like my life was laying before me in a thousand pieces…” my friend said, as she recounted what she experienced when she realized she needed God to put it all together again. A poignant picture of the old English nursery rhyme Humpty Dumpty. Do you remember it?

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; All the king’s horses and all the king’s men, Couldn’t put Humpty together again. That’s right, no human can put us back together. When we come to broken places in our life, only God, our creative designer, can recreate us. If we fail to recognize God, we’ll go around the bend again, and we will have picked up additional substitutions (heart idols) along the away. Eventually, adding all this together, the fall later becomes greater.

Sin has its way of marring the image of God in His creation. We all take on the wear of life and there are reset places along the way that God uses to align us once again with Himself. Not because He is cruel, rather because of His love and mercy. He uses our broken places to bring us opportunity for wholeness.

I have seen in my life, places where I allowed relationships with other people to come ahead of God. This is a common form of idolatry that is not always easy to recognize. Our Father designed and created us to fellowship with Him first, then with others in order to create wholesome bonds. Relationship with our Creator is what life is all about;  it is through our brokenness that we have another opportunity to recognize our need of relating to God.

But how do I relate to a Holy God? He seems so far off and impersonal, even scary sometimes. This has not always been man’s feelings toward God. When God created Adam and Eve they walked in free and open fellowship with the Father. There was no fear, shame, guilt; nothing was between them. But then sin entered (Genesis 3) and their relationship changed.

We are all born under this curse of sin and so we start life out in a strained, separated condition. Once we are old enough to recognize this, we have some choices to make. The Holy Spirit reveals this separation in a variety of ways. That is why it is so important to share the love of God with children so when they realize their sinful propensity, they can find their way to a loving Savior who can bring relief and a lifting from the burden of sin. Jesus makes it possible for us to choose to enter into relationship with our Father through a new birth experience. He talked to Nicodemus about this exchanged life in John Chapter 3. If you’ve not experienced this yet, read there and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal this to you. Jesus took the sins of the world upon Himself so that we could have a relationship with God.

Back to the broken pieces: Have you had a major experience of breaking occur in your life? Some of us have had it happen several times, and in various ways. How have you responded? Are you able to see the purpose of God in it or are you angry with Him, still not understanding His love to you.

I have a book by Dwight Carlson, M.D. called, Overcoming Hurts and Anger. In it, he describes the destructive results of unresolved anger in a person. He mentions so many effects, that it makes you want to really examine your heart to be sure you are totally free of any hidden anger. He explains that sometimes people have become so good at denying or suppressing anger they don’t even realize it’s there until the lid blows! It was April of 2014 that my lid blew. A series of events led up to it and wow! it was devastating. It was the beginning of my road to getting help to change some proud, and self-protective patterns in my life.

I spent several months alone, living with various friends who were willing to help me through this awful season of change, grief and loss. At one point I was living at a couple’s summer place, an RV near Lake Champlain. What for some would have been a wonderful summer retreat, was for me a time of deep soul searching. It was so painful, I despaired of life. I remember the dark, oppressive thoughts that I battled there day-after-day. I was alone, and determined to allow God to remake me through this devastating time; I was hungry.

This event revealed the very broken person I had become. It took a lot of work and restructuring, lots of love and care by friends and counselors, to remake me into someone who could really receive God’s love and begin to love the way He does. So now, after much surrender and remaking, I can look back and say, “Thank you Lord, for everything.” All the pain, rejection, sorrow and heartache was worth it. He took a vessel that was completely broken and continued to make me into someone that He could now use fully for His purposes.

Be encouraged that no matter what is happening in your life right now, God is at work. You may feel very alone, but if you will turn to Him, receive counsel and care, you will find a path leading to freedom and hope. My life now abounds in hope as Romans 15:13 says, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”

Perhaps you have tried to read His Word and nothing makes sense. You may need to humble yourself and allow someone to help you. Become vulnerable and see how beautifully God meets you there. He will take your broken pieces and put them together in a way that you never imagined He could. But you must acknowledge that you are broken before He can put you back together again.

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